Comparing Productions of Hamlet, Act II, Scene ii. (Part 2 of 4)

[canaryxblue]

Tennant's first "except my life" is beautifully chilling.

[Godzilla52]

Branagh was by far the best. 

[rioshinx]

i memeorized this for school thx :D

[SayaFight]

Words, words, words! XD

[ProfessorPher]

Kenneth Brannagh likes LOTS OF ANGRY YELLING.

[aliciaap]

branagh's 1996 polonius is the best, tennant's hamlet feels more real

[ViPrAx500]

Tennant's mad acting was by far the best. Ethan Hawke's just didn't fit (what was with the gun) and Branagh while his is the most complete interpretation (keeping the original speech the most) he is hard to understand at times.

[lora2708]

@ViPrAx500 really? I find Branaugh's Hamlet the most easily accessible.

[thecrimsonfloyd]

Not Branagh's best scene, though his version may be the best.

[KilldozerRocks]

2:49. Okay, that goes in the hall of fame for silliest faces to ever be featured in a tragedy.

[zaboomafooba]

@KilldozerRocks And 7:13! Haha, I love David Tennant's Hamlet...

[KilldozerRocks]

@zaboomafooba Definitely.

[ozzian2000]

@KilldozerRocks 7:14 is definitely a contender

[KilldozerRocks]

Ethan Hawke is pretty damn bad in the scenes where he pretends to be mad, but he's actually not as bad in the scenes where he contemplates to himself, just to be fair.

[TulseLuper]

The Ethan Hawke movie has some good things in it (Liev Schreiber is fantastic) but it really doesn't work. Hawke is dire, and although Bill Murray is one of my favorite actors, he is woefully miscast.

[gokucrazy22]

i like branagh's the best. i also like tennant's. both are hilarious

[Thorne42]

Just looked at the comments, and I'm glad to see that I'm not the only one who thought Ethan Hawke was diabolical!

[BitchinnShoes07]

6:00. ...Hamlet...is wearing jeans and a t-shirt.

[JohnKFisher]

@BitchinnShoes07 That's the beauty of Hamlet. It fits in any time, in any place. :-) And that's why I put this together.

[tinyartist18]

@BitchinnShoes07 DAVID TENNANT FTW

[TornLoveNotes]

Brannagh and Tennant's humour for this scene are brilliant! Ethan Hawke as Hamlet, on the other hand, makes me want to vomit....

Did anyone see the Rory Kinnear version? I might dare to say it was better even than Tennant's *ducks fangirl projectiles*

[PrimaDonna081191]

I prefer Tennants because he takes his time, while Branagh tends to spit out the lines quickly. Branagh's interpretation is very good, and it is obviously different because it is a film adaptation but I'm still partial to Tennants...

[Socktheif93]

The Ethan Hawke version makes me want to smack my head against a wall.

[whovianfloovian]

@MajCinematic I'm a bit of a fan girl (check my name) but my favourite performances of Hamlet was the BBC one... the actors I mean. The actual production was terrible, it looked like they'd filmed it in a velodrome. I kept expecting bicycles to go whizzing past in the background. I really liked the Branagh one too, because very unusually it had the full text. But sometimes the delivery seemed just a little bit garbled, and the sound quality on the video was poor. Maybe I need the dvd now!

[kayanne42]

hahahaha... polonius cracks me up in the david tennant one ... "indeed that is out of the air... how pregnant sometimes his replies are."

[abvflux]

Kenneth's performance may've bordered on satire, but his direction was by far the best.

[homesauce2000]

Kenneth Branagh Hamlet: "Except my life. Except my life. Except my life 0_0 HAHAHA The face was priceless

[ActraiserIII]

Branaugh was way too dramatic. His egoism leaks into the scene and ruins the pathos. It wouldn't be bad for the stage, but it's hard to believe he's depressed over anything. Hawke actually conveys the sense that Hamlet suffers over the issue and is sick. The David Tennant version has a real authentic feel, he carries the madness part and expresses it well.

[krim7]

@ActraiserIII Branaugh's performance is indeed overly dramatic but, in a way, I think that best conveys the status of Hamlet, he is the Prince of Denmark after all.

[baceace]

All 3 had Terrible Danish Accents!!!!!

[JohnKFisher]

Part 3 is now posted.

[choochoolady61]

Tennant has an amazing grasp of the humor of the scene.

[SpiderXxPirate]

I think by far, the best is Branagh's, then Tennant's, then Oliviers's. Mel Gibson's would have been good if it wasn't for the fact that he was . . . Mel Gibson. But what was up with the Ethan Hawke one? Painful.

[venakew]

it's like hes doing it at gunpoint.

[SpiderXxPirate]

@venakew You're right! It so does!

[billyg89]

It's quite obvious that olivier and branagh were the best films here, but tennant breathed some new life into the role which i was happy to see as well.

[caustic77755]

davies was my favourite polonius, tennant and branagh were both really great

[AvatarYoda]

So fascinating that all of them deliver it so differently, especially the "Words, words, words," "Well, God-a-mercy," "You are a fishmonger," and "Except my life" parts. I think that next time someone asks me what I'm reading, I'll channel Branagh and say, "Words, words, words," just to shake them up.

[darkwizet]

"Excellent well! You are a feesh-mangah" =D

[AtTheCinematheque]

Is it '...but not as your daughter may conceive' or 'but as your daughter may conceive' ?? It's different in every version = = ...

[plienow]

Best Hamlets: Sir Derek Jacobi and David Tennant. This proves it. Time Lords make proper Hamlets! XD

[InTraphic]

branagh/briers #1 then the rest...

[luchador1764]

holy shit hamlet 2000 looks like a complete piece of shit.

[deckman92]

the hawke/murray one was pretty terrible

[brainwasher9876]

ethan was less than stellar.

[krim7]

@brainwasher9876 The movie itself is really weird. The Tennant version did "Hamelt in modern times" better.

[PandoraXMoss]

EXPECT MY LIFE!!! LMAO!

[Charmolution]

Picard beamed into the last scene!

[youlookhigh]

EXCEPT MY LIFE. xD

[dbvixxen]

Oh good grief, Ethan Hawke's Hamlet.... *shudders* That was bad.

[thepantweaver]

He is pretty awful, but Bill Murray is quite a good Polonious, actually.

[MidnightEyes17]

Kenneth Branagh and David Tennant are deffinitly my favorites, absolutely brilliant actors!!! But David I think is one of the only men in the world that can make Hamlet seem like a comedy in this act but not make it to over barring and draw it away from Shakespears meaning of the play.

[Mr14henry4ever]

bad movie..takes alot from the play! not even close to hoe u would immagine it

[smurvin]

Which version are you talking about?

[whovianfloovian]

These tedious old fools!

Oh my, but Tennant made me laugh!

[crazypicturelady]

Great job sir. David's was my favorite. Ethan's was NOT. I wonder what other productions could be compared.