Shakespeare and Film Hamlet

University Degree Linguistics, Classics and related subjects

Leeon Graham Shakespeare and Film Hamlet

“Hamlet’s story is essentially one revolving around the idea of the Oedipus complex – the son/mother relation is at heart of this drama”.

“Hamlets story is essentially one revolving around the idea of the famous theory of the Oedipus Complex. The critical applications of the famous theory to the tragedy of ‘Hamlet’ are untold”(www.hamlet.com). Kenneth Branagh makes a wonderful attempt in capturing many film technique’s which enhance the underlying heart of the movie which takes place between ‘Hamlet and his mother.

‘Hamlet’ awakens his repressed incestuous and parricidal desires. The disgust which the remarriage of his mother arouses him, as well as the violent behaviour during their confrontation in the Queen’s bedroom, are signs of the jealousy which he constantly experiences, even if he is unconscious. Hamlet is absolutely horrified by the thought that his mother could feel desire for Claudius, whom he describes as a ‘Murderer an villain,/ A slave that is not twentieth part the tithe/ Of your precedent lord’.

“Such an act, that blurs the grace and blush of modesty, Calls virtue hypocrite, takes off the rose from the fair forehead of an innocent love and sets a blister there, makes marriage vows as false as dicers’ oaths-O, such a deed as from the body of contradiction plucks the very soul, and sweet religion makes a rhapsody of words. Heaven’s face does glow o’er this solidity and compound mass with tristful visage, as against the doom is thought-sick at the act. (Act three scenes four). Branagh builds this scene up to a sudden halt of death of Polonius and the conflict between Hamlet and Gertrude continues. This bedroom scene is one example amongst many of Branagh’s attempt to show Hamlet aversion to sexuality, which he more often than not associates with vulgarity and sickness. Despite his violent reactions he is none the less fundamentally incapable of acting, he cannot bring himself to avenge himself on the man who has killed his father and taken his place at the side of his mother. Given that Claudius does no more than reproduce the repressed fantasies of childhood, the hatred Hamlet feels for him is progressively replaced by feeling of guilt which constantly reminds him that he is no better than the man he is supposed to punish.

Throughout Branagh’s version of Hamlet he does well to meet the ambiguity of Hamlets Language, everything he says is transmitted in various degree’s, through metaphor, simile, and above all wordplay.

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Hamlets intimacy with Ophelia is another aspect in which Branagh has worked with film technique’s in order to give his audience a clear picture of their complex situation for example Branagh uses flashbacks of intimacy to let the viewers know of Hamlet and Ophelia being together. The audience is meant to understand Ophelia’s predicament. This attained love affair humanises ophelia’s following interchange with Hamlet. We as viewers feel sympathy for both characters that are acting out with their control. This scene in particular shows that Hamlet can love other than his Mother or Father but does indeed highlight the tragedy that the women in his life have let him down and his father who is no longer in his life had left him with a very heavy burden which is beyond him.

Everyone agrees that we have no original stage directions for Shakespeare’s plays and that this is the source of particular puzzlement in Hamlet. Considering the middle of ‘Hamlet’ ‘get thee to a nunnery’ speech, in which he suddenly asks Ophelia “where is your father?” and speaks so cruelly to her: if a stage direction indicated that Hamlet has become aware that Polonius and Claudius were spying on him and that Ophelia is in on it, we would understand his severe change in tone. Many directors have adopted this convention, as does Branagh:

A Tiny noise. She glances across the room. And then it dawns….. It’s a trap. She has been unable to be purely honest…. Hamlet (continuing his lines) “ Where’s your father?” the most agonising decision of her young life where she will betray him just as his mother did. Ophelia “at home my lord…..” And with that phrase their love is dead. Hamlets shift in emotions as he is forced to recognise that just as he feared he cannot trust the women he loves, follows not from the lines but from the stage directions in which Branagh has wisely input. He and his company have engaged the text and made it tell a story and have created dramatic action, body language, facial expressions and kinetics.

Furthermore, Branagh has picked up on the cosmetic touches which subconsciously adds to the audience’s viewing for example, Gertrude and Ophelia look alike (Christie and Winslet both wear long, blonde ringlets), so that they could be the same women at different stages of her life. Both characters are also easily abused by men and are both affected in similar ways by Hamlet. Along the same lines Branagh has done a similar thing with Hamlet and Claudius who both share the same hair colour (nearly white) to enable them to be more than just nephew and uncle but perhaps father and son.

Throughout the film Hamlet subconsciously reveals the truth about his feelings, whether he realises them or not the anger in which he portrays to his mother is complete envy of not having her love. Hamlet communicates on two different levels throughout the film and we are repeatedly reverted back to the underlying relationship between Hamlet and his mother for example, when words seem like normal conversations there can be feelings expressed without being conscious of it. Like when Hamlet sets out rules for the Gertrude’s sexuality in their long talk alone, which seems very unusual “O, throw away the worser part of it, and live the purer with the other half. Good night – but go not to my uncle’s bed”. Hamlet suggests his mother should be in love with him instead of his uncle. Neither Hamlet nor Gertrude realise at this point what Hamlet really means.

He also brings it to his mothers attention that he is insanely jealous of her relationship with the king “let the bloat king tempt you again to bed, pinch wanton on you cheek, cal you his mouse, and let him, for a pair of reechy kisses, or paddling your neck with his damaged fingers…” Desire is in the unconscious when we lived out the oedipal dream, it was destined to be in a warped form, and there’s surely an echo of that in Branagh’s version of Hamlet.

Later on in the movie Hamlet starts to suspect his love for his Mother, “That I essentially am not in madness, but mad in craft”. Here, he tries to not let her know that at this, he is playing mad in reverse. Through out the Movie Hamlet is dressed in Black with his Mother always-dressed in lighter colours to segregate the two characters and let the audience know there is a stern divide between them. His dress code shows that from the minute we see him, we know that it ends in tragedy.

In conclusion “Branagh’s splendid film is nothing less than a monument to the highest of art of the western canon” (Freud). It is surely the most ambitious Hamlet on film and it may well be the grandest cinematic rendering of any Shakespeare play. Branagh has left in every word of Shakespeare’s poetry. He has not changed a line precisely for this reason he has achieved something truly extraordinary. He has interpreted in detailed stage directions in every scene in a way that invites our understanding. Branagh has given one of greatest texts a context, and it is not about psychopathology. He has rediscovered the moral adventure of Shakespeare’s Prince and the son/mother relationship, which is at the heart of this amazing drama.