The Hamlet Project: Kenneth Branagh (1996)

 

By the time Kenneth Branagh made what is referred to as "The Eternity Version" of "Hamlet," he'd had more than twenty years to think about the part. Prior to directing his 1996 version, Branagh had played the part for the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art,  had acted in the play as Laertes for the Royal Shakespeare Company production, tackled the part again with his own Renaissance Theatre Company and again in a radio version. Then, there was his meditation on the play, the 1995 comedy "A Midwinter's Tale" (known as "In the Bleak Midwinter" in the UK), about a ill-starred community theatre production at Christmastime:

TOM: ...but no, no, no, no, Hamlet isn't just Hamlet, oh no, no, oh no, Hamlet is me...Hamlet is...Bosnia, Hamlet is...this desk...Hamlet is the air. Hamlet is...my grandmother, Hamlet is everything you've ever thought about sex...about...about...geology...

JOE: Geology?

TOM: In a very loose sense of course.

Kenneth Branagh has gone on to become the first person nominated in seven different categories for an Academy Award. He has known critical and commercial success in big-budget Hollywood spectacle, small independent films and in large character pieces. He is still best known for his Shakespearean work, and even had a go at playing the Bard himself in the remarkable"All Is True." There is a sense one gets in watching Branagh's Hamlet that he has attempted to cram his entire biography - and all of his instincts as an actor and director - into this version which uses the entire text. In the spirit of full disclosure, I should say that this is my favorite film version of the play. 

When Branagh wrote about his experience on the project, he cited Goethe: "A genuine work of art, no less than a work of nature, will always remain infinite to our reason: it can be contemplated and felt, it affects us, but it cannot be fully comprehended, even less than it is possible to express its essence and its merits in words." Yet in making his own filmed version, Branagh was guided by the impression left on him when he first saw the play at 15 with the prince played by Derek Jacobi - he wanted a "Hamlet" that left the audience asking "what happens next." He wanted a film that was an event - in 70 mm with huge sets, international casting, a world that was big and brightly lit, glamorous, suspenseful, sexy. 

The film begins and ends with the image of the dead King Hamlet, as a statue, guarding the real life Blenheim Palace, which doubles for our Elsinore. The final view we get of the statue may remind viewers today of the toppling of images of Middle Eastern dictators, such as Saddam Hussein. However, audiences in 1996 would have flashed back to the fall of the Soviet Union only five years before. From the beginning, we have a sense that we are watching the end of something - the fall of the house of Hamlet. At this moment in time, which appears to be late 19th century, when a ghost appears on the ramparts, invading armies are marching, the days of the monarch are numbered. 

Because Branagh opts for the complete text, he is free not only to explore the psychological drama of "Hamlet," but the political. There is also the spiritual, for a restless ghost is haunting the kingdom. In this version, the rationalist Horatio, played by Nicholas Farrell, is left with a mystery which he must impart to his tortured friend up in the castle. 

The throne room of Elsinore is a wonderful combination of the Winter Palace and Versailles - a hall of mirrors with an overhanging walkway. One of Branagh's aims was to show the paranoia of royalty - of a public performance that is always watched and must never be relaxed. The King can not be allowed to be anything less than regal. That is why the palace is stocked with hidden doors and passageways for quick escapes. There is always something to hide. 

But the people are celebrating the marriage of their new king - Claudius, played by Branagh's teenage hero, Jacobi. At first sight, Claudius appears to be a thoughtful, politically savvy ruler. We can easily imagine him having long prepared himself solely for this moment, perhaps a feeling that he is more suited to the role than his predecessor, no matter how popular he was. And there is continuity, since the Queen has not changed. Gertrude, played by Julie Christie, is just as much a presence on the throne. With everything tidied up, confetti falls and the celebration of the change in power continues, leaving alone to contemplate his fate - Hamlet. 

Branagh's prince is dressed in a black military tunic, as one might expect. But as director, Branagh is careful to give us little glimpses of what Hamlet could have been. Perhaps what he was prior to the death of his father. He leaves no doubt that Hamlet has been to bed with Ophelia. He shows the two of them as naked, playful lovers. When Rosencranz and Gildenstern arrive, he is shown to be a warm, jocular friend. And when the ghost of King Hamlet appears, one is led to an inescapable conclusion - Hamlet looks more like his live, villainous uncle than he does his late, virtuous father. Draw your own conclusions on how long Claudius and Gertrude have been intimate with each other. Does this mean that in his vacillations, in his subterfuge, in his self-dramatizations, Hamlet is behaving more like the man who might actually be his father?

Polonius, played by Richard Briers, is more human and less comic than in other productions. He is the Prime Minister, and shows himself a warm and loving father to his children. When he gives Laertes his parting advice, these aren't pedantic nostrums from an old windbag. They are the anxiety of a father who wonders if he will see his son again. When he dies by Hamlet's hand, there is the feeling of accumulating tragedy.

In keeping with earlier decisions, Branagh makes it clear that Claudius did kill his brother, by himself. He gives us flashes of a memory that comes back to Hamlet as the ghost speaks - that of a moment where his uncle and mother got a little too close; an indication of something sinister that perhaps led to the time being out of joint. The ghost scene itself is interesting, for another reason. In the 1988 documentary "Discovering Hamlet," Branagh says the ghost scene is one of the more exhausting ones to deliver on stage. An actor has to respond to the ghost in such a way as to show the audience the proper amount of fear, wonder and horror. To reproduce the scene for the film, he plays it out in a series of closeups, between himself and the ghost, played by the whispering Brian Blessed. (Anyone who has seen the bombastic Blessed in other roles might barely recognize him in this restrained appearance.) 

Branagh's strategy is to keep the image in constant motion, to give the audience every sense of the largeness of Shakespeare's vision in as many ways as possible without pausing long enough for attention to wane. When Rosencrantz and Gildenstern appear, they are brought to the royal bedroom in one continuous take, a hallmark of Branagh's directorial style. The maids are making up the bed, while Claudius welcomes the two. At one point, the king sits down on the bed while his boots are shined. The maids pause in their work out of deference to the royal person. Then the party proceed down the corridors to the throne room in a "walk and talk" at least a century before "The West Wing." Bits like this extend throughout the movie, along with cameos to remind the audience that they are watching something big. When Charlton Heston's Player King begins Aeneas' tale to Dido, we aren't just allowed to visualize the scene through Heston's epic voice, we are treated to flashes of John Gielgud as Priam, and Judi Dench as Hecuba. Neither has any dialogue, but in seeing Gielgud, we are reminded of his own Hamlet, forever lost to us because it was not recorded on film. 

The 1988 Hamlet stage production Branagh starred in was directed by Jacobi, For it, Jacobi envisioned that Hamlet's "To be or not to be" soliloquy should instead be a speech delivered to Ophelia. For the film, Hamlet enters the throne room, aware that Claudius and Polonius are watching him from behind one of the mirrors. This allows the speech to be more than a contemplation of life or death, but also a (not-so) subtle threat to the life of the king. Then Kate Winslet's Ophelia enters the room to return his love notes, and Hamlet exploits the moment, and her watching father, by feigning madness and torturing her with the "nunnery" speech. These directorial decisions have the effect of making Hamlet less wild and more calculating, though at the same time rendering him even more heartless to his lover. 

There are many great performances in this film, but Jacobi's Claudius stands out. As the king confesses his murder, for just a second, Hamlet is allowed to imagine the culmination of his revenge with Claudius' death. But just as quickly, when he realizes the potential theological implications, he pauses. By showing this, we see just how close we came to a different resolution. Again, Branagh exploits the possibilities of alternative Hamlets. And because he lives, Claudius is shown to be a genuinely remorseful man, accenting his humanity and his villainy.

When Laertes arrives at the head of a revolutionary mob in the final acts, the King very carefully talks him down from anger and subtly redirects him toward vengeance. But then Gertrude enters to relay the information about Ophelia. It's at this point that Branagh does not do what he has up to now - he does not show us the dead Ophelia immediately. Why? Because his focus remains on the conniving king, because he must show the moment when Claudius beckons Gertrude to come with him, and the queen refuses. She has seen the true nature of her new husband, and of her mistake. Then we are shown Ophelia in one shot, submerged beneath water, given up to madness. 

When we see Hamlet again, he is no longer clothed in black. He has returned from England, there is resolution in him, and an easy grace that shows itself with the gravedigger. This continues, even after Ophelia's burial, when Hamlet is again with Horatio in the library, sneering at the foppish Osric, played with sufficient camp by Robin Williams. Yes, Branagh's "Hamlet" is occasionally busy. The cameos, such as Billy Crystal and Jack Lemmon, might feel awkward. Not everyone can speak the speech trippingly on the tongue. 

And Hamlet's final duel with Laertes is staged with all the drama and panache one could ask for, but crammed with bits of stagey stuff. Laertes falls from the second floor walkway once defeated. Hamlet remains up there, so he must hurl his sword at the king like a javelin and manage to pin Claudius to the throne, just as a chandelier comes crashing down on him. Then, in Errol Flynn style, Hamlet cuts a rope, swings down to the floor, grabs the laced cup, runs to the throne and forces the last of poison  down the king's throat. For a man dying of the same venom, Hamlet's daring-do feels like a bit much, no matter how exciting it all is. (Then again, Olivier leaped 14 feet down onto Claudius.) But Branagh intercuts the duel with the invading Norwegian army, so that when Fortinbras bursts in, all of the pieces fit together. Richard Attenborough's English Ambassador is there only a second, before Hamlet is carried out, Christlike, sacrificed to little salvation by his tardy revenge.  No matter how we got there, we are appropriately breathless. 

Later, in "All Is True," Branagh's retired Shakespeare gives advice to another man on the act of creation: "If you want to be a writer, and speak to others and for others, speak first for yourself." That may be one reason why Branagh's "Hamlet" succeeds. This busy, feverish, breakneck barrelhouse Hamlet is the Hamlet inside him, a Hamlet that is not just speaking beyond a mirror to his antagonist, but to the reflection that only he can see. 

Previously:

The Play's the Thing
Laurence Olivier (1948)
Toshiro Mifune (1960) 
Richard Burton (1964)