274 - Hamlet, 1948, United Kingdom. Dir. Laurence Olivier.
Hamlet is a prince in Denmark. His father died two months ago, and his mother Gertrude has already married his father's brother, Hamlet's uncle Claudius. Hamlet is grieving and upset. He cannot see how his mother could so quickly remarry after her husband's death. His mother and uncle tell him that he should move on already!
Hamlet's dead father returns as a ghost to inform Hamlet that he was murdered by the current king and queen, that his own brother and wife conspired to kill him so that his brother could usurp the throne. He orders Hamlet to take revenge on his brother, Hamlet's uncle, and Hamlet receives this task with trepidation, but he is committed to doing it.
Polonius is the chief councilor to the king, both to Hamlet's father and to the current king Claudius. Polonius gives long-winded and humorous speeches filled with platitudes and wordplay. He has a son, Laertes, and a daughter, Ophelia. Laertes is Hamlet's friend, and Ophelia is his girlfriend. When Hamlet learns of his mother's betrayal of his father, it shakes his faith in women, and in his efforts to exact revenge he feigns insanity. These two things come together to cause Hamlet to mistreat Ophelia in a troubled moment, and to reject her, which in turn causes her to drown herself. Her brother Laertes in his anger will become Hamlet's enemy and be manipulated by Claudius into challenging Hamlet to a duel using a poison-tipped sword. Laertes will prick Hamlet's arm with the sword, and in the course of the sword fight Hamlet will take the sword and prick Laertes back. Both will receive the poison and both will die.
Hamlet's mother Gertrude will drink poison that is intended for Hamlet, and Hamlet, when he discovers all of this, will drive Claudius through with the poisoned sword. Leading up to this final showdown, Hamlet will expose the king and queen by having a group of actors play a reenactment of the conspiracy and murder. He will confront his mother in private and accidentally kill Polonius by running him through with a sword on the other side of a tapestry, thinking it to be Claudius. He will pause in killing Claudius earlier when he has a chance because Claudius is in the act of prayer, and according to his theology, if he kills him in that moment Claudius will go to heaven and Hamlet will fail to achieve the revenge his father commanded of him. Hamlet will also spend time alone in reflection, speaking in soliloquies, and he will reflect on the nature of life and death while holding skull at a grave being dug by a man named Yorick, which will turn out to be Ophelia's grave.
Sir Laurence Olivier was a classical actor. He performed Hamlet and many other Shakespearean roles on the stage. He also began acting on film fairly early, at age 23. Now he is 40 and he is directing a film for the second time. He first was four years ago with Henry V, where he also directed and starred as the title character. Henry V was nominated for four Oscars--for Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Art Direction (interior, color), and Best Musical Score. Laurence Olivier won an Honorary Oscar "for his outstanding achievement as actor, producer, and director in bringing Henry V to the screen."
Hamlet will be nominated for seven Oscars and will win four--for Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Art Direction (black and white), and Best Costume Design (black and white). It is the only time a Shakespearean play has won for Best Picture, although several have been nominated, and it was the first time a non-American movie won for Best Picture. It was also the first time a director directed himself to a Best Actor award, something repeated only once, by Roberto Benigni in Life is Beautiful.
Olivier chose black and white and had cinematographer Desmond Dickinson film in deep focus the spare play-like sets that Carmen Dillon had built. There are elements that remain theatrical, such as the spare sets, the lack of furniture, the costumes, and the entrances, and there are elements that are more filmlike, such as the sweeping camera moves, the editing, and the enacting of thoughts expressed in voice-over.
Olivier is athletic and relaxed. He does not push but he speaks the lines trippingly from his tongue. In fact, he underplays much of the emotion. His portrayal is physical and not passive. His swordfighting shows an experienced command of the skill.
The scene with Yorick at the graveyard is especially effective. While Yorick is digging the grave, he finds a skull and places it on the ground outside the grave. Hamlet's shadow appears on the ground, placing the skull directly inside the head of the shadow. Hamlet's conversation with Yorick is present and engaging.
Olivier brings the plot of the play to life. He makes it easier for the average viewer to understand what is happening.
He removes the political subplots and focuses only on the tragedy of the royal family. In doing so he removes several characters, such as Rosencrantz, Gildenstern, and Fortinbras. He also removes a couple of soliloquies, "O what a rogue and peasant slave am I" and "How all occasions do inform against me." With these cuts, the film still runs a solid two-and-a-half hours.
The film features Jean Simmons as Ophelia, who at age 19 was already on her twelfth feature film. She would go on to a great career on both sides of the Atlantic. Eileen Herlie, who plays Hamlet's mother Gertrude, is 29 when the film is made, 11 years younger than Oliver, at age 40. Peter Cushing plays Osric, whom this generation of Americans know as Grand Moff Tarkin in Star Wars, and Christopher Lee appears as a Spear Carrier, who played in a lot of horror movies with Cushing before going on to play Count Dooku in Star Wars and Saruman in The Lord of the Rings. Desmond Llewelyn, who played Q in James Bond, was an Extra.
Something powerful happens in the final scene.
After Gertrude dies from drinking the poison, after Hamlet realizes that both Laertes and he have stabbed each other with the poison-tipped sword, and after Hamlet has exacted revenge on his uncle Claudius, Laertes appeals to Hamlet for forgiveness.
Laertes makes his request. "Exchange forgiveness with me, noble Hamlet. / Mine with my father's death come not upon thee. / Nor thine on me."
Hamlet responds affirmatively. "Heaven make thee free of it."
Heaven make thee free of it.
Hamlet is a tragedy. And yet, with those words it becomes something more, as Laertes and Hamlet administer to one another the most important of all spiritual needs--grace.
If Heaven makes you free of it, then nothing else matters. Everything is going to be okay. Forever. That is the good news.
Throughout this year we have observed when films feature forgiveness as a major theme. We saw it in 02 - Revanche, in 12 - Leon Morin, Priest, in 17 - Three Colors: Blue, in 218 - The Virgin Spring, in 225 - Scenes from a Marriage, in 253 - Dekalog: Nine, and in 264 - Close-Up.
Sometimes it is spiritual. Sometimes it is relational. Sometimes it is legal. Always it is vital.
This version of Hamlet is worth watching. Enjoy it.
Good night sweet prince:
And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest!
* * * * *
When I first saw Laurence Olivier's film version of Hamlet years ago, I disagreed strongly with its opening. Olivier begins the film with a few lines of verse from within the play, and then inserts the statement, "This is the story of a man who could not make up his mind."
What?
Where did he find the right to insert his opinions into the original text? Is he a filmmaker or a literary critic? Why not just turn it into a documentary and stand in front of a chalkboard if you want to comment on the play after having begun performing in it?
Is this Annotated-by-Olivier Shakespeare?
Why put a filter over my eyes before you show me something?
Why not let me view it for myself and make up my own mind what the story is about?
I was especially not too keen on Olivier's making Freud that filter through which I should look--a man born 255 years after Shakespeare wrote Hamlet--as though Shakespeare could have written the play with Freud's ideas in mind. Olivier seemed to make it Oedipal, which was in vogue in the twentieth century, that just like Claudius, Hamlet wanted to kill his father and marry his mother. We were fed that in school, and one can find it in the text, but did it need to color everything in the play?
No, I said, it is not the story of a man who cannot make up his mind--as though Hamlet had that particular personality trait outside of the context of his situation. It is on the contrary the story about a man who is otherwise as decisive as anyone else but who has been placed in an impossible situation. (There are lines in the play where Hamlet asserts his decisiveness, but Olivier removed them.) His choice, for example, not to kill Claudius while he is praying is not a moment of hesitation but rather the belief that it will not effect the revenge which his father commanded of him. Furthermore, his father's direct instructions contradict his own natural instincts. That is not indecision on his part. It is conflict between choice and obedience. Hamlet shows himself to be quite decisive when he runs Polonius through with his sword through the tapestry, thinking he is Claudius.
Yes, he reflects. Yes, he is upset. Yes, he feigns insanity. Yes, he takes out his anger over his mother's betrayal on Ophelia. But he knows what he is doing.
Though this be madness, yet there is method in 't.
It is good to watch the movie again and revise my thoughts. I still disagree with Olivier's inserting that statement in the opening, but I can overlook it. And though he inserts the line, he does not push the Freudian angle too heavily in the film, nor does he push the indecisiveness. He plays Hamlet with a robust athleticism and easy grace. He is relaxed, comfortable in his own skin, comfortable in the character.
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