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Hamlet (2009)

BBC Worldwide Streaming Video - 2009 Community Rating: 4 out of 5

Cover image for Hamlet (2009)

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In 28, the UK's eminent Royal Shakespeare Company brought Hamlet - Shakespeare's most famous and perhaps most influential play - back to the stage, spoken in verse but with contemporary dress and David Tennant in the eponymous role. Tennant's interpretation garnered critical approval and Patrick Stewart - playing Claudius - was praised for a performance of great depth and complexity. In this specially-shot screen version of the stage play (filmed on location rather than in the theatre), Tennant and Stewart reprise their roles.

COMMUNITY REVIEWS

A Fresh, Disturbing Look at Hamlet submitted by howarde on June 16, 2022, 8:25am This is as good a place as any to start if you have never watched a performance of Hamlet before. The dense language is a challenge as always, but this production does a good job of making the plot and the inflection of the characters' speech make basic sense. Even though I am fairly familiar with the play, several little things about plot and characterization clicked for me watching this performance. I generally enjoy watching modern dress productions of Shakespeare, although it does cause for some awkwardness when things like clothes or weapons are talked about in detail and are obviously different from what's on screen. But I also think this production used the conceit of modern technology effectively, especially security cameras, which are apt in this play about secrecy and surveillance.

Standout performances include Patrick Stewart's Claudius, which gave nuance to the character that I have never seen before. The same can be said for Penny Downie's Gertrude. Oliver Ford Davies was also one of the best Poloniuses I have ever seen. And the guy who played the Gravedigger—*chef's kiss* to that performance.

As for David Tennant: he succeeded in making Hamlet scary, and I mean that as a compliment. This is the first production I have seen where the other characters' fear of Hamlet seemed reasonable and not simply self-interested. I think this play is often taught and directed with the assumption that we are hearing the story through the perspective of Horatio, and that the audience will identify with Hamlet and continue to be sympathetic even as his behavior and its consequences spiral out of control. This production takes a fresh look at Hamlet, his words and actions, and creates a deeply ambivalent characterization—helped along in part by Tennant's talent for the grotesque. Any sympathy we have for Hamlet by the time we get to "The rest is silence" is the result of Tennant stripping away our assumptions about this character and building something new in their place.

Cover image for Hamlet (2009)

SERIES
BBC Literary Adaptations



PUBLISHED
Year Published: 2009
Format: Streaming Video

SUBJECTS
Death
Mental illnesses
Interpersonal conflict