Rotten Tomatoes Logo Do you want to see ‘Hamlet’?

Hamlet (1996)

tomatometer

94

Average Rating: 8.2/10
Reviews Counted: 54
Fresh: 51 | Rotten: 3

Kenneth Branagh's sprawling, finely textured adaptation of Shakespeare's masterpiece lives up to its source material, using strong performances and a sharp cinematic focus to create a powerfully resonant film that wastes none of its 246 minutes.

79

Average Rating: 7.2/10
Critic Reviews: 14
Fresh: 11 | Rotten: 3

Kenneth Branagh's sprawling, finely textured adaptation of Shakespeare's masterpiece lives up to its source material, using strong performances and a sharp cinematic focus to create a powerfully resonant film that wastes none of its 246 minutes.

audience

86

liked it
Average Rating: 3.8/5
User Ratings: 30,173

My Rating

Movie Info

Hamlet, son of the king of Denmark, is summoned home for his father's funeral and his mother's wedding to his uncle. In a supernatural episode, he discovers that his uncle, whom he hates anyway, murdered his father. In an incredibly convoluted plot--the most complicated and most interesting in all literature--he manages to (impossible to put this in exact order) feign (or perhaps not to feign) madness, murder the "prime minister," love and then unlove an innocent whom he drives to madness, plot

PG-13, 3 hr. 58 min.

Drama, Romance

Kenneth Branagh

Sony Pictures Classics

All Critics (54) | Top Critics (14) | Fresh (54) | Rotten (3) | DVD (3)

There are many ... instances when you want to run screaming from Elsinore Castle.

September 25, 2002 Full Review Source: Washington Post | Comments (4)
Washington Post
Top Critic IconTop Critic

With his handsome and compelling Hamlet, Kenneth Branagh brings the Bard's greatest tragedy passionately alive on the screen.

August 15, 2002 Full Review Source: Los Angeles Times | Comment
Los Angeles Times
Top Critic IconTop Critic

This Hamlet may not be perfect, but it is perfectly engrossing.

April 12, 2002 Full Review Source: Globe and Mail | Comment
Globe and Mail
Top Critic IconTop Critic

As star and ringmaster, Branagh gets to the heart of Hamlet and goes to admirable lengths to take his audience there, too.

January 1, 2000 Full Review Source: New York Times | Comment
New York Times
Top Critic IconTop Critic

Moviegoers who applauded the vigilante justice in such recent films as Joel Schumacher's A Time To Kill and Barry Levinson's Sleepers should be totally in sync with the action and have no trouble surmounting the verbiage.

January 1, 2000 Full Review Source: Sacramento Bee | Comment
Sacramento Bee
Top Critic IconTop Critic

Every little triumph seems to inspire in Branagh some accompanying act of bad taste or judgment.

January 1, 2000 Full Review Source: Salon.com | Comments (3)
Salon.com
Top Critic IconTop Critic

A work of tremendous personal ambition equipped with a budget nearly equal in magnitude.

April 20, 2011 Full Review Source: Slant Magazine | Comment
Slant Magazine

Shakespeare's great tragedy -- all of it.

January 2, 2011 Full Review Source: Common Sense Media | Comment
Common Sense Media

To be, or not to be. Kenneth Branagh's seminal Hamlet is as conflicted and vital as life itself.

August 18, 2010 Full Review Source: Slant Magazine | Comment
Slant Magazine

The play widely regarded as the best piece of dramatic literature ever written...[in] the only unexpurgated big-screen version. [Blu-ray]

August 16, 2010 Full Review Source: Groucho Reviews | Comment

Simply gorgeous to look at, and a number of the performances are outstanding...

July 2, 2008 Full Review Source: TV Guide's Movie Guide | Comment
TV Guide's Movie Guide

Brave, yes, but undeniably excessive.

July 2, 2008 Full Review Source: Film4 | Comment

Die-hard Bard students may quibble, but this gargantuan and glorious Hamlet is a movie-lover's paradise.

September 17, 2007 Full Review Source: eFilmCritic.com | Comment
eFilmCritic.com

...when I first saw it on DVD, I wrote that its spectacular sets and costumes cried out for high definition. Apparently, Warner Bros. thought so, too. (Blu-ray Edition)

August 25, 2007 Full Review Source: Movie Metropolis | Comment
Movie Metropolis

Branagh combines one of the Bard's best plays with some of the best filmmaking the medium has to offer.

August 25, 2007 Full Review Source: Movie Metropolis | Comment
Movie Metropolis

The two-disc special edition DVD release of Hamlet is spectacular.

August 23, 2007 Full Review Source: Apollo Guide | Comment
Apollo Guide

Branagh has one-upped Olivier again by making his Hamlet a bold spectacle: big and loud and colorful.

August 16, 2007 Full Review Source: Combustible Celluloid | Comment
Combustible Celluloid

Fine version of one of The Bard's best plays.

December 8, 2006 Comment
Dispatch-Tribune Newspapers

If you're willing to sit through Branah's 4-hour Hamlet, you'll be rewarded with a lavishly mounted, full-bodied version that brings new dimensions.

July 15, 2006 Full Review Source: EmanuelLevy.Com | Comment

The few missteps, mostly in casting, are a drop in the bucket when it comes to this adaptation.

July 14, 2004 Comment
Needcoffee.com

Viewers patient enough to sit through four hours of this film are going to be rewarded with a memorable experience.

June 1, 2004 Full Review | Comment
rec.arts.movies.reviews
More Critic Reviews

Audience Reviews for Hamlet

Just as a cinematic experience, this film is unparalledled. It takes the story and puts it in a different era, but for the most part keeps the rest of things intact. This is a grand, long, sweeping epic that reaqlly does justice to the Bard and this, his most famous/popular (I'd assume) story. The technical stuff, like

May 12, 2011
cosmo313
Chris Weber

Super Reviewer

Incredible direction coupled with incredible acting equals Kenneth Brannagh's Hamlet. Full review later.

August 21, 2010
TomBowler
Thomas Bowler

Super Reviewer

Hamlet Quotes

No quotes approved yet for Hamlet. Logged in users can submit quotes.

Movies

Opening

59% Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace (in 3D) Feb 10
31% The Vow Feb 10
53% Safe House Feb 10

Top Box Office

85% Chronicle $22.0M
64% The Woman in Black $20.9M
77% The Grey $9.3M
73% Big Miracle $7.8M
29% Underworld Awakening $5.5M
2% One for the Money $5.2M
36% Red Tails $4.7M
90% The Descendants $4.6M
32% Man on a Ledge $4.4M
45% Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close $3.8M

Certified Fresh In Theaters

99% A Separation Dec 30
97% The Muppets Nov 23
97% The Artist Nov 25
96% Tomboy Nov 16
95% Pina Dec 23

Movies Like Hamlet

Latest News for Hamlet

What's Hot On RT

Critics Consensus
Critics Consensus

Journey 2 Not Worth the Trip

Luis Guzman
Luis Guzman

What are his 10 best movies ever?

<em>Amazing Spider-Man</em>
Amazing Spider-Man

See the all-new action-packed trailer!

The Avengers!
The Avengers!

Five new Marvelous pictures

Top Movie Quizzes

LEGO Mania: 2011 Best Picture Nominees
by natalie - 18,566 taken
created 12 months ago
How Much Do You Know About Leonardo DiCaprio?
by natalie - 44,438 taken
created 15 months ago
Pixar Movies!
by jdikwlzviv - 27,153 taken
created 15 months ago
The Wizards of Harry Potter
by jdikwlzviv - 27,649 taken
created 15 months ago

Foreign Titles

  • Hamlet (2009) (DE)
  • Hamlet (1996) (UK)
Help | About | Jobs | Newsletter | Critics Submission | API | Licensing | Blog | Developers | Mobile