Movie Review-Hamlet, with Mel Gibson
Juliet, Othello, Taming of the Shrew), the authenticity of the setting is most crucial for
capturing and engaging the audience’s attention for the entirety of the play. Zeffirelli has
chosen a twelfth-century Welsh castle to be the setting of the Royal Castle of Elsinor in
Denmark. Its ramparts, round towers, dark hallways and twisting stairs are the imagery
needed to uncover King Hamlet’s murder and to weave Hamlet’s elaborate plan to exact
his full revenge upon those responsible.
Shakespeare plays are not meant to be read silently but to be performed, with the
flow of the language, the emotions of the words conveyed through body language. In
Shakespeare’s day great care was taken to cast leading roles with popular actors who
could bring in the money. But a great script could bring about an audience’s emotional
investment through listening to the words and watching the action in a play, from the
groundlings who stood the entire time, to those who paid half a penny to sit on a cushion
in the sequestered seating. It was escapism at best, even if only for a few hours.
Zeffirelli has chosen well with casting Mel Gibson in the leading role of Hamlet,
Prince of Denmark. He effectively captures the essence of Hamlet, who is grieving over
the loss of his father, the too-quick remarriage of his mother to his uncle, and then the
encounter with his father’s ghost telling him that his death was “a foul and most unnatural
murder.” He demonstrates the prescribed descent into madness through all the steps
in the script and the wild-eyed look that only Gibson can do.
A personal aspect of the play that resonates with me is there are events that have
happened in my life that if I had known what the outcome would have been, I would have
done things differently leading up to those events, how everything in life would have
turned out for the better. However, I believe we are meant to experience things in life to
make us better people. What of Hamlet’s regrets? If Hamlet had been home rather than
off to school in Germany; if he could have watched his father’s back, rather than open
him to the treacherous vulnerability by his own brother Claudius. But then our lives are
not Shakespeare plays to be performed before a crowd.
At the end of Hamlet, I am saddened that a young man groomed to be king will
never come to fruition. His chance to demonstrate his royal blood and breeding are taken
away and he dies along with most everyone else. Hamlet is able to get revenge on
his uncle/stepfather, but at the cost of the lives of others along the way--Ophelia and
Polonius. It is tragic to see Ophelia die because she added the innocence of young
love to Hamlet’s character, and she showed the genuine emotional heartbreak of being
spurned by him. Hamlet treats her appallingly, but was it part of his ruse to fane
madness, and she was the sacrificial character in this tragedy or was he pushing her
away so she would not get caught up in his plan of revenge? Polonius was the voice of
reason to whom Gertrude and Claudius listened about Prince Hamlet’s madness. He
keeps pushing Ophelia to remind Hamlet’s of his love and kindness towards her. He
should not have been in Gertrude’s bedchamber as it was not something proper at the
time but poetic license adds to the intrigue of the play.
The play was fun to watch but its outcome was sad. It is not fun to watch murder,
lies, deception, suicide unfold before you and not be able to stop it. To act and to have
the full attention of an audience would be quite titillating. The relevance to today’s world
is that the more power you have, the more you have to watch your back as there is always
someone there to knock you out of your place. You have to carefully choose who you can
trust, and those you think you can fully trust need to be carefully watched also.
Even though I have seen Hamlet performed before and Hamlet always dies, there
is still hope that maybe this time it will be different. “There is nothing good or bad that
thinking makes it so” (Hamlet). It does encourage me to attend other Shakespeare plays,
The language may be archaic, but I want to see more plays and judge for myself why
Shakespeare is still popular 396 years after his death.
Works Cited
Hamlet. Dir. Franco Zeffirelli. Perf. Mel Gibson, Glenn Close, Alan Bates, Paul Scofield,
Ian Holm, Helena Bonham-Carter. Warner Bros, 1990. Film
