laurentic

I have rarely been so depressed by a movie as this one, not least that it finds 97% critical favour on Rotten Tomatoes.

Clearly I'm in the miniscule minority, but for me the film - and its rave response - sums up all that's wrong with the human race: macho jingoism laced with toe-curling sentimentality. The only bright note was that my 13 y/o daughter found it equally cringeworthy.

Shakespeare had it in one: "It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing."

Utterly brilliant - I saw this film 17 times in the cinema when it first came out in 1964 - and I was all of 18. I'd never read Hamlet, never heard of Shostakovitch, couldn't speak a word of Russian - and yet this film changed my life! Now it's finally arrived on DVD in all its original splendour, complete with Shostakovitch's sensational score in stereo... The editing of Shakespeare's original by Pasternak is masterly, the direction faultless - but it's Innokenty Smoktunovsky's interpretation of Hamelt that lingers a lifetime in the mind. I've seen every other film adaptation of Hamlet, and none of them come anywhere close to this incredible cinematic masterpiece, which remains my #1 film of all time!