| Hamlet | |
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Theatrical release poster |
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| Directed by | Franco Zeffirelli |
| Produced by | Bruce Davey Dyson Lovell |
| Written by | Franco Zeffirelli Christopher De Vore |
| Based on | The play by William Shakespeare |
| Starring | Mel Gibson Glenn Close Alan Bates Paul Scofield Ian Holm Helena Bonham Carter Stephen Dillane Nathaniel Parker |
| Music by | Ennio Morricone |
| Cinematography | David Watkin |
| Editing by | Richard Marden |
| Studio | Nelson Entertainment Icon Productions Carolco Pictures |
| Distributed by | Warner Bros. |
| Release date(s) | December 19, 1990 (limited) January 18, 1991 |
| Running time | 130 minutes |
| Country | United States United Kingdom France |
| Language | English |
| Box office | $20,710,451 |
Hamlet is a 1990 drama film based on the Shakespearean tragedy Hamlet. It was directed by Franco Zeffirelli, with Mel Gibson as the young Prince Hamlet. It was also the first film from Icon Productions, a company Gibson co-founded.
Dunnottar Castle, Stonehaven, Blackness Castle and Dover Castle were used as locations in the film.
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The cast includes three actors - Paul Scofield, Alan Bates, and Ian Holm - who had themselves played Hamlet on stage or film. It also features two actors - Stephen Dillane and Michael Maloney - who went on to play Hamlet onstage.
Film scholar Deborah Cartmell has suggested that Zeffirelli's Shakespeare films are appealing because they are "sensual rather than cerebral", an approach by which he aims to make Shakespeare "even more popular". To this end, he cast Gibson — then famous for the Mad Max and Lethal Weapon films — in the title role. Cartmell also notes that the text is drastically cut, but with the effect of enhancing the roles of the women.
J. Lawrence Guntner has suggested that Zeffirelli's cinematography borrows heavily from the action film genre that made Gibson famous, noting that its average shot length is less than six seconds. In casting Gibson, the director has been said to have made the star's reputation part of the performance, encouraging the audience "to see the Gibson that they have come to expect from his other films" Indeed, Gibson was cast after Zeffirelli watched his character, Martin Riggs, contemplate suicide in Lethal Weapon.[1] The fight between Hamlet and Laertes is an example of using Gibson's experience in action movies; Gibson handily depicts Hamlet as an experienced fencer.
Guntner has written that the casting of Close as Hamlet's mother (only nine years older than Gibson, and then famous as the psychotic "other woman" in Fatal Attraction) highlights the incest theme, leaving "little to our post-Freudian imagination" and Cartmell notes that Close and Gibson simulate sex in the closet scene, and "she dies after sexually suggestive jerking movements, with Hamlet positioned on top of her, his face covered with sweat".
The movie received two Academy Awards nominations, for Best Art Direction (Dante Ferretti, Francesca Lo Schiavo) and Best Costume Design.[2]
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