There has been significant fanfare surrounding Hamnet, and with good reason. The film marks Chloé Zhao’s awaited return to narrative storytelling after winning Best Picture and Best Director for Nomadland in 2020.
This film, co-written by Maggie O’Farrell’s from her original novel – a fictional tale about the origins of William Shakespeare writing Hamlet – is more unbalanced and I had hoped, but is anchored by two deeply felt performances from Jessie Buckley and Jacobi Jupe. I also, on the record, came in with extremely high expectations, as Hamnet has thrust its way to the front of the Oscars conversation.
I have a complicated relationship whether or not Paul Mescal is a good actor. There have been films that I particularly love his performance in, and others, not as much. In Hamnet, I think he is okay. What’s undeniable is the emotional precision Jessie Buckley brings to Agnes. It is at times an astonishing performance during the quiet and interior moments, but felt less potent when she was swinging for the emotional fences. Overall, there is a stillness in her work that her expressive face carries so much on and she destined to be in the Best Actress conversation. I was also deeply impressed by the performance of, Jacobi Jupe, who plays Hamnet. For a young actor, he absolutely defied my expectation.
Now let’s move to the Chloe Zhao of it all. She has a speckled history as a filmmaker, but I applaud her visual prowess and interesting ideas translated to cinema. From the opening moments, she leans into her signature aesthetic – natural light, slow pace, and an incredible sense of natures surround. It’s a very meditative film and, by extension, very slow. Usually this is a feature, but in Hamnet, it felt too meandering. This left me frustrated as the first act gave audiences little build into the relationship between Mescal and Buckley, so the second act feeling so aimless felt like a misfire. That runtime could be have been deployed more usefully.
What was curated brilliantly was the third act, described by critics as an absolute wallop. And I generally agree, but would even point to the most powerful section of the film being the last 10 minutes. It was a stunning conclusion to this tragedy, and there were few dry eyes in the auditorium. In addition, there was a spiritual sequence in the middle of the film I thought was equally exceptional and emotional. These two scenes carry a lot of my liking for Hamnet overall.
It’s easy to admire Hamnet, but I didn’t love it. There are special individual elements – pockets of strong performances, stunning cinematography, and those two aforementioned scenes – but the entire feature doesn’t come together fully to create the impact I was hoping for, or the expectations the film community asserted.
