Hamlet (1991)

Cast

  • Mel Gibson as Hamlet
  • Glenn Close as Gertrude
  • Alan Bates as Claudius
  • Paul Scofield as The Ghost
  • Ian Holm as Polonius
  • Helena Bonham-Carter as Ophelia
  • Stephen Dillaneas Horatio

Directed by

  • Franco Zeffirelli

Produced by

  • Dyson Lovell

Photographed by

  • David Watkin

Written by

  • Christopher De Vore
  • Zeffirelli

Music by

  • Ennio Morricone

From The Play by

  • William Shakespeare

Roger Ebert

January 18, 1991

I had a professor in college who knew everything there was to know about "Romeo and Juliet." Maybe he knew too much. One day in class he said he would give anything to be able to read it again for the first time. I feel the same way about "Hamlet." I know the play so well by now, have seen it in so many different styles and periods and modes of dress, that it’s like listening to a singer doing an old standard. You know the lyrics, so the only possible surprises come from style and phrasing.

The style of Franco Zeffirelli’s "Hamlet," with Mel Gibson in the title role, is robust and physical and - don't take this the wrong way - upbeat. Gibson doesn't give us another Hamlet as Mope, a melancholy Dane lurking in shadows and bewailing his fate. We get the notion, indeed, that there was nothing fundamentally awry with Hamlet until everything went wrong in his life, until his father died and his mother married his uncle with unseemly haste. This is a prince who was healthy and happy and could have lived a long and active life, if things had turned out differently.

Part of that approach may come from Zeffirelli, whose famous film version of "Romeo and Juliet" also played on the youth and attractiveness of its characters, who were bursting with life and romance until tragedy separated them. The approach also may come from Gibson himself, the most good-humored of contemporary stars, whose personal style is to deflect seriousness with a joke, and who doesn't easily descend into self-pity and morose masochism. He gives us a Hamlet who does his best to carry on, until he is overwhelmed by the sheer weight of events.

Zeffirelli sets his film in a spectacular location - a castle on an outcropping of the stark coast in northern Scotland, perched on top of a rock nearly surrounded by the sea. There is mud here, and rain and mist, and the characters sometimes seemed dragged down by the sheer weight of their clothing. This is a substantial world of real physical presence, fleshed out by an unusual number of extras; we have the feeling that this throne rules over real subjects, instead of existing only in Shakespeare’s imagination.

Right at the outset, Zeffirelli and his collaborator on the shooting script, Christopher De Vore, take a liberty with "Hamlet" by shifting some dialogue and adding a few words to create a scene that does not exist in the original: The wake of Hamlet’s father, with Hamlet, Gertrude and Claudius confronting each other over the coffin.

In film terms, this scene makes the central problem of "Hamlet" perfectly clear, and dramatically strengthens everything that follows. It sets up not only Hamlet’s anguish, but the real attraction between his mother and his uncle, which is seen in this version to be at least as sexual as it is political.

The cast is what is always called "distinguished," which usually but not always means "British," includes at least three actors who have played Hamlet themselves: Alan Bates, as Claudius; Paul Scofield, as the ghost of Hamlet’s father, and Ian Holm, as Polonius. Holm is especially effective in the "to thine own self be true" speech, evoking memories of his great work as the track coach in "Chariots of Fire," and I enjoyed Bates' strength of bluster and lust, as a man of action who will have what he desires and not bother himself with the sorts of questions that torture Hamlet.

The women of the play, Glenn Close, as Gertrude, and Helena Bonham-Carter, as Ophelia, are both well cast. Close in particular adds an element of true mothering that is sometimes absent from Gertrude. She loves her son and cares for him, and is not simply an unfaithful wife with a short memory. Indeed, there are subtle physical suggestions that she has loved her son too closely, too warmly, creating the buried incestuous feelings that are the real spring of Hamlet’s actions. Why has she remarried with such haste? Perhaps simply so the kingdom’s power vacuum will be filled; she seems a sensible sort, and indeed everyone in this version seems fairly normal, if only Hamlet could rid himself of his gnawing resentment and shameful desires long enough to see it.

Bonham-Carter is a small and darkly beautiful actress who is effective at seeming to respond to visions within herself. As Ophelia she has a most difficult role to play, because a character who has gone mad can have no further relationship with the other characters but must essentially become a soloist. All of her later scenes are with herself.

That leaves Hamlet and his best friend, Horatio (Stephen Dillane), as those who are not satisfied with the state of things in the kingdom, and Dillane, with his unforced natural acting, provides a good partner for Gibson. As everything leads to the final sword fight and all of its results, as Hamlet’s natural good cheer gradually weakens under the weight of his thoughts, the movie proceeds logically through its emotions. We never feel, as we do sometimes with other productions, that events happen arbitrarily.

Zeffirelli’s great contribution in "popularizing" the play has been to make it clear to the audience why events are unfolding as they are.

This "Hamlet" finally stands or falls on Mel Gibson’s performance, and I think it will surprise some viewers with its strength and appeal. He has not been overawed by Shakespeare, has not fallen into a trap of taking this role too solemnly and lugubriously. He has observed the young man of the earlier and less troubled scenes, and started his performance from there, instead of letting every nuance be a foreshadow of what is to come. It’s a strong, intelligent performance, filled with life, and it makes this into a surprisingly robust "Hamlet."

‘Hamlet’

By Jeanne Cooper
Washington Post Staff Writer
January 18, 1991


Murder most foul is at the heart of "Hamlet" -- and that's just one from the smorgasbord of cliches spawned by Shakespeare's Danish tragedy. But thanks to director Franco Zeffirelli and an impressive cast, both the tale and the telling are strikingly fresh.

Disappointed purists will say it's fresh only because Zeffirelli, who co-wrote the screenplay with Christopher De Vore, has pared the Bard down to about 2 1/2 hours, reassigning lines and transplanting scenes as well as chopping vigorously. Reduced to "Master Pieces Theater," Shakespeare's text nevertheless gains in force what it loses in integrity. Movie audiences can savor the full implications of the Elizabethan language when there's less of it to digest.

Of course, some of us have big appetites. To divert our attention, Zeffirelli lets Mel Gibson prove there's method in his Mad Max. As Hamlet, Gibson turns in a stunning performance. Restoring humor and power to the melancholy Dane, Gibson also employs the brooding strength seen in "Mrs. Soffel" and the underrated "Tequila Sunrise." The Australian-raised actor not only holds his own with Shakespeare's diction, but also reinvigorates Hamlet's plotting with mordant wit.

Even those unfamiliar with "Hamlet" should be able to follow that plotting easily. The movie opens with the burial of Hamlet's father; while his widow Gertrude sobs, brother-in-law and new king Claudius eyes her meaningfully. Soon they have a reason to act like newlyweds, to Hamlet's dismay. Transformed from a gray Brunhild into a radiant bejeweled beauty, Gertrude (a superb Glenn Close) clearly arouses Hamlet as much as she does Claudius (Alan Bates, gracefully understated). But before the prince can sort out his Oedipal complex, his father's ghost reveals there's something rotten in Denmark: Claudius poisoned him.

As the ghost, Paul Scofield is a master of restraint during his revelation, which unfortunately highlights Gibson's one indulgence of Acting! The lethal box-office weapon lets his baby blues well up, his jaw drop and his head shake in close-up after close-up. He's so wired you almost expect Danny Glover to appear and talk him down.

Once the scene is over and Hamlet has sworn revenge, Gibson controls his character tautly. He teases courtier Polonius (a wonderfully annoying Ian Holm) and others almost impishly, yet lets us see his rage building towards a climactic bedroom scene with Gertrude.

As Ophelia, Helena Bonham-Carter still looks as childlike as she did in "A Room With a View" -- especially next to Gibson and Close -- but her acting shows maturity. Although limited by her few lines, she's absolutely chilling in her mad scenes, parceling out chicken bones instead of flowers and singing ironic love songs.

Nathaniel Parker is moving as Ophelia's aggrieved brother Laertes; Stephen Dillane is convincing as Hamlet's cautious friend Horatio; and as false friends Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, Michael Maloney and Sean Murray mix camaraderie with creepiness. It's as if two of the guys in the Docker's ads were narcs.

Production designer Dante Ferretti and music supplier Ennio Morricone also contribute authenticity and atmosphere to "Hamlet." But forget the "trappings and the suits of woe"; what you'll remember longest is Gibson's demonstrating he has "that within which passeth show."

Movie Review – New YORK TIMES

Hamlet (1990)

December 19, 1990

Review/Film; From Mad Max to a Prince Possessed

By CARYN JAMES

Published: December 19, 1990

The greatest disservice Franco Zeffirelli did Mel Gibson was to tell interviewers he was inspired to cast "Hamlet" after seeing "Lethal Weapon." There, as a grief-stricken cop who does a mean Three Stooges impression, Mr. Gibson puts a gun to his head and comes close to suicide. The scene, when you think about it, is "to be or not to be" with a vengeance, but it doesn't lead directly to Shakespeare. It leads to jokes about "Lethal Bodkin" or "Mad Hamlet, the Road Warrior."

The greatest service Mr. Zeffirelli did the actor, though, was to make that cockeyed connection. Mel Gibson's Hamlet is strong, intelligent and safely beyond ridicule. He is a visceral Hamlet, tortured by his own thoughts and passions, confused by his recognition of evil, a Hamlet whose emotions are raw yet who retains the desperate wit to act mad. He is by far the best part of Mr. Zeffirelli's sometimes slick but always lucid and beautifully cinematic version of the play.

At the start, the windswept medieval castle on a cliff jutting out to the sea suggests a classical "Hamlet." But this naturalistic, emotionally-charged interpretation, the same approach that made Mr. Zeffirelli's 1968 "Romeo and Juliet" so popular and artistically successful, is not for philosophers or purists.

The screenplay, by Mr. Zeffirelli and Christopher De Vore, freely plucks lines from one scene and drops them in another; the words are Shakespeare's, though they are not necessarily where Shakespeare put them. The actors work so hard to give the language clear and natural readings that they sacrifice much of its poetic sound. But this tinkering is in the cause of creating a drama that speaks easily and directly to our own age.

For one early, painful moment, this method looks very inauspicious. The film invents a scene in the crypt of the castle, as the old King Hamlet is about to be sealed in his coffin. Glenn Close, as Gertrude, sniffles loudly over her husband's body. Alan Bates, as the new king, Claudius, casts a leering look across the coffin at Gertrude. Campiness threatens until a hooded figure turns to face the king and we first glimpse Hamlet's face. He bitterly calls his uncle and new stepfather "a little more than kin, and less than kind," and from that moment the film is controlled by his dignified yet explosive presence.

Mr. Gibson is comfortable with the language and facile with his character's ever-changing demeanor. Hamlet is visibly changed to his core when his father's ghost appears on a dark battlement demanding vengeance for his murder by Claudius. Mr. Gibson's Hamlet is less in love with his mother than he is furious at her betrayal of love, justice and her son. He is most effective when he cries fiercely, "frailty thy name is woman," and extraordinarily convincing when he denies his love for Ophelia and cries, "No more marriage!"

If anyone is incestuous in this mother-son affair, it is Gertrude. She is girlishly infatuated and sexually hungry with Claudius, and far too attentive in the kisses she bestows on her son. Ms. Close makes her troubled without being monstrous. Yet there is too much posturing in her performance. When the Player Queen arrives, in the play that mocks the story of Claudius and Gertrude, the actor who portrays her does a wickedly accurate impression of Ms. Close, her chin jutting out, her nose in the air.

The other actors are more subdued, including Mr. Bates, who stops leering and gives a solid performance. Helena Bonham-Carter is a wan Ophelia. As Polonius, Ian Holm has the impossible line, "to thine own self be true," and he cannot conceal the strain of trying to make it sound fresh. But one of the film's best scenes includes him, when Hamlet is acting mad, with one boot off and his shirttail out, calling Polonius a fishmonger.

If it takes a while to forget Mel Gibson and believe in the character, that is partly the unavoidable curse of a movie star Hamlet and partly because Mr. Zeffirelli's camera lingers far too lovingly on Mr. Gibson's attractive face. And though Hamlet's soliloquies are obviously set pieces, Mr. Zeffirelli cuts in and out of them so abruptly that they seem more like star turns than they should.

But Mr. Gibson never plays them that way. There is evidence of a deeply troubled soul but no trace of "Lethal Weapon" hysteria when he looks out a window of the castle and says, "O that this too sullied flesh would melt." He reserves his tears for the scene in Gertrude's bedroom, when he mistakenly kills Polonius and confronts his mother with her betrayal. By this scene, when the depth of Hamlet's sorrow and confusion surface in recriminations and pleas to abandon Claudius, Mr. Gibson's movie star persona has been left far behind.

Despite Mr. Zeffirelli's lavish attention to Mr. Gibson's face, more often he creates a fluid and atmospheric style that keeps the camera moving but does not call attention to it. This "Hamlet," which opens today at the 68th Street Playhouse, establishes a strong sense of intrigue, of people skulking around the castle.

The film is richly photographed and elaborately produced. Ms. Close's costumes alone can attract attention, with their flowing veils and elegant jewels. But the visual beauty is always a backdrop to the drama, not an end in itself.

As the ghost, Paul Scofield appears like an actor from another, more classical realm. It is greatly to Mr. Gibson's credit that his more natural, less mellifluous reading seems an equally respectable artistic choice. Mel Gibson may not be a Hamlet for the ages, but he is a serious and compelling Hamlet for today. "Hamlet" is rated PG (Parental guidance suggested). It includes some violence. HAMLET Directed by Franco Zeffirelli; screenplay by Christopher De Vore and Mr. Zeffirelli, adapted from the play by William Shakespeare; director of photography, David Watkin; music by Ennio Morricone; production designer, Dante Ferretti; produced by Dyson Lovell; released by Warner Brothers. At the 68th Street Playhouse, at Third Avenue. Running time: 135 minutes. This film is rated PG. Hamlet . . . Mel Gibson Gertrude . . . Glenn Close Claudius . . . Alan Bates The Ghost . . . Paul Scofield Polonius . . . Ian Holm Ophelia . . . Helena Bonham-Carter