FILM REVIEW
HAMNET
Rated PG-13
125 Minutes
Released December 5th
Production designer Fiona Crombie endeavored to convey historical accuracy, love, happiness, and sadness in the spaces Will and Agnes Shakespeare and their family inhabit in the movie Hamnet. She says, “It’s very much a part of the world building, connecting the characters to the home, to the forest, and to the Globe” (theatre), in late 1500’s England.
The beginning of the film is a montage of richly colored tableaux of life in the English countryside at that time. Directed by the award-winning Chloe Zhao, the film is a riff on what William Shakespeare’s family life would have been like, with clues pieced together from histories of his time and from his prolific library of plays and sonnets. The story is seen from the point of view of a historical figure usually passed over by historians and Shakespearean scholars, since there are few details recorded about her, Shakespeare’s wife Anne, or as she is called here, “Agnes” (those names were interchangeable at that time).
This is the story of Shakespeare’s wife, two daughters, and his son, Hamnet, who are left behind in their English country cottage by the bard when he makes his way to London to write and stage his plays. The film’s writers, Maggie O’Farrell in her novel and then both O’Farrell and Zhao in the screenplay, take much literary license in painting a detailed history of the Shakespeare Family life.
The author and filmmakers have created this heartwarming rendition by “reading between the lines” of his plays and sonnets. Zhao cast two Irish actors as her leads, which, to me, seems a good choice. Having lived in Ireland, I believe the culture and landscape there is closer to Elizabethan England than is England today. Jessie Buckley is superb as “Agnes,” as is Paul Mescal as “Will.” The children are amazing – Jacobi Jupe as “Hamnet,” Olivia Lynes as “Judith,” and Bodhi Rae Breathnach as “Susanna.” And, Noah Jupe, Jacobi’s older brother, plays “Hamlet” on the Old Globe stage.
Chloe Zhao is at the beginning of a celebrated career as a film director. She was born in Beijing and raised by her stepmother, an actress, and her father, a wealthy manager of a steel company. She was a restless, rebellious child, uninterested in school. She was drawn to Western pop culture and spent her days creating her own art.
She grew up without cell phones and very little access to the internet, so she is more connected to people and their relationships with the nature around them. In 1998, at the age of 15, she was sent to boarding school in England. Not exactly feeling at home there, Zhao soon moved to Los Angeles by herself. She loves to take her inspiration from the real people she discovers, as in her Oscar-winning film Nomadland, and she is brilliant at capturing the landscape and interiors that shape her characters and their stories.
Frances McDormand, who starred in Nomadland, says of Zhao that “she’s…like a journalist…she gets to know your story, and she creates a character from that.” Zhao often continues to tweak her scripts on set as the film is being shot, because as she puts it, “My goal is to put the camera inside of the character.” Her films explore identity and the search for belonging, the legacy of a childhood always moving from place to place. Zhao says that she feels her extreme personality and neurodivergence are her superpowers.
Jessie Buckley is the perfect choice to play Agnes, who really “wears the pants” in the family, while dad Shakespeare is off in London pursuing what we now know is his inspired artistry. I’ve long felt that Jessie Buckley’s talent has not been recognized. Now it will be. Buckley and Mescal both grew up in Ireland, have worked as actors since childhood, and have built careers in theatre, film, and TV. The children who play Shakespeare’s kids are super talented: Jacobi Jupe, Olivia Lynes, and Bodhi Rae Breathnach. Noah Jupe, an accomplished young actor and Jacobi’s older brother, plays “Hamlet” on stage in the movie.
This movie truly humanizes Shakespeare and Agnes so that they are not just legends. It doesn’t matter if every detail is true; this film gives us the playwright as a strikingly human entity who rings true as the author of such an extraordinary body of work. Hamnet, the son of Shakespeare, was born in 1585 and died in 1596, and his tragic death is thought to have inspired the play Hamlet, written between 1599 and 1601. If you have ever lost a child or anyone close to you, this film will pierce your heart, yet it’s a beautiful study of lives well-lived.
Kathryn Whitney Boole has spent most of her life in the entertainment industry, which has been the backdrop for remarkable adventures with extraordinary people. She is a Talent Manager with Studio Talent Group in Santa Monica. kboole@gmail.com
