The Hamlet - Research Paper Example

Imaginative thinking is very important to literature. Of course, the film medium is a form of literature, so, imagination also comes in handy. When William Shakespeare wrote “Hamlet”, it is very certain that he put a whole lot of imaginative thought into it (Shakespeare & Constance). In both versions of Hamlet’s adaptation—Franco Zeffirellis 1990 film starring Mel Gibson and Michael Almereydas 2000 version, the directors, as well as the actors, have been very creative as far as interpreting the play is concerned.

Michael Almereyda’s version is the ‘marriage’ of the past and the contemporary. The question that this version probably raises in the mind of many viewers is whether this ‘marriage’ was worth it after all; whether this union has yielded any positive fruit. Like Shakespeare does in most of his plays, Michael Almereyda makes an attempt to make use of, not only a story that viewers are familiar, but he adopts a setting – in terms of place and time – that they are familiar with. He makes use of the present day New York.

Unlike what obtains in Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Michael Almereyda prefers to make Denmark a high profile media corporation, rather than interpreting it to be a country. If he (the director) had not intended to change anything in the play, he would certainly have left Denmark as a country that it is in Shakespeare’s version. Perhaps the only feature of this version by Almereyda that has not changed particularly is the language. The original Shakespearian language that was used by William Shakespeare himself is maintained.

The choice of Shakespearian English for a screenplay set in the twenty first century seems to be an anomaly. As with some other features of the screenplay, the author seems to be pleading to the viewers that they suspend every sense of verisimilitude they possess. This is because it is totally illogical for anyone to choose