Hamnet postulates that the epic tragedy of Hamlet was William’s deeply personal response to the death of his son. Now, that crescendo of catharsis is merely the final third of Farrell’s novel and Chloe Zhao’s masterful film. A reaction-inducing climax and conclusion like that could only come from an equally important effort to establish the beautiful and challenging humanity of the people going through their ordeal.
Read MoreThere are commendable allegories bottled somewhere inside both Ben Fountain’s 2012 award-winning novel and Ang Lee’s adaptation of “Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk.” However, knowing what we know now about “paid patriotism” since 2015, those morals, and any patriotic pride the fictional story’s grand setting can muster, have lost too much of their high ground to inspire. It is difficult to invest in a reflective film wrestling with disillusionment when too many current audiences already enter with the same feelings about the War on Terror. Disillusionment of disillusionment is a tough sell if the goal is the change minds.
Read More
