Hamlet (1964) [N/A]

Release Date:
June 24, 1964

Original Title:
Гамлет

Alternate Titles:
Gamlet
هاملت

Genres:
Drama

Production Companies:
Lenfilm

Production Countries:
Soviet Union

Ratings / Certifications:
GB: U 

Runtime: 140

Shakespeare's 17th century masterpiece about the "Melancholy Dane" was given one of its best screen treatments by Soviet director Grigori Kozintsev. Kozintsev's Elsinore was a real castle in Estonia, utilized metaphorically as the "stone prison" of the mind wherein Hamlet must confine himself in order to avenge his father's death. Hamlet himself is portrayed (by Innokenti Smoktunovsky) as the sole sensitive intellectual in a world made up of debauchers and revellers. Several of Kozintsev directorial choices seem deliberately calculated to inflame the purists: Hamlet's delivers his "To be or not to be" soliloquy with his back to the camera, allowing the audience to fill in its own interpretations.

Additional information:

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Assistant Director:
Valentina Kuznetsova

Costume Design:
Simon Virsaladze

Director:
Grigori Kozintsev

Director of Photography:
Jonas Gricius

Editor:
Yevgeniya Makhankova

Original Music Composer:
Dmitri Shostakovich

Production Design:
Evgeny Eney

Set Decoration:
Yevgeni Gukov
Georgi Kropachyov

Sound:
Boris Khutoryansky

Theatre Play:
William Shakespeare

Writer:
Grigori Kozintsev
Boris Pasternak

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