Monday, August 12, 2013

The Hamlet of Jonathan Slinger




Well-done, by Jonathan Slinger. On stage, soliloquies look very much as they are: soliloquies. But on film, especially this one, they can look more like a conversation with us as the audience. It lends an immediacy and intimacy to this particular soliloquy. It crystallizes for me how radically different media that film and stage are.

Also, I really appreciated Slinger's enunciation and pacing of Shakespeare's poetry. Even a native English-speaking audience will struggle to understand Shakespeare, in part because actors often seem to rush the text and forget that they're performing for a 21st century audience (not 16th or 17th century). What's even more difficult about this soliloquy is that it's 'broken' poetry. Hamlet is stunned by his mother's hasty mourning and remarriage, and speaks emotionally in starts and stops.

Anyway, a truly fine effort by Slinger! 


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