V.ii. Duel and Deaths - Fodor (2007)

Much more from Laertes' point of view than other adaptations, the sequence starts with him painting his blade with poison and tying a red ribbon - belonging to his dead sister Polonia - to the hilt. There is an odd smelling-of-the-ribbon moment that's in line with the incestuous vibe of the family and Laertes will be haunted by red-filtered memories of his dead sisters over the course of the next minutes. Though we can sympathize with his loss, we mustn't forget this version of Laertes is a psychopath. And yet, does his resolve flag after Hamlet's sincere apology? The way he grits his teeth having to say he would not wrong Hamlet's love makes us think perhaps it does, he does not wish to wrong it but knows he must.

Fodor's limited means to stage the duel sets it in an unimpressive white room (like much of the film), too small for an audience (or a camera, the excitement of the fight is sustained by POV shots and editing). Claudius, Gertrude and others - including Rosencrantz & Guildenstern, very much alive - thus stand behind the two-way mirror, observing. One observer that stands in the room itself is the Ghost, sarcastically looking on, and sometimes visible to the participants, especially when they're about to die. The duelists' attendants are sometimes present, sometimes not, initially seen in perfectly composed shots just behind their friend - creepy Osric for Laertes, and loyal Horatio for Hamlet. The latter obeys her feelings more readily than Hamlet does and has a sense of what's about to unfold, staring at Laertes' blade most intently. But the purplish color of the metal isn't necessarily proof of foul play. Also in the room with them, so to speak, is Polonia. Not physically (or in ghost form), but as that red ribbon, showing even when the swords themselves don't, as the white blows them out of sight. Unfortunate that the sound of the room is so hollow, speaking to the film's cheapness more than the visuals do. If the dialog isn't recorded properly at times, at least Fodor uses sound design to enhance the scene, with cheering crowds and driving techno.

As the fight progresses, Claudius seems to lose faith in his plan. "Our son shall win" isn't the insincere enthusiasm that's often depicted, but something he fears is happening, or is even resigned to at that point. After Gertrude drinks from the unattended cup, sad Claudius stops looking at the fight and only looks at her. The Ghost smiles sarcastically at the situation. Meanwhile, Hamlet gets his hands sliced open, at which point he and Laertes go at it with fists, and in the struggle, the Prince gets his hands on the ribboned foil and skewers Laertes (which is potentially a fatal wound, poison or no). The music cuts out, everyone just stands there not knowing what to do, and then Gertrude starts to convulse and dies. In a small trade of lines, it's Horatio who deduces and reveals the cup was poisoned, not Laertes, making her a stronger character in the end. That hard bastard confesses and dies, but does not point fingers or ask for forgiveness.

The culprit is clear and Hamlet's call to seek out treachery is pointed firmly at Claudius who then gets stabbed repeatedly. The POV shot (above) is violent but not gory, and the scene shifts to a blue filter as Claudius enters the Ghost's world (we don't see it per se, but this is the implication). Horatio is shocked, the Ghost's face does not change, presumably the courtiers (including R&G) have run off, there will be no Fortinbras in this version. Dissolves during the stabbing makes it seem like it lasted a long time too.

Hamlet's final scene is his farewell to Horatio (and it's his strongest scene in the film), a two-shot that gives them equal importance, perhaps to highlight the passing of the story from one teller to the other. The sound of the ocean outside can be heard, death coming in like a tide. Her offer of a suicide pact is rejected, but as the cup isn't in her hands, Hamlet's "let go" takes on another meaning: "Let [me] go". Here, Horatio's gender swap allows for a tenderness that's been politicized by modern day audiences when both are male, and yet, they don't hold each other with their arms, only their eyes. Hamlet kisses her tears away, and then her, full on the lips. He dies loving his best friend as Marillion's "She'll Never Know" plays. A more positive ending than one might have expected from his "horror" adaptation. The sexual tension between these characters ends with Hamlet's death (the literary connection between sex and death need not be expounded on here). As he dies, the room gets darker. The Ghost finally approaches and Horatio sees him, an angel of death (though should we be thinking her doom will yet come?). A crashing sound like a gun shot, cut to black and credits. That's almost a reference to Fortinbras' war-like volley, isn't it?

V.ii. The Readiness Is All - Fodor (2007)

In Fodor's version of the play, Osric and his attendant Lord are figures of almost cartoony disposition, but with a definite sinister streak. As Hamlet and Horatio stand against a white wall - he, sorry for what he's done and she, disappointed - Osric and the Lord are intercut walking, taking the lift, etc. They even have a theme, Coming by Goldie, and "What were the chances?" sampled over their arrivals and departures, an ironic phrase since we know full well the King will put his plan into action now. Just as Horatio approaches Hamlet in comfort and forgiveness, the spell is broken by a comically fast Osric, handing the Prince his card. She is bemused as the Lord creates a set around them - a couch, a table, a plant - and this turns into the sort of interview one might have with an insurance salesman.

So when Osric tells Hamlet he's hot, it's like a test. Do YOU think it's hot? Oh you think it's cold? Okay, let's write that down. And so on. Osric has this fake laugh to indicate he doesn't really understand what the Prince is telling him, or perhaps to disarm him. Meanwhile, Fodor cuts frequently to the over-expressive Lord, just standing there making kooky expressions, or licking his chops lasciviously. The comedy is grotesque so as not to jar too much with the horror of the piece. Belchambers runs through Hamlet's lines in quick, mumbling fashion, but the character's almost incidental after a while. The camera only likes the other three. Horatio is very much amused by Osric and his big wager calculator until a words resonates with her: hangers. It's an executioner's pun. A bell sounds. And from then on, Horatio loses her good spirits and watches Osric carefully. And he looks back at her. They're the two people in the room who understand what's really happening, and Hamlet seems completely oblivious. Osric's face in slow motion as he waits for an answer, like a predator in a nature documentary.

After he leaves, Horatio's warnings make her sound like the wise one, and Hamlet seems naive. Belchambers doesn't give the famous lines from this sequence any kind of gravitas, murders it in fact. No readiness from him, literally and perhaps even on the actor's part. But "let be" and fade to black.

V.i. Ophelia's Funeral - Fodor (2007)

Sad music plays over a series of expedient shots separated by fades to black: The burial party approaching, a blue-lipped enshrouded Ophelia in the ground, Hamlet hiding behind a tree. When we pull out and start the scene, the grave is absurdly shallow, which seems a production necessity though does facilitate Laertes' interaction with his sister's corpse. This may be Jason Wing's finest moment as Laertes, who brings more dimension to the character in this scene than in any other. His Laertes is such a psychotic thug, one hardly understands how Hamlet can say "I loved you ever", but here he sustains a believable state of grief balanced with rage. He's a very threatening man, and no one wants to irk him further, which is why he has to repeat his first question twice. The Priest (played by Fodor himself) gives an appropriately nervous performance as the man who must still give the answers.

In a "shocking" production like this one, you'd expect the leap into the grave to be include some objectionable element, but Fodor surprises by letting Laertes show actual kindness. It's not a full-on, incestuous embrace, but the stroke of a cheek, the covering of her face with the shroud, and notably, the taking of a red scarf, the only real color in the scene. It's the color of blood, a symbol of his revenge perhaps. And then Hamlet reveals himself and Laertes goes limp. Not literally, but his performance does. They've built him up as a thuggish monster too much for this confrontation to be so tepid. A couple of men hold him, but they probably shouldn't even have been able to pry him off Hamlet's throat. Horatio, a member of the burial party, is immediately at Hamlet's side (missing the black eye Laertes gave her, oops!), but he doesn't need much holding. Gertrude is so shocked she reverts to her native German. Claudius flies into action, giving orders and shuffling the characters about. He gives the words urgency and power, but when you think about it, he merely sends everyone where they would naturally have gone. Gertrude and Horatio with Hamlet, Laertes with him. It's like telling a cat to do something it's about to do and calling it trained. Such is his power in Denmark.

V.i. The Gravedigger Scene - Fodor (2007)

Fodor's version of this scene still features black comedy, but the scene is heavily re-engineered. The jokes are different as are some of the participants. It begins with Hamlet and Bernardo (not Horatio) jogging down a forest path. Because Hamlet's exile was omitted from the film, it's not clear whether he left at all, though he would know of Ophelia's death if he was at Elsinore. Perhaps he's staying at a friend's house - Bernardo's - in the same area. They hear a tussle, noise that leads them to the priest hitting the Gravedigger. Fodor himself plays the priest, a character that steals lines from the First Clown (the Gravedigger in this scene is the dense Second Clown), and from Horatio/Bernardo, acting as bouncing board and exposition.

If he's hitting the 2nd Clown in the beginning, it's for not having found the answer to his riddle. But that's not really where the black comedy comes from because these lines are mostly cut. Instead, there's the matter of the grave being dug in a minefield - surely a comment on a rotting Denmark and the wars Hamlet's father fought - with the addle-brained Clown fiddling around with a found mine (a pun on whose grave it is? "Mine, sir"?), and having both feet in his grave, exploding. The other men are pelted with dirt, the Priest picks up his arm and delivers his original joke's punchline "the gallows may do well to thee". The adaptation has a nasty, horror vibe, but this scene is nasty in another way, and doesn't quite fit. It gets worse.

William Bedchambers is not the most solid of Hamlets at the best of times, but this scene sees him at his worst. Bad line readings that emphasize the wrong words and multiple fluffs as he struggles to get his lines out, an indie budget possibly keeping the production from doing them again. The hesitations give the scene a less rehearsed quality, which could be a positive, but practically shrugging at the fact he knew Yorick as if it were an off-hand remark drains the life out of the moment.

IV.vii. Ophelia's Death - Fodor (2007)

The Ophelia in this adaptation is a junkie, now in withdrawal after her sister Polonia's death, as she was her "medicator". When she finds a syringe and tries to shoot up, she dies from an overdose. Her death is intercut with the previous sequence, increasing the tension, but also drawing a link between the talk of the poison and the girl accidentally poisoning herself. Because events are so different from the ones related by Gertrude, the Queen isn't needed here and does not appear. It's a small mercy, because the actress' handle on the English language is limited. It's not clear that she would have given the speech what it needed.

In contrast to Claudius and Laertes discussing Hamlet in a dark room, Ophelia's sequences are blown-out, a pure white bleaching the color out of the film. The sound design is just as extreme. We may be hearing and seeing her madness and her ecstasy, or we may be experiencing the scenes from the Ghost's limbo. He watches as Ophelia "drowns" in her narcotic bliss, chokes, convulses and finally stops moving. Suddenly, her body is on the beach in the same position. Were we there all along? Has the Ghost moved her? The latter is suggested. He continues to watch as Claudius and Laertes run to her silent (as per the sound design) and apparently unbidden.

One of Fodor's key ideas is keeping the Ghost in the play all the way through as an unseen observer, although here it is suggested he takes an active hand in Ophelia's death. She finds the heroin under mysterious and fortuitous (in a sense) circumstances, in a room filled with his signature white light. He moves her body where she might be found by the people upon whom he wants revenge. Or since this will arguably push Hamlet over the edge, perhaps he's engineering events so that his son finally kills Claudius like he promised. The more his tardy son waits, the more blood will be shed. Fodor's Ghost is a figure from horror stories whose agency is more direct.

IV.vii. Claudius' Seduction - Fodor (2007)

Fodor actually intercuts this scene with Ophelia going to her death, making the two moments more overtly simultaneous and giving Fortune justification for killing a young girl. As Laertes plots against Hamlet for the loss of one sister (the feminized Polonia, so Claudius "loving" Laertes' sister has extra meaning), another is taken from him as payment for his sin. Ophelia's death we will discuss at a later date, but the editing does give the Claudius-Laertes scene more forward momentum and contrasts talk of death with death actually happening. This is largely the function of the darkness in this candle-lit scene, contrasting with the whiteness of Ophelia's ecstatic world (and this "Denmark" in general), though of course, it fits the mood of the conspiracy.

Notably, Laertes initially refuses a glass of wine from Claudius, which is how we might track the seduction (not that this psychotic Laertes needs much prodding, he must only be convinced of the specific plan). The idea of the rapier duel is made acceptable in a modern setting by the inclusion of the oft-cut Lamond, introducing Laertes' reputation for fencing into an era that would normally not feature swords, but Laertes grimaces at first. He'll do it, but it needs something more. He adds poison to the mix (meanwhile, Ophelia is poisoning herself with drugs), and cold, unblinking Claudius puts some in a wine cup as his plan B. Only then does Laertes accept a glass, and they drink together, not realizing this wine is poisoned too. Sealing this deal, they've put into motion the mechanism of their own deaths. They might as well have drunk the venom directly.

IV.v. Laertes Returns - Fodor (2007)

Fodor's Laertes is a psychotic brute, never more apparent than in his return from France. Instead of leading a rebellion directly to the King and Queen, he first makes a move on Hamlet's friends, Horatio and Francisco, knocking the latter out and viciously beating the former to some heavy metal music. It appears as if he's about to rape Horatio, but Laertes actually takes his belt off to choke her with it, dragging her to the beach as a hostage when he meets Claudius and Gertrude. Though the disturbing inference is there, I'm relieved the film didn't go there, as it would have been a paltry misuse of Horatio's feminization.

At the beach, this Laertes proves too gross in nature to keep to the Shakespeare's lines, dropping a number of F-bombs into his speech that emphasizes his beastliness. Of course, the text was going to suffer a lot of changes anyway, since he's not asking after his father's death, but his sister's, Polonia being this adaptation's other feminized character. The sexual politics that come into play actually give Claudius a better motive for Polonia's death, and Laertes more justification to come after the King. After all, Polonia had been Claudius' lover, so both Royals would have had reason to want her killed. Their discussion becomes a shouting match, which is perhaps the only way one can communicate with this brutish Laertes. While present, Horatio of course has no lines during this scene, but that can easily be attributed to a bruised throat. Gertrude is also largely taken out of it as the King's pleas for her to let Laertes ("Let him go, Getrude") become "Let her go, Laertes", in reference to the captive Horatio.

Then a strange moment that foreshadows Ophelia's death. Laertes hears a noise, turns around, the sound drops out in favor of eerie music, and Ophelia stands there, flowers in hand, in saturated whites and blues. She's a ghost, already dead as far as fate goes. She comes forward and kisses him passionately, something Laertes has the surprising decency to find disturbing. If there's something this whole sequence proves is that while painted as a coarse monster, Fodor's Laertes isn't sexual, only violent. He would probably be intolerable if he were both.

The the sound drops back in, the colors return to normal, and the scene regains a sense of normalcy (such as it is) as the girl frenetically looks through her brother's pockets, likely looking for heroin, though she finds nothing. Remember, Polonia was supplying her with it, and a large part of Ophelia's breakdown in this version is attributed to withdrawal. Angry and bitter, and holding back tears, she then proceeds to distributing her flowers before walking off, her final words completely cut as we move back to Claudius' seduction of Laertes. She does tweak some the lines she IS afforded to interesting effect, in particular "You must sing a-down a-down, / An you call him a-down-a" pronounced "a-down-er", a clue to the drugs that are on her mind, as well as a less-than-stellar appreciation for her cruel, manipulative sister.

IV.v. Ophelia's Madness - Fodor (2007)

The more extreme relationships in this version of the play transform the meaning of almost every line in the scene (at least, those that survived the edit). It occurs under a quay on a muddy beach where Ophelia is brought to the Queen by Horatio and the Gentleman, where they exchange sarcastic barbs. It's a reversal. Instead of the Queen trying to avoid the mad young girl, she instead has the disruptive Ophelia brought to her for a scolding, either on her orders or by Horatio's initiative. Why is Gertrude so aloof? We have to remember that in this version, the slain Polonia was Ophelia's SISTER, a sister having an affair with Claudius. The Queen may be transferring resentment to the mistress' sister. The scene also suggests a similar adulterous relationship between Claudius and Ophelia, as the songs (here just shouted rhymes) about "tumbling" are thrown the King's way. And he seems particularly empathetic, though again, this may be transference as she was his lover's sister. Either way, the mistrust in the Queen's eyes is what creates the ambiguity.

Oddly, the songs are not gender-translated like the rest of the play. "He is dead and gone" can now only mean Hamlet, because Ophelia has lost no father. Hamlet isn't dead, though they might have said that to comfort her. She might be talking about Hamlet Sr., as she is one of the people who seems able to see the Ghost when she's high on heroin. Fodor had a perfect excuse for Ophelia's madness even in his modern context, but he doesn't seem to use it here and the scene is the weaker for it. Polonia was Ophelia's pusher, and the girl could have been crashing hard at this point. However, the performance has none of that, and the way Ophelia recites the songs by rote, without inflection or inner discourse, doesn't work either as withdrawal OR madness.

Fodor suggests a number of dark happenings in both past and present, but they don't come together satisfyingly in this scene.

Act IV, Scenes 1-3 - Fodor (2007)

Fodor's Hamlet makes Ophelia much more of a participant in this sequence, starting on her and a visitation from the Hamlet ghost child. She follows him out into the hall, where a young Ophelia ghost is also running around. In this world, it seems your spirit can leave you early and remain in echoes of better times. Ophelia ignores her younger self and moves towards the end of the hall while intelligible shouts are heard resonating through Elsinore, likely people looking for Hamlet. Ophelia finds him first, having just stowed the body behind a folding screen, in a room dimly lit in red. She spies from one of the doors as Rosencrantz & Guildenstern find Hamlet. These are much more menacing, violent characters in Fodor's adaptation, so Rosencrantz is visibly holding back from attacking the Prince with great difficulty. Guildenstern's "A thing, my lord?" is said with outrage instead of the usual misunderstanding tone. Calling the King a thing is, it seems, a step too far, and the sponges wonder how much trouble Hamlet is willing to get himself into.

After they leave, Ophelia walks towards the folding screen where she finds her sister Polonia's body, hung in the closet, head down.

 She tries to take her down, to awaken her, and failing, throws an expletive-filled tantrum. Flashback images remind us of Polonia's role as her sister's drug pusher, sticking needles into her arm to manipulate her. The whole set-up creates an entirely new motivation for Ophelia's madness. She hasn't lost a beloved father at her lover's hand, she's lost her dealer. She's angry, not distraught, but soon she'll be feeling the pangs of withdrawal. What's most interesting is that Polonia has basically been placed "behind an arras", in death an image of the life she led.

Scene 3 is entirely omitted (as is Scene 1). It's an odd exclusion, and we may wonder where Hamlet has gone. The point is made later when he returns, so expediency may have been the order of the day. And since Ophelia discovers Polonia's body, there's less of a reason for Claudius to keep asking where it is.

III.iv. The Closet Scene - Fodor (2007)

Fodor's Hamlet really scrambles this scene up, changing the order of lines and events, to get the most creepiness out of it, but also to cover the fact that Gertrude hates her romantic rival Polonia, and the latter would not scream for help if Gertrude were in danger. Polonia's death scene thus comes at the end, rather than early on.

One of the points of view in the scene is a security monitor watched by the Ghost, who looks bored and distant, cold. This is an odd conceit, but as the scene develops, one used to create an image of the land of the dead. When the Ghost appears to Hamlet, there's a flicker that makes the normal image desaturate and distort, as if we were suddenly looking through the monitor. The effect heralds the Ghost's presence and is not sustained throughout the visitation, though Hamlet's POV is blown out, irridescent, whereas his mother's is normal. It's not just the sense of the supernatural that's conveyed here, but perhaps that he's having some kind of psychotic episode, hallucinating. And indeed, it's the Ghost that nods pointedly in the mirrored closet's direction from where Polonia watches. Real or not, it's the proverbial voice telling Hamlet to kill. And it makes sense that this Ghost would want Polonia dead, as she appears to have been a co-conspirator in his murder, or he may just want to push Hamlet over the edge to turn him into the weapon he needs him to be. If the Ghost is NOT real, the Hamlet is merely picking up on his mother's early reference to seeing black and grained spots as she looks right into the mirrored door, a silent cue to warn him they're being watched, something his psychotic break makes him subconsciously realize. Because we so often see the Ghost from an omniscient, third person POV, we must surely accept the Ghost is real, however, though it may be we are as mad as Hamlet.

The way the lines are stacked (and performed) in this adaptation, Hamlet is less of an accuser and more of a convincer. That's because Gertrude is already well on her way to rejecting Claudius, who she knows is already being unfaithful to her (with Polonia). As her son begins to speak, flashbacks to such indiscretions cross-fade through the screen. These same words and if somehow shared, images, bring a smile to closet queen Polonia's face. There is no real violence between mother and son, even once Hamlet pulls out a gun, and after Polonia's death, Gertrude easily promises not to let Claudius tempt her to bed, nodding emphatically, comforting him, completely sincere. Once again we must contend with parts of her dialog being delivered in German, which isn't so baffling in the context of royal pairings. Gertrude might well have been another country's alliance with Denmark, a rare pearl from another realm that two brothers fought over, though that's not very relevant to this modern staging.

After the Ghost leaves, a pounding beat is introduced in the score, Hamlet makes his mother sit in front of the mirror (introducing the line about setting up a glass much later in the scene) as he points a gun at her reflection. Her death will be a symbolic one, the death of the mother he hates, allowing her to be reborn on his side rather than her husband's. Polonia senses the bullets flying around her, and in an interesting bit of editing, flashes (as perhaps Hamlet does too) to the icepick murder shown in Hamlet's film. As the icepick enters the ear, so does a bullet penetrate her. The door opens, and to Hamlet's horror, he hasn't killed Claudius but Polonia (horror at having killed, at any rate, and in realizing he must kill again to honor his revenge pact). Polonia is framed in a smaller screen, her skin blue, with a treatment that makes it seem like she's part of Hamlet's film, odd slowed-down, choking sounds coming from her. This is where the fantasy of death and its reality converge, the cognitive dissonance Hamlet experiences. Polonia's death is almost painterly, a posed tableau. And eventually, the screen, colors and treatment adjust to normality (or what passes for it in this horrific version), and her death becomes real. Hamlet cries, for his own soul if not for this villain's.

III.iii. The Confessional - Fodor (2007)

Fodor cut into this scene substantially, but his spareness works. The penitent Claudius is first seen in shadow (above) and says one line from his talk with Rosencrantz & Guildenstern (absent), inserting it in the soliloquy admitting his guilt. The line: "I like him not, nor stands it safe with us / To let his madness range". His guilt for past sins is prefaced by the promise of future sins. So it is in the play, but by removing all intervening text, Fodor brings the irony forward. Even as Claudius is praying for forgiveness, he has put into motion more evil. In this version, the speech can't even really be called a prayer, since it avoids his wish for forgiveness. This is a darker world where divine intervention isn't an option, and where it would not be believable for any of the characters to actually be pious. In part because of the modern setting, but also because their interpretation is so much more corrupt than in the classic text.

Mid-prayer (as it were), the lights come up and Polonia enters. Or has she been there all along? She is, in this version, fully aware of Claudius' misdeeds, and often a willing participant. She's there to explain her plan to Claudius (substituting the word "arras" for "mirror" to match the later location), and despite their romantic relationship, seems afraid of him. Or perhaps FOR him. Claudius seems to be in shock, and zombie-like, shuffles off after Polonia when she stops speaking.
Holding his arm, she brings him back to his room before heading for Gertrude's, and they share a light kiss at the end of the hall. Still, Claudius barely responds to it, though he does turn back towards her as she leaves. She is, after all, a part of his sins, which are amply on his mind in this moment.

Earlier in the hall sequence, Hamlet creeps up behind them, sees them together, might even guess at Polonia's destination, but he does not, as in the play, attempt to kill Claudius. We know he has a gun and that he has said he could do "bitter business" this night, so the implication is that he might have shot them both in the back right then and there, but chose not to. Why is not revealed. He certainly has no cause to think Claudius is seeking redemption, nor that a praying man would go to Heaven even if he'd seen Claudius praying (which he has not). There's not even the sense that Hamlet feels sorry for his stepfather. He just ducks out of sight after a short moment, and only Polonia feels that perhaps she was being watched. It's possible her presence protected Claudius as Hamlet could not be sure he could perpetrate a double murder successfully.

III.ii. Critical Reception - Fodor (2007)

After the King leaves, Hamlet's insane clapping draws a hateful look from Polonia, who in this universe, is Claudius' lover. Polonius's change of gender has several effects, but one of them is creating a dynamic that makes attacks on Claudius that much more personal for his councilor (and chief accomplice?). The King obviously "blenched", and Horatio really did note him and shares in Hamlet's joy. There is no bitterness in them, Fodor treats this as a victory as yet untinged by what must come after. When Hamlet calls for the recorders, it's in a gently mocking, celebratory tone, a way of smoothing over the fact that it's a clarinet and not a medieval recorder he finds. It's amazing how an actor can simply put a little humor or sarcasm into a single word and modernize it immediately. Rosencrantz & Guildenstern, dangerous bullies in this world, are really angry and do a lot of shouting out of their frustration. They're at the end of their ropes. In fact, their reaction is so strong that Hamlet's "I am tame" shames them into a quieter stance. They're the ones who seem crazy, not him. Instead of the aggressive, threatening madness most Hamlet put on in this sequence, this one instead goes for innocent playfulness, as a man-boy who doesn't understand why people are angry at him. Ever his partner in this affair, Horatio quietly smiles next to him, somehow acting as Hamlet's irony. It's how R&G know they're being laughed at. No matter how much they threaten him with body language and tone, Hamlet doesn't lose his composure. On "as easy as lying", he makes it a discovery, an answer inspired by looking at them. And there's no violence in the business with the recorders. He just gives them the clarinet and begs them to play it, more a petulant child than a dangerous man in his own right. They hesitate before admitting to not knowing how and roughly disassembling the instrument before giving it back, again an implied threat. By the time Hamlet gets to "you cannot play upon me", Polonia is standing behind R&G and the remark is addressed to her as much as to them, if not more. Through the innocent act, he lets slip that he knows they're all in league with each other. The imaginary cloud in the ceiling plays out as a power struggle, Polonia refusing to be intimidated, her responses dripping with sarcasm to let him know she's quite aware of what he's doing. There is further osmosis between the conspirators at the end of the sequence when "by and by is easily said" is spoken to R&G instead of Polonia, but they put a further twist on it. R&G each get one "by" thrown in their direction, making it "bye" and "bye", a pun on their quick dismissal directly following. Horatio then leads him out of the room by the hand, a gesture that could be interpreted as either romantic or childish, but a tense sound stops him. Does he feel the Ghost? A gun left on a chair - it might have fallen out of R&G's pockets - draws his attention, and he fondles it as he says his speech, a prayer to the gods of violence. These choices are informed by the modern staging of the play in the film. Hamlet does not carry a weapon, so much procure one. And the "witching hour" cannot be heralded by bells or some such, so a strange feeling comes upon the Prince instead. It's a supernatural occurrence, this weapon suddenly materializing when Hamlet needs to kill the King, and supernatural forces may well be at work.

III.ii. The Mouse-Trap - Fodor (2007)

The Mouse-Trap is translated into a German experimental film in Fodor's vision. It was made very quickly, although the play does allow for temporal anomalies like this, as we've often discussed. In the film, we first see a hammer and a screwdriver, the murder weapons, as it turns out. Then the murderer, thinking, plotting. The Queen getting her picture taken, an image of the people's adulation. At this point, we cut to Hamlet in the audience, nodding along. Even in the text as written, the Queen hammers her point a bit stridently - Gertrude's evaluation is not far off - so this might indicate that her dialog was manipulated by Hamlet. A similar idea is used here to "get" Gertrude as well as Claudius. In the text, it makes her a betrayer of her word. In this version's film, she is a co-conspirator whose motivation seems to be greater fame and power.

The film continues... The Queen is having dinner and flirting (insincerely) with the King. In the audience, there are uncomfortable shots of Claudius and Polonia - in this version, his new mistress. Does she see herself onscreen? Is she actually the Queen character who seduces the King to slip him poison? We assume it's the Player Queen, because that's what it is in the text. Fodor's gender-switching game may give a different interpretation where the character is both women. On screen, drinks are brought to the table, and in the audience, it sparks Ophelia's "You are merry", but as with most of the dialog that should intercut the Mouse-Trap, it is done in voice-over, making it very ambiguous as to when these words were actually spoken. Usually, we can assume they were said before the start of the film. In others, such as Getrude's "The lady doth protest too much", that wouldn't make sense. Are these words just the imaginings of Hamlet, taking the place of memories? Or since we never see her "protest", are we hearing something said in an earlier part of the projection?

Back in the film, the King drinks and topples over (Polonia and Claudius share a look, and again we wonder if she's the woman). Horribly, the poison is just a knock-out drug and the murderer must stab the King in the ear, driving the screwdriver down with his hammer. At the first stab, we hear a horse neighing, perhaps an image imposed by Hamlet to represent his noble father.
Claudius starts getting hot under the collar, and at the murder, Fodor flash cuts to every character's reaction. Shock is registered on almost all faces, even on Rosencrantz/Guildenstern's, though he soon starts to laugh at how cool the violence is like the sociopath he is. Children's laughter is heard on the soundtrack at this point. The King rises and distraught, goes to stand before everyone, the movie projection flickering on his face. He's lost it completely and he stands revealed, the projection putting the murder on him, like blood on his hands. Everyone then leaves behind him, and only a judgmental Gertrude stays a moment to give her son a stern look (setting up the next scene), before leaving Hamlet and smiling Horatio alone in the dark to enjoy their victory.

III.ii. Instructing the Players - Fodor (2007)

Fodor actually weaves three sections of the scene together into a whole through the use of voice-over. The play has been turned into a film (one that must have been made very quickly, since we only just met the players), the projection of which is intercut with the faces of the people watching it (essentially, conspirators on both sides). None of the dialog is spoken during the film, but rather heard over the film (which is itself, if not silent, at least muted). We'll speak to that strangeness when we get to that part of the text, but for this section, it's simple enough. The only lines retained are an abbreviated version of Hamlet giving Horatio her mission, and her accepting. The voice-over acts as a memory from just before the projection as the two of them share secret, confident smiles, like the one above.

The Nunnery Scene - Fodor (2007)

The scene comes on the heels of the conspirators discussing their plans to spy on Hamlet while Ophelia boards him, even as they watch him practice fencing from behind a two-way mirror. Hamlet reclines on the floor, and they send Ophelia to him. She kisses him to wake him, and never really seems hurt through the scene. This is an Ophelia that's controlled by her sister (Polonia) through drugs, and one that might well be just as manipulative as her sister. In no way does she appear to be as vulnerable as other Ophelias are, but her confidence may be bolstered by drug use. In any case, the accidental image created by her hair connecting her mind with Hamlet's (above) is merely illusion. There is no emotional understanding between them. The two-way mirror device is well-used, allowing both Hamlet and Ophelia to look straight at Claudius and Polonia. The effect is different depending on the speaker. Hamlet's words are ironic because he doesn't know (at least initially) who he's really speaking to, while Ophelia can give meaningful looks to her co-conspirators. The image of that free-floating mirror creates an ironic wedding portrait. But while Ophelia remains rather cold, it's Polonia who reacts the most, giving weight to Hamlet's words. While Claudius shakes his head in disbelief, Polonia seems to feel the stings Ophelia does not. This is a new side to her character. Normally, she's basically psychotic, but do we glimpse here empathy for her sister? Or is she as selfish as ever and seeing the stepfather in the son? There's an obvious relationship between Claudius and Polonia in this film, but does he love her? And does she even care seeing as she's manipulating him anyway? It's an effect created by the mirror and the re-gendering that we have two couple on each side of the glass. At least some of her reactions come down to embarrassment at being proven wrong about Hamlet's love-induced madness. Certainly, Claudius reacts quite strongly at having his time wasted by this exercise. Is that loss of power over him what she's really reacting to? As the sound design becomes more and more bizarre - strange, anxious birds, and finally funereal bells - Hamlet seems to realize they might be watched. Having grown up in this house, he probably knows it's a two-way mirror. Ophelia doesn't answer him when he asks where her sister is, either because it would be absurd (the house is everyone's "home") or as a continuation of her passive, numb attitude. He leaves and she's left standing there, with no real reaction, and certainly no speech. On the other side of the mirror, Claudius also leaves, disagreeing with Polonia's take though not resolving to send Hamlet to England. We're left with two sisters, left by their lovers, staring at each other.

III.i. To Be or Not to Be - Fodor (2007)

Fodor's Hamlet places the speech very early in the story, as Hamlet sits at his reel-to-reel and speaks into a microphone just after a musical montage representing his first encounter with Ophelia (unseen but described in the play). It is then followed by Polonia's scene with her spy Reynaldo (or here, Reynalda). In effect, the speech is now part of Hamlet's initial set of reactions to meeting his father's ghost. At that point in his emotional journey, Hamlet is actively thinking about revenge, cutting off ties to loved ones, setting up his cover as a madman, and in this repurposed sequence, leaving a record of his thoughts for posterity. It's a suicide note on audio, except he doesn't go through with it. Hamlet's pace suggests he's been composing it in his head. He rattles off the speech rather quickly, especially the list of ills we must bear here on Earth.
The speech intercuts between the first frame shown and the one above, Hamlet's half-face (an image of ambivalence?). The camera in that shot gets ever closer to him as we delve deeper into his consciousness. These shots are further intercut with Hamlet Sr.'s funeral, as various characters kiss his dead mouth goodbye. We see Polonia in particular, intimating a relationship between her and the former King and a possible role in his betrayal. At "To die, to sleep, perchance to dream", those flashbacks begin, with a frame of various characters all fated to die, lined up in a row. At the very end, as Hamlet himself kisses his father's cadaver, we hear the sounds of bells and sea birds, disturbing elements taking us further into the memory. Those flashbacks are blown out even more than the present day's film treatment, adding a greenish tinge to the proceedings that evoke both a sickliness and perhaps the "pale cast of thought" itself.

A notable cut: The speech is largely intact but omits "For in that sleep of death what dreams may come". Why? I am unable to come up with an answer. Perhaps Fodor felt it was too pretty and precious a line for his horror story. Perhaps the actor skipped over it. Theories?

III.i. Briefings - Fodor (2007)

The conspirators are in a dark space, made stranger by often abstract angles, watching Hamlet practice his fencing from behind a two-way mirror. There is much to learn about the characters as Fodor imagines them here. The camera follows glances from Polonia's chest to Claudius' eyes, for example, and the two characters are sometimes standing next to each other, sometimes have Gertrude between them. Continuity mistake? The effect is to make the Queen's relevance intermittent at best. Even Ophelia, naive in the way she gazes at Hamlet, gleefully smiles at the end of the sequence when the Queen notices, powerless, that Polonia and Claudius are holding hands. The Queen knows of her husband's infidelities, but bears them and the scorn and ridicule of the entire house. This is a world with far more palpable corruption, and one gets a sense from these events that the King is not so much do things for Gertrude as he is for Polonia. Polonia's motivation is manipulation for manipulation's sake, or simply to do evil. She drugs her sister to control her, keeps her away from Hamlet, and is now bored with that and tries something else. Hamlet is either the object of a certain vengeance (he and Horatio have humiliated her with the truth of their words - a more distracted, older Polonius would probably not react like that), or a pretext for getting closer to the King. The idea that she is in control here is presented visually by having Rosencrantz & Guildenstern seem to speak to her more than to the King. The King is not in the frame, and Polonia, being closer, becomes the most powerful (largest) figure.

R&G are less sycophantic in this version, they just share Polonia's evil bent. In fact, only Gertrude in any way smiles. The others are all cold and calculating. They report their findings while watching Hamlet, as if he were some laboratory animal. "There did seem a kind of joy" is said with the voice of a scientist, observing an intriguing behavior. Polonia entreats the King to "hear and see the matter" in what sounds like a further variable. There is no sincerity in Polonia's voice; she essentially says "Let's see what happens when we humor him." It is an experiment.

Hamlet ends his practice (with an unnamed characters), and tells his sparring partner that he "fights like a girl". This departure from the text has an ironic bent, since Hamlet's adversaries in the play include two women (three in this adaptation), and he is about to have a confrontation (possibly violent) with one of them. He then goes up to the mirror to fix his shirt. Ophelia looks right into his eyes, unseen. She's a manipulator too, though her goal may be different. She is happy to be part of this plan and will not show the doubt and fear other Ophelias have been prone to. As he lies down to rest in the white room, Ophelia leaves the dark one to join him.

II.ii. O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I - Fodor (2007)

Hamlet's thought process via-à-vis this speech was almost all played out in his head during the previous sequence, through hallucinations that matched each of the Players with members of the Court. The effect the Players have on him is thus played rather than discussed (he doesn't unpack his heart with words). So the speech starts at "I have heard that guilty creatures sitting at a play", and because Horatio is present, those words are spoken to her. The soliloquy is turned into a (one-sided) conversation. Hamlet informs his friend of his plan, as he must do according to the text - Horatio is aware of the plan by the time the play rolls around - but there is no reaction from her (none are scripted, obviously). We simply fade to black.

Though we can of course mourn the loss of Hamlet's quest to better understand himself - these many cuts are part and parcel why William Belchambers is a weak Hamlet - we can still enjoy with interest the greater importance given to Horatio in the adaptation. She is present and even active through most of Act II, even though Shakespeare never included him/her in the text. And this element does work quite well. It makes the friendship more believable, and deepens the Horatio character. She is steadfast in her friendship to Hamlet, backing him up silently and thus, without judgment. Yes, it weakens Hamlet and any cuts made to the scenes where she is present seem to speak to some kind of self-censorship on his part (though the impression is only in the mind of the well-informed viewer who knows the text). Another reason it works as smoothly as it does is because the film takes place in the modern era, an era largely devoid of class issues. This Horatio may move about Elsinore, attend Hamlet and even face up to more highly placed "courtiers" (in the play's normal hierarchy, that is) without the social boundaries that would have prevented the "historical" Horatio from doing so.

II.ii. The Players - Fodor (2007)

Polonia walks into the room to announce the players' arrival. She seems disinterested and impatient in a way that reminds of Much Ado About Nothing's Beatrice taking pleasure "upon a knife's point". Hamlet and Horatio openly hate her. As she goes through the players' list of qualifications, it sounds like sarcasm, but it goes on so long, Horatio seems to wonder if she's for real. And then the players come in. Electronic music blares. The picture is polarized. We're in an 80s music video. The self-satisfied Polonia smiles and appears to find them cool. She blushes and fans her face. Our three players (two men, one woman, sizzlingly intense) are hot! They're radioactive! And it certainly seems like Polonia has fallen under their spell. It's the sycophant in her. Just as she's latched onto the King and the power he represents, so does she succumb to the players' star power.
In fact, everyone does. Hamlet is up and excited. Horatio smiles expectantly. The prince asks for a speech, and the players merely stare at him impassively. It's this uncomfortable moment that may prod Hamlet into starting the speech himself. Horatio smiles kindly at Hamlet's attempt, encouraging where the players are not (indeed, they're rather sinister). As Horatio becomes more and more apprehensive about the players' non-reaction (a complete inversion of the emotional Player that gives Hamlet reason to soliloquize), the prince recites his portion of the Priam speech with smiles. He enjoys the words, but doesn't perform them as so many other Hamlets do. Polonia applauds him for it, one might say sarcastically.

The players move to a carpet that will act their stage and face each other. Horatio shares a gleeful smile with Hamlet at their eccentricity. As Hamlet places himself in the center, the players start to walk around him, in various directions, reciting what I imagine is the Priam speech in German, sharing lines among them. The soundtrack has the quality of chanting monks. The bizarre ceremony sends Hamlet into a flashback sequence featuring his father's funeral as each character, in turn, kisses the corpse on the lips. A cacophony of bells, children's laughter and German words scores this seance which conjures up the oft-seen ghost(?) of child Hamlet. And this time, Horatio sees him, touches him, shakes him.
She leaves the silent but laughing child to support his adult self as he comes out of the trance and feels faint. Hamlet then gets a clear vision or the players, matching each one with the role of King, Queen or Ghost, and we understand how and when Hamlet got the idea for the "mouse-trap". He goes on to ask the First Player to play "The Murder of Gonzago".

Now, this is a very strange sequence and one that doesn't really work for me. It fits the "horror story" aspect that Fodor tries to bring out of the play, but robs us of Shakespeare's words and their intended performance. What we have instead is creepy German performance art, confusion where ironically things become clearer for Hamlet. His lost childhood appearing to Horatio in the flesh isn't explained, nor can it be.

II.ii. Rosencrantz & Guildenstern - Fodor (2007)

A weak Hamlet
Fodor's Hamlet - not to say William Bedchambers' - is weaker than in any other version of the play, and this sequence shows how the director has undermined the character in a number of ways. First, of course, is in how R&G - the play's notoriously weak characters - interact with him. Instead of fearful sycophants, we instead have short-tempered, bored louts. Hamlet is suspicious of them and antagonistic (he just caught them talking to the conspirators), but gets no real reaction from them except even more disdain and ire. When accused, they meet outrage with outrage and shame Hamlet for being "poor in thanks". The overall effect is that R&G are stronger characters than Hamlet. They win this skirmish.
There's also the matter of Horatio, who is at Hamlet's side throughout this sequence. She not only has her emotions under more control than Hamlet, sizing up R&G with, by turns, a steady gaze and the same kind of dismissive boredom, but she also borrows some of Hamlet's lines ("Then is doomsday near" and later, the question as to why the Players are on the road). Hamlet is not a whole man in Fodor's vision, he needs to be completed by Horatio. Where R&G are usual the "two who are one" and still don't measure up to one Hamlet, here Hamlet must meet two with two, and still loses the argument.

Whether you agree with this idea or not, there are interesting things about the way Fodor stages the sequence. Until an accusation is actually made, each duo is never in the same shot as the other. They are separate and, in R&G's case, refuse to engage. Both groups look into camera, involving the audience in an unsettling way (very much what Fodor is going for throughout the film, which also justifies his emasculation of the lead) and playing with the mirror effects inherent in the text. Reference to Denmark being a prison shifts our point of view to the Ghost, listening and turning his head. An intriguing piece of editing, as it links the idea with that of Hamlet's father being trapped in a hellish state. Denmark is a prison to Hamlet, but it represents much worse to the Ghost. Hamlet is also haunted by his child-self, another ghostly character lurking about, though much happier, laughing behind potted plants - a counterpoint to the prince's depressing vision of Denmark.

The cut from confession directly into "What a piece of work is a man", omitting further description of Denmark's putrid skies, turns the line's irony to straight sarcasm and becomes the accusation that finally rouses R&G from their torpor. As often happens with cuts, it reveals an intent that is more ambiguous when lines are distanced from one another. It may thus be true to say that Hamlet always meant this speech to refer to R&D, two friends who have deeply disappointed him. Not that Fodor in any way paints them as friends.