Hamnet

Released 2025. Director: Chloe Zhao

THE HISTORY OF WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE contains many blank pages. Nobody can even say for certain how many plays he wrote and in what order he wrote them. The tragedy of Hamlet, considered to be one of the greatest dramas of the Western canon, is widely believed to have been inspired by Norse legends about the prince named Amleth. In Maggie O'Farrell's novel “Hamnet”, she envisions that the source of one of the Bard's most celebrated masterpieces was a place of deep sadness.

The book takes its time to describe a detailed, sensory vision of family life in Stratford in the late 16^th century with its emotional currents swirling around the death of Shakespeare's young son named Hamnet (a name interchangeable with Hamlet in those days). It's a story about parents grappling with the sudden loss of a child and about channeling guilt and grief into art.

Oscar-winning director Chloe Zhao takes her time to set up domestic scenes as immersion, distilling the essence of the book and enriching the story by slowly and imperceptibly adding small details to their lives building to a heart-rending finale that delivers a cleansing cure for dry eyes. As an exploration of bereavement it is staggering. I have not shed this many tears over the death of a child in the movies since Susan Sarandon whispers goodbye to her son in Lorenzo's Oil back in 1993.

At the heart of the story is Mrs Shakespeare, Agnes Hathaway (her name similarly interchangeable with the more commonly known Anne) the strong-minded woman who mixes herbs and plants for healing, she with an ungovernable spirit and blighted with the ability to see the future. She catches the eye and heart of William, her step-siblings' Latin tutor, a young man not even his own family thought would amount to anything. They wed, a daughter named Susanna is born. William, who's been struggling in his father's glove-making business, leaves for London and becomes a playwright and actor. Agnes gives birth to twins Judith and Hamnet. Agnes raises the children while the absent father comes home intermittently through the years. The twins fall victim to the bubonic plague ravaging across England and Hamnet succumbs, a harrowing and shocking end that shatters his mother's heart into pieces beyond repair.

In just a few short scenes young Jacobi Jupe shows us an active, thoughtful boy who loves swordplay and misses his father dearly. By the time he innocently swaps places with his sickly twin sister in childish naivete to save her, we've connected with the parents' impending loss. This is heightened by virtue of his difficult birth, when he's presumed a stillborn only to survive and dies while still a child, in the very same house where he cheated death once before.

The boy's passing drives a wedge between his parents. Agnes resents her husband's absence as their son dies a cruel death while she tries everything she could to save him. William is locked in his own guilt and leaves his family to return to London while the pain is still raw, despite Agnes's forceful objection. Mother and father grieve in different ways, and sometimes it's what drives couples apart.

Agnes lives by the healing power of nature. She finds solace in the woods when she's hidden away in the lush tapestry amidst trees and shrubs, ferns and ground cover, cradled in the hollow of a great tree feeling protected and understood. From the first moment Jessie Buckley appears alone in the woods, we see a woman married to nature. There's a sense of fullness in Buckley's creation of Agnes, a character completely dug-in with her environment. The story is very much told from her point of view and Buckley's searing turn makes you feel you understand why Agnes is different and through her obstinacy and fierce love your heart breaks for her loss.

As Agnes feels she's coping alone in the dark, William sinks to the depths and needs to process the feelings in his own way. With the same haunting vulnerability he brought to Aftersun and All of Us Strangers, Paul Mescal's Shakespeare is a man crushed inside who finds consolation through the careful expression of words, their rhythm and meaning. How the two meet and connect illustrates the power of great art. “Remember me,” the last words uttered by the ghost of a slain king on stage takes on an exceptional weight now that the movie reinterprets them in a new light, as a grief-stricken father implores his departed son.

By this point the movie has completely earned our sympathy and it's a genuine accomplishment to reach here. Grief is extremely difficult to portray persuasively and artistically in movies. One misstep and it could feel false, mushy or glum. Despite some gut-wrenching performances, movies such as Rabbit Hole, Changeling, Collateral Beauty and even Manchester By the Sea, all dealing with parents mourning a dead child, never quite managed to reach across the defences and find that place in your heart that connects to the tear ducts. Certainly not so for Hamnet.

The role of art in the management of grief and separation cannot be under-estimated. Music, poetry, dance, storytelling, any creative pursuit can help to deal with suffering and heartbreak. The way Hamnet probes these deep emotions is searching and masterful. Remember at the end of E.T. when the alien points its glowing fingertip at Elliott's chest and says “I'll be right here” and your emotions surrender and soar? This analogy may seem odd but the compelling sentiments are similar and the lingering effects are just as strong. Hamnet's powerfully moving final scene is an invitation to open your heart to a liberating experience of catharsis.

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