Hamlet (1948)

Rating: 70%
The next best picture winner is Hamlet. Nuff said.

Plot:Well I'm pretty sure just about all of you who are reading this review know the actual story. But for those of you know don't, Hamlet is a prince in Denmark who has just lost his father. His mother marries his uncle and become king of Denmark. But then Hamlet comes across the ghost of his father who claims that he was actually murdered by his uncle so he can become king, so the ghost tells Hamlet to avenge him. Troubled by this news, Hamlet thinks about whether or not what the ghost said is true and that he should kill his uncle to avenge his father's death.

Honestly to me, this was just Hamlet. I'm not saying that it's bad or anything, but it wasn't something you'd already know if you know the story almost scene by scene. But I'm in no way saying that this movie is bad. It does give out some very good performances. They do a fairly good job in actually express how they are feeling with whatever is actually happening. I guess I didn't really expect that from this film because my brother had told me that he wasn't all that entertained when he saw this film a couple years ago or so. And I will also add that I ended up particularly enjoying the last half an hour or so of the film. The sword fighting was actually really well done, the last scene with Ophelia really showed how she goes mad, and I liked the symbolism with the last moment they had with Claudius. I thought it was a really nice touch. So with all of that said, it was better then I thought it would be. But that doesn't mean I was completely entertained. It was still Hamlet, a story that just about everyone knows. It gave us the story almost completely the way it was written - they completely left out the characters Fortinbras, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, which I was personally surprised about the last two and found that to be another down - so while it did things better then I thought they would, it wasn't much for me personally.

And that's basically my review for Hamlet. It's not a huge thing for me personally since I'm not a die hard fan of the play or anything, but it does have good performances, really enjoyable last half hour, and despite cutting some characters out, it otherwise give you Hamlet plain and simple making it a fairly enjoyable film to see.