Review of Hamlet (1990) by Trisha W — 16 Apr 2008

I have to compare two film versions of Hamlet to the Shakespearean version for my final English paper. I chose this version because I had not seen it before, and I had heard this was one of the best adaptations.

And without having seen all of the different versions, I can say that I was very pleased with this version. Zeffirelli's adaptation seemed to follow in a logical sense, despite some minor rearrangements and omittion/addition of scenes/lines.

I like how they still spoke the Shakespearean lines. The setting was beautiful with the castle being dark and drab, just like the original script. Ophelia was truly believeable as a mad woman at the end, bouncing between emotions just as Hamlet did throughout as well.

Hamlet was beautifully played by Mel Gibson, who I think was very dramatic and and captured the moment of Hamlet in each line, or at least almost each, with the facial expressions and persona of someone so unstable.

The movie was overall a job well done compared to the original script, though the original was still the more thrilling.