Hamlet Superlatives

Longest Hamlet

No surprise here, Kenneth Branagh’s is the longest, at two hundred and forty two minutes.  Fortunately for Branagh’s film, it’s also fast paced and well done, saving it from feeling like it’s an hour or two too long.  Runner up:  Rodney Bennet’s at two hundred ten minutes. 

Shortest Hamlet

Simon Bowler’s bizarre hour and fifteen minute Hamlet: really more like a random sequence of scenes than a story, due to the extreme cuts.  If someone were watching Hamlet for the first time with this movie, they would have literally no idea what was going on. 

Best editing of the text

While Peter Brook’s was perhaps the most interesting edit of the text, there were some issues with it like the removal of Laertes from act one.  Of the plays that editing out a significant portion of text, the best editing award goes to Campbell Scott who managed to get the run time down to three hours without ever making me feel like I was missing anything. 

Sloppiest Editing of the Text

This is a close competition, with Michael Almereyda, Franco Zefirelli, Michael Mundell and Simon Bowler.  Simon Bowler’s edit is so extreme that the play didn’t really have any coherent plot, so I’m taking it out of the running because I’m not sure it qualifies as a fully-fledged Hamlet production.  Of the three remaining, the competition is fierce, but the largest number of line-flubs, errors and illogical editings goes to Michael Mundell’s Hamlet.

Best Double-Casting

In multiple Hamlets, the same actor played multiple parts.  In running for this category are Patrick Stewart as The Ghost and the Claudius in Doran’s Hamlet, Jeffrey Kisoon as the Ghost and Claudius in Brooks’ Hamlet, Bruce Myers as Polonius and the Gravedigger in Brook’s Hamlet, Byron Jennings as the Ghost and the Player King in Scott’s Hamlet, and Ryan Gage as Osric and the Player Queen in Doran’s Hamlet.  While Patrick Stewart and Jeffrey Kisoon were both excellent in both their roles, the award has to go to Byron Jennings.  The idea of double-casting the Ghost and the Player King is highly original, and he did it extremely well. 

Best Double Appearance

There were four double appearances in the sixteen Hamlets:  Eileen Herlie as Gertrude in the Olivier and Gielgud films, Patrick Stewart as Claudius in the Bennet and Doran films, Michael Maloney as Rosencrantz in the Zefirelli film and Laertes in the Branagh film, and Derek Jacobi as Hamlet in the Bennet film and Claudius in the Branagh film.  Jacobi was superlative in each film, making him the obvious winner in this category.  

Funniest Hamlet

David Tennant is a great comic actor, and he was one of the few who remembered just how funny a character Hamlet is.  He was completely hilarious in all the scenes where he just ran circles around everyone else.  Runner up: Richard Burton, especially in his scenes with Hume Cronyn. 

Prettiest Sets

There’s a lot of competition here, but ultimately, Kenneth Branagh’s Elsinore is hard to beat. 

Best Soundtrack

The award easily goes to the Kozinstev Hamlet, with a spectacular soundtrack written by Shostakovich.  Runner-Up:  The music in all of Branagh’s Shakespeare movies is excellently done, and his Hamlet is no exception. 

Worst Soundtrack

Campbell Scott’s Hamlet easily has the saddest soundtrack, since it was virtually the only weakness of the entire film.  However, it was such a massive problem that it really interrupted the movie for me.  Tied for second place are Michael Almereyda’s Hamlet, where the music seemed to be desperately trying to persuade you that it was cool, and Michael Mundell’s Hamlet where it was consistently mood-inappropriate and sounded like it was from a different movie.  

Best Gertrude

Penny Downie in Gregory Doran’s Hamlet really defines Gertrude for me.  She was complex, subtle, and, most of all, excellent at establishing relationships with the characters around her.  She related with each of them in different ways, but they all felt very real and natural.  Runners-up: Judy Christie from Kenneth Branagh’s Hamlet and Blair Brown from Campbell Scott’s Hamlet. 

Best Polonius

This is a tough one, and there are going to be two winners here.  Hume Cronyn in John Gielgud’s Hamlet went for a funny Polonius, and it was enormously effective.  Richard Briers in Kenneth Branagh’s film went for a more powerful, sinister Polonius, and it worked just as well, though very different.  Runner-up: Roscoe Lee Browne in Campbell Scott’s Hamlet.  He played the part well, but I thought they pushed the “sinister Polonius” idea farther than it should go.  There’s sinister, then there’s evil.  It was mostly good, but occasionally went over the edge. 

Best Claudius

Without a doubt, Derek Jacobi in Kenneth Branagh’s Hamlet.  He brought so much to the role, and created such a complex, nuanced character out of Claudius, who can sometimes come off as a slightly flat villain.  He was truly spectacular. 

Best Ophelia

There’s a lot of competition here, but it ultimately comes down to Helena Bonham-Carter and Kate Winslet.  They were both spectacular, with truly powerful mad scenes.  However, Winslet had the double advantage of a full, unadulterated text, and great actors to play off of.  While none of that is Carter’s fault, it did mean that Winslet was better able to create a full, complex character.  Kate Winslet, with Helena Bonham-Carter in a very close second. 

Best Horatio

Horatio is a character who can easily fall flat, especially in heavily cut versions of the text.  However, if given enough lines and a good actor, he can be one of the coolest characters in the play.  The best of the Horatios was Peter de Jersey in Gregory Doran’s film. He had a quiet presence throughout the film, and his friendship with Hamlet was understated but strong.  Runner up:  Nicholas Farrell in Kenneth Branagh’s Hamlet. 

Best Laertes

While he certainly wasn’t in the best of the Hamlets, Peter Cumpsty’s Laertes was spot on, brining out sympathy without overacting, and giving the character some real personality in his short time on screen.  Runners-up: Terence Morgan in Laurence Olivier’s Hamlet and Edward Bennet in Gregory Doran’s Hamlet. 

Best Osric

Ryan Gage in Gregory Doran’s film is the obvious winner in this category.  He was a perfect foil for David Tennant’s Hamlet to run circles around, but he seemed like a real person, not a cartoon character.  They had by far the funniest Osric scene.  

Best Players

The players in Branagh’s Hamlet had Charlton Heston and they were played as a group of extremely talented professionals.  Their scenes were two of the best in the entire film.  An easy win to the players in Branagh’s Hamlet, with particular praise for Heston’s Player King. 

Best Fortinbras

Ian Charleston’s Fortinbras in Rodney Bennet’s Hamlet wasn’t woven into the plot with the same detail as Rufus Sewell’s Fortinbras in Kenneth Branagh’s Hamlet.  However, he managed to make an extremely strong impression during his brief moment in act four, and his cool, assertive takeover at the end was perfectly done.

 And some silly ones...

Most Incestuous Closet Scene

There’s really no competition here.  Mel Gibson and Glenn Close in Franco Zefirelli’s Hamlet took the incest to a whole new level.  Watch with caution. 

Sleaziest Rosencrantz and Guildenstern

Jonathan Hyde and Geoffrey Bateman as Rosencrantz and Guildenstern in Rodney Bennet’s Hamlet practically left a trail of slime behind them everywhere they went. 

Best Time Lord in Hamlet

Four Time Lords have cropped up in the fifteen Hamlet films: Patrick Troughton, Derek Jacobi, Lalla Ward and David Tennant.  Since Troughton had about two lines as the Player King in Olivier’s Hamlet, he’s out of the running, and since Lalla Ward was a completely mediocre Ophelia in Bennet’s Hamlet, so is she.  That leaves Jacobi and Tennant, in a very hard decision.  Jacobi was in two Hamlets and Tennant was in one, but Jacobi only played a Time Lord for one episode, whereas Tennant played the Time Lord, and for three seasons.  The award goes to David Tennant. 

Worst “To be or not to be”

William Houston in Michael Mundell’s Hamlet was bad on technical aspects, and as bland as possible in acting aspects.  There were dark shadows over his face, lighting inconsistencies, a shaking camera, and constant distracting jumps to different camera angles.  That, coupled with a bland delivery makes it easily the worst.  Runner-up:  Laurence Olivier, because he managed to hit every cliché there is about that speech. 

Sexiest Hamlet

Why is this even a question?  David Tennant, obviously. 

Most Over the top Laertes

For some reason, actors playing Laertes frequently take it was a free license to chew up all the scenery, so there’s fairly heavy competition in this category.  However, the award has to go to Stepan Oleksanko in Grigori Kozinstev’s Hamlet.  Runner-up: David Robb in Rodney Bennet’s Hamlet. 

Worst Line Flub

While there’s some heavy competition between Ethan Hawke and William Houston to see who could flub the most lines, the award goes to Ethan Hawke for his dreadful mistake during “To be or not to be” where he referred to death as “The undiscovered country to whose bourn no traveller returns.” 

Most Overdone Death

In Branagh’s Hamlet, Claudius was murdered by a sword thrown from across the room that managed to completely impale him, then crushed with a falling chandelier and then force-fed poison.  It was a bit much, to say the least.