Twenty One

 Hamnet 

Sometimes you can say too much about a film that left you pretty much speechless, so I won't do that. I won't blather on about the stunning visuals, the aching beauty of English woodland, and the captivating woman that belongs there.

I won't bleat about the selfish man who captures her heart but is the epitome of wanting different things, deserting her when heavily pregnant, compelled by nothing more than ambition and the feeling of being caged by a world that is for his wife infinite and unbounded.

Until it becomes bounded. It's not a spoiler to say that Hamnet dies since that's the whole of the film. It's a film that's all about how things happen, not about what happens. 

Where it's most convincing is in Agnes. What a part! Chloe Zhao and Maggie O'Farrell have created peak "strong female lead" without in any way sliding into the cliche. Amazingly real, earthy, passionate, deep. It's a role that needs a woman to rise to meet it head on. And does Jessie Buckley do that?

Polish Ms Buckley's Oscar. She is so good. As we walked out, Zenita said to me, It's like she wasn't acting. I knew exactly what she meant. You feel right along with her. The shy smiles, the love for her kids, the bare torment of her grief. 

If you have a heart-- Well, if a film can make you cry, take tissues. (For me, of course it was very close to the bone. I'm the father of twins. My Zenita sobbed when the twins were lying together on the deathbed. And I could understand and appreciate in a very real way the pain Agnes felt, how desperately she tried to keep her son alive by sheer will alone. And we felt it all the more, me and Zenita, because Judith was born not breathing, just like Zenita, and I think we were both willing her to live. But you don't have to be even a parent to feel along with this.)

Not everyone will love Hamnet. They'll dislike the contrivance, slow pace and the sentimentalilty. But those are all the reasons I have it as a five-star movie. It's only pretending after all to be about a play or even about a child who dies. It's about a woman, about motherhood and about the deep tides of humanity that rise and fall and carry us with them.

posted by Dr Zen @ 9:44 pm