Compare Hamlet Movie And Movie

1080 Words3 Pages

Mohamad Maarouf

1111021077

ENGL103/SEC E 3-3:50

Dr. Alan Hickman

Drama Paper

Comparison and contrast between Hamlet the play and Zefferilli’s movie
Shakespeare is known for his genius and well-written plays, and many of his plays were turned into movies and performances worldwide. Having a play established as a movie makes it more interesting since effects are added as well as the language is updated. However, the film versions of the play “Hamlet” were not mastered perfectly as the written version. William Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” and Franco Zeffirelli film version of the play share many characteristics such as the characters and the basic story. However, in the remaking of the ghost scenes, Zeffirelli uses narrative and film techniques to create a suspenseful atmosphere and creates feelings of pity for “Hamlet”. Zeffirelli makes obvious changes by rewriting the play’s plot, by the setting of each scene, and by the dialogue.
Starting with the plot of the play, Zeffirelli changes the plot and rearranges the actions of Hamlet in order for him to get right into the main action happening with the characters. The actual play begins with some minor characters that are standing all together and are discussing the fact that they have seen a ghost. The reason behind having that scene is to establish the conflict of having trouble brewing in Denmark. The audience knows that there are problems happening because the king is repeating the battlements with guards and the guards have seen ghosts walking among these battlements at night. In addition to that, the action happening in scene I establish the idea of ...

... middle of paper ...

... of how a character is feeling. Hamlet, for example, was followed by the camera and was viewed from many angles; the sweat on his face was showing. Thus, showing these details on Hamlet’s face allow the audience to show sympathy towards Hamlet.
In conclusion, Hamlet the play and Hamlet the movie have so many characteristics in common such as the story and the characters, yet the movie differs from the play in so many ways such as deleting parts of the script, changing the setting of some scenes, and mixing Shakespeare’s language with updated language. Although many things were contradicting with the actual play, the idea of having the play as a movie helps the audience in creating a perfect image of the characters in their heads. In addition to that, having effects in a movie, such as sound and light, helps in building up a more exciting story than just reading one.

Open Document