There have been numerous adaptations of William Shakespeare's classic tragedy. Some adaptations take the premise or the foundation of the story and create modern-day dialogue. Other translations to the screen keep the text as Shakespeare and change the setting or time period. This film, directed by Aneil Karia, does the latter. This feature is also produced and starring Riz Ahmed, who won an Oscar with Karia for The Long Goodbye (2020). Earlier this year, Ahmed received an Emmy nomination for his series Bait (2026), which took a well-known character and added or inter-played his South Asian culture and community to it. He does the same here. It's Shakespeare as interpreted through a South Asian lens and a Muslim lens.
Riz Ahmed (Sound of Metal and Rogue One: A Star Wars Story) stars as Hamlet. Shakespeare's concept was that the titular character was a prince of Denmark. It's not clear if Ahmed's Hamlet is a prince. People refer to him as "lord." Given that the film is set in London in present-day, it's unlikely that this Hamlet is a member of the British royal family. The term "lord" could simply mean that he's a part of the British nobility or even the peerage that ranks high in British society. However, his mother is referred to as queen, so in this world, Ahmed's Hamlet could indeed be a prince of England.
The film seems to focus on Hamlet's grief, as the majority of the narrative is Hamlet dealing with the death of his father. This is a film about mourning and the lengths or the depths someone will sink, while in depression. It's also about revenge, reinforcing this idea that anyone seeking revenge should dig two graves. Revenge is destructive to the person seeking it, as much as it is the target.
As with other Shakespeare works, there is a supernatural element. Following his father's funeral, Hamlet sees his father's ghost or spirit who tells him that he was murdered and the murderer is Hamlet's uncle. One could argue that this supernatural element isn't really ambiguous. In the play, there are other characters who see the ghost and talk to Hamlet about it. Here, Ahmed's Hamlet is the only one who sees this ghost. As such, there's a question here if the ghost is real or if it's a hallucination, spurred by Hamlet's grief. In the play, Hamlet pretends to be crazy. Here, Ahmed's character isn't pretending. The interpretation here is that Hamlet is actually losing his mind. Therefore, Hamlet's uncle being a murderer is not fait accompli. It's perhaps meant to be a legit mystery.
In the play, Hamlet concocts a crazy plan to solve that mystery. Because of the lack of ambiguity about the ghost and what happened, it's not really a mystery that needs to be solved. Shakespeare might have intended it to feel like a mystery or wanted a scene of suspense to build to the moment of violence, or maybe Hamlet needed some physical proof to his uncle's villainy beyond the supernatural. Here, Hamlet isn't sure, so he needs proof. The scenes of Hamlet pretending to go crazy in the play are played as if Hamlet is actually going crazy, and Ahmed's performance of showing the psychological descent and showing the bursts of madness are incredibly well done.
There are a lot of close-ups, indicating how much of a psychological thriller this film is. The rest of the camerawork is following Ahmed around in an almost feverish way. There's a lot that's cut from the play to make this film. We don't get the famous Rosencrantz and Guildenstern as characters. This essentially is fine. The only time that the cuts hurt the narrative or perhaps causes confusion is the stuff involving Fortinbras. That character and story line literally come out of nowhere.
I did highly enjoy the so-called play that Hamlet commissions. It's not exactly a play-within-a-play. It's a musical dance number that's performed at his uncle's wedding to his mother. It's like a Bollywood number or a dance that is perhaps typical of a South Asian weddings, but interpreted in a very morbid and creepy way. It was led by a dancer named Subhash Viman Gorania, and he was very extraordinary.
Rated R for some bloody violence, suicide, brief drug use and language.
Running Time: 1 hr. and 53 mins.
Available on Amazon Prime Video.
