DVD Review

Kenneth Branagh’s Hamlet

Director: Kenneth Branagh

Principal Actors: Kenneth Branagh, Kate Winslet, Derek Jacobi, Richard Briers, Charlton Heston, Sir Richard Attenborough, Julie Christie, Gerard Depardieu, Jack Lemmon, Robin Williams, Billy Crystal, Rufus Sewell, Michael Maloney

Production Company: Castle Rock Entertainment, Warner Brothers Video

DVD Release: August 14^th, 2007 (Films Theatrical Release:1997)

Length: 4 Hours 2 minutes

Rating: 14A 

5 Stars 

Reviewed By: Kindah Mardam Bey 

I will tell you right off the bat this is not a review, it will be a homage to a key figure who changed my own perceptions towards the world of the arts – Kenneth Branagh. Admittedly, some discussion of the DVD, ten years in the making, and the film Ken Bran so painstakingly created will indeed seep into this ‘ode;’ so stay if you dare to travel into my ramblings, or jump ship now if you have an aversion to knowing far too much about this journalist! 

At the age of fifteen Kenneth Branagh saw Derek Jacobi play Hamlet on stage, and it changed his life forever. At the age of fifteen I saw Kenneth Branagh’s film Henry V mandated by my high school drama teacher to any of us students ‘serious’ about the theatre over a series of lunch hours, and then and there I became enraptured by the world and words of Shakespeare. 

Branagh funded Henry V, the first film he directed in his twenties, with money he earned by writing his autobiography. Bolshy a move as it was to write ones autobiography when it was still considerably in progress, it rendered such a result that the first man to appear on screen of Henry V as the narrator was Derek Jacobi, who first inspired Branagh a decade earlier. Irish born Branagh has worked from his insurmountable Beginnings and created a world enriched by his own passion for Shakespeare. He has become the Shakespearean actor of his generation, but he still seems, as is apparent in the DVD commentary, a dreamer following the much larger and intricate footsteps of The Bard.  

Between Henry V (which has the best fight scene ever created on screen, all to the war cry of Orff’s Carmina Burana to set the stage) and Hamlet, Branagh managed to produce and direct two more classics with Shakespeare as a central theme; Much Ado About Nothing and A Midwinter’s Tale. The former is a juicy retelling set in a captivating Italian villa, and the latter is a black and white film telling of a group of ‘slightly mad, but passionate actors’ who put on a version of Hamlet in a Church as their failed careers seem to all boil into one fabulous and hilarious story.  

It was A Midwinter’s Tale that stored enough faith in Kenneth Branagh by Castle Rock entertainment to allow him his greatest dream; a full-length version of Hamlet on screen. I can remember it being a freezing February day in 1997 when I trekked to the downtown core of my city and watched Kenneth Branagh’s Hamlet in the dingiest theatre I’ve ever seen. I simply didn’t notice it that much, as the four hour long (apparently called the ‘eternity film version of Hamlet’) feature had me thrilled, captivated and plastered to my seat. Even though I knew the story of Hamlet and had my prerequisite dry-surface rendition of Hamlet at high school, what I found so blatant about Branagh’s version was how he made the story easily understandable, and yet handing the audience the gravity of the story at the same time.  

I now understand why Hamlet is so important to our society, and the more I read it, the more I dissect it, the more I understand about myself; I believe this is why it is such a passionate point of discussion for educators and performers alike. The DVD commentary is with Kenneth Branagh and Russell Jackson the text authority on the set of Hamlet a decade ago. Mr. Branagh appears thrilled that an internet campaign has released his film into the world of DVD and a greater accessibility for audiences. Ken Bran’s discussions about the film are exactly what us enthusiasts of this project have so eagerly waited for. When Mr. Branagh isn’t interrupted by Jackson’s cyanide comments wrapped in treacle, or decidedly talking over a stream of Ken’s thoughts, we are privy to an artist discussing his own work and a deep seeded passion for the subject matter. You wish Michelangelo had such DVD commentary to go along with his David or Da Vinci for his Mona Lisa. Almost spying into the thoughts of a creator and his creation is a delight to listen to. I believe, for the most part, this will be an exciting addition to the DVD the internet campaigners have waited so patiently for. 

A few years after Hamlet, Kenneth Branagh made Love’s Labours Lost and a less than kind response was made to his newest Shakespearean project after the success of Hamlet. It is hard to follow the greatest play ever wrote with anything else, and the critics seemed eager to pick fault where fault did not lay. I heard that Kenneth Branagh might not do another film based on a Shakespeare play and so I set to that night and wrote my one and only fan letter ever. It was a plea for him to continue his work, and how much his Shakespearean films had affected my own life. I compared Ken to a modern day Orson Welles as opposed to the obvious Sir Laurence Olivier comparison, stating that he had that same maverick spirit and passion as Welles about making films he believed in. A few weeks later, to my surprise, I received the sweetest letter in response from the man himself.  

Aside from being a complete inspiration for me in the world of the arts, a connection to Kenneth Branagh oddly had me find my best friend in the world; now that is something to be thankful for. So it appears that Mr. Branagh has unsuspectedly touched my life in a few different ways as Derek Jacobi did for him. Seeing this go full circle as Branagh’s version of Hamlet is played off of Jacobi’s version of Claudius in a delightful and cohesively karmic circumstance.     

Recently, another Kenneth Branagh-Shakespeare co-production was released in As You Like It – another stunning rendition of the Bards’ words committed to celluloid by his greatest admirer.  

However, it is his eternity version Hamlet that Kenneth Branagh will go down in history for. It is not a definitive version as Hamlet and Shakespeare will perpetually evolve for their own eternity, but it is the version that every student will watch and it will hopefully inspire generations upon generations to learn more about the great writers of history, the great composers, and the great stories that help us learn and grow and reflect. 

Other features of the DVD are some trailers of previous films based on Shakespeare’s plays, the 1996 Cannes film festival promo, and the documentary TO BE: A History with Hamlet, which unfolds more behind the scenes stories about the making of the 1997 film. 

Despite bringing back a flood of fond memories and facilitating as a marker for my own evolution, and continual education of Shakespeare, and the theatre; the release of Kenneth Branagh’s Hamlet has reminded me of what great filmmaking and great acting looks like. The sets are vibrant and the lush, the acting (including Kate Winslet’s reckless abandon into her first Shakespearean role as Ophelia) is superb, the music is haunting and now we have high-definition TVs, we can all appreciate the crispness of the picture and the splendid decision on Branagh’s part to use 70mm film as oppose to the standard 35mm at the time. Simply put, this landmark film is beautiful and enigmatic in every way.  

The classics are truly for everyone; at any point someone can buy a book, or in this case a film, and learn something from it. All anyone ever needs to enjoy a classic play, novel, or piece of music is to take an interest; the classics have an indiscriminate universality to them. Mind you, with such passionate educators and visionaries as Kenneth Branagh, it is easy for the rest of us to take an interest and be equally captivated by the subject matter.   

So if you have managed to follow my ramblings to this point, you are a brave soul indeed, and perhaps might pick up this DVD that has so many hearts invested in it -- from concept to creation to distribution. If you are by chance, fifteen years old and searching for some other obsession to take on then the standard stereotypes of smoking, drugs or alcohol, then I highly, highly recommend an obsession with Shakespeare as you will never lose interest it would appear!