Hamnet (2025)

Score: 3.5 / 5

Few filmmakers view mundanity -- or indeed nature -- with the level of Romanticism displayed by Chloé Zhao. The Rider and Nomadland deal with individuals practicing their individualism in an unforgiving and bleak western America that nevertheless feels warm and richly layered. This palpability is shared even by her MCU entry, Eternals, which I find one of the most visually original and beautiful of the franchise (take another look at that naturally-lit forest fight scene if you want to argue me). Though I find the stories she chooses to tell stupefying, superheroes excluded, I cannot deny the spiritual craft at work in her attention to atmosphere and landscape. Her characters are not isolated in nature; her characters find connection with each other through nature, and it seems that's also how we're meant to connect with them.

Based on the 2020 novel of the same name (which I've admittedly not read, and now do not plan to), Hamnet tells a fictionalized story of how William Shakespeare and his wife, Anne Hathaway, may have dealt with the untimely death of their son. Meant to be a tearjerker of a certain literary order, we'd have seen a title like this sweeping the Oscars back when The Weinstein Company was churning out Best Pictures every damned year. The Academy loves a period, British biography and sob story. Or at least it did. As it is, star Jessie Buckley (playing Anne as Agnes, presumably in reference to her sometime legal name, according to official records) brings the bulk of the film's emotional intensity. Much as Frances McDormand managed to wrangle profoundly emotional work out of the otherwise dismally dry Nomadland screenplay, Buckley here has her work cut out for her.

Not that Hamnet, here adapted by novelist Maggie O'Farrell along with Zhao herself, is dry. Quite the opposite: this heartfelt and deeply sad material could have gone a number of directions, perhaps most dangerously melodrama. Yet Buckley and her costar, Paul Mescal, carry us through with rigorously internalized beats of eroticism, affection, loss, shame, guilt, withdrawal, and communion. One wishes to have been a fly on the wall during their intimacy coordination sessions, where surely simply hearing them talk through their craft would have sold expensive tickets. Unfortunately, they're forced to navigate familiar, dare I say rote, scenes with predictable revelations, resignations, and reconciliations to the point that I nearly dozed off in our screening.

Moments of interest abound, here, though they're rarely explored in any length or detail. Agnes is supposedly the daughter of a forest witch, hence her connection to nature both visually and aurally. The sound designer (IMDb tells us that Johnnie Burn won the Oscar for The Zone of Interest recently, deservedly) lures us into the woods in the same way cinematographer Lukasz Zal (also from The Zone of Interest) arranges it around us. Lush and sensual, the forest feels alive and communicative. It's telling that we're introduced to Agnes as she's dressed in a startling red gown, curled up under a tree, and our first instinct is of Grimm fairytales or Puritanical nightmares about alluring women in the woods. Her contrived but horny encounter with the man she'll be remembered for marrying feels natural in this setting; it's an effective storytelling device to immerse us in this cinematic world.

The first half is quite charming, and I found myself absorbed into the dynamics of this family. Between their somewhat mythic family being born and raised -- superstitions and all, as one child is miraculously revived from stillbirth -- to the intergenerational makeup and casting (shout out to Emily Watson and Joe Alwyn in almost pointedly underwritten roles), Hamnet sets up a lot of narrative and thematic possibilities. Yet, from its title and what we already know of shadowy history, the loomings and forebodings never allow us the opportunity to enjoy the present so much as dread what's coming.

Come it does, in full operatic fashion. Grief has become somewhat trite in some genres, drama included, arguably since 9/11, and this is no exception. Shrill and histrionic, the film luxuriates in the visceral pain both Mescal and Buckley deliver: score swelling, light fading, camera lingering in moments of private sorrow for far too long. I could feel the other bodies in my theater shifting with unease as we voyeuristically fed on the characters' bereavement. Powerful stuff, sure, but not clear in its own purpose or efficacy.

As a side note, if you haven't yet, please do yourself a favor and go watch All is True from 2019; the film tackles the same tragedy, navigating the same fraught marriage, but through the eyes of significantly older versions of the characters. It's wonderfully literate, minimalist in execution, with some of the most underrated acting and screenwriting of that year (by Kenneth Branagh, Judi Dench, and especially Ian McKellan). 

And then there's the mess of Hamlet, which is posited in this material as being Shakespeare's therapeutic response to his son's death. The historicity of that notwithstanding -- I'm not the person to judge, as I'm a bit of a conspiracist when it comes to the Bard's identity -- the film discredits itself as pandering claptrap when Mescal recites the Danish prince's "to be, or not to be" soliloquy like Inspector Javert looking at his reflection in the river and contemplating suicide. There's a nice nod to the play when, in the film's climax, Agnes travels to London to see Will's new hit; the playwright might say here that the play's the thing wherein he'll catch the feelings of his embittered wife. Agnes, sure that Will has been avoiding coping, or is profiting from their son's death, becomes enraptured in the play, pushing forward through the groundlings to all but crawl onto the stage itself.

And while far too much of Hamlet is shown here in the film, largely out of context -- and the case is frankly not made convincingly that the playwright had bereft paternalism in mind when writing this tragedy -- there is a keen observation that should be more clear. This is art therapy, both for its creator and its audience, and it works effectively. We watch the play (or, rather, a montage of its most irrationally recognizable one-liners) mostly through Agnes's eyes. There's a clever touch here, in that the actor playing the actor for Hamlet is Noah Jupe (A Quiet Place and its Part 2, Wonder, and series such as The Undoing) is the older brother of the actor who played Hamnet. It's as if Agnes is seeing her own son, grown up rather than fatally arrested, acting on stage, as he'd excitedly desired as a child. You'll notice, during this scene, that the cinematography and sound design revert to similar techniques from the opening scene: we hear the breathing of the crowd, the pulsing rhythm of life around a singular woman attempting to connect. The theatre is as natural and, indeed, lively as the forest of Agnes's origins, and she's spiritually returned there as a result of catharsis and finding meaning through art.

Eternals (2021)

Score: 4.5 / 5    ***updated

It can't be easy to step into the most fanbase-established, well-financed, studio-overseen cinematic franchise of all time and make something that feels fresh. The standard of superhero movies has been long set, and while every year threatens to end the hype, somehow the MCU (and, in my unpopular opinion, Warner Brothers' DCEU) manages to keep things interesting and moving forward. But as some of the more popular parts in Marvel's roster age out -- or die out -- I've been wondering how newer and more obscure characters will be popularly appreciated and welcomed. I certainly didn't know anything about Shang-Chi going into his first feature, and I was blown away by it. Something similar happened recently to me in a screening of Eternals, about whom I knew only the barest of details.

Basically -- and I mean very -- the Eternals are the ten children of a Celestial named Arishem sent to Earth in 5000 BC to destroy the Deviants, invasive monsters who kill apex predators. They succeeded and lived as gods (literally) in ancient cultures before spreading out and trying to lead normal lives, helping in small ways as they are able. In the present, the Deviants reawakened after the Blip, and so the Eternals band together to learn why; unfortunately, the truth is much darker and more frightening than they could have imagined. It doesn't help that the Eternals, much like any family, harbor feelings of resentment, joy, love, and loss between them, which makes their reunion rife with drama. It all leads to a fun but underwhelming climax that feels about as fresh as last week's cake. Its visuals feel ripped from any number of apocalyptic movies, and the action is almost laughable. But by this point, you do care quite a bit about the characters, which carries you through to the end. That's not nothing, but it showcases what Zhao could have used more help doing.

I confess myself a little underwhelmed too by the mythology of this movie. While you can certainly watch it with enough basic information to go on, I could not help wishing for more. Which is a bit absurd, when you account for its two-and-a-half-hour runtime. For its huge cast of brand-new characters, its extensive world-building, and more veiled references to less-popular Marvel titles, it almost feels not long enough; I couldn't tell you a whole lot more about the "significance" of any of these characters within the franchise even after seeing the movie. It's more of a standalone flick than any other in the MCU, which I guess is a good thing until the ending and post-credits scenes had me scratching my head. In fact, apart from a couple references to Thanos and everyone returning after the Blip, this movie was uniquely self-sufficient until the last few scenes (and, I have to note, the end of this movie teases Blade, which provoked me to let out a loud, excited squeal in a packed, silent auditorium).

Director Chloé Zhao (Songs My Brothers Taught Me, The Rider, Nomadland) is a surprising and odd choice for this movie, based on her previous work. You can certainly see how she humanizes these characters and connects them to far-flung but very specific global and cultural locations; that's just something she's uncannily good at doing. That, along with finding perfect magic hour lighting in her landscape shots. Thankfully -- and I say this as someone who respects her eye and tone but generally dislikes her movies so far -- here her vision soars due to its intense, plot-driven structure. The credits indicate she helped with the screenplay, but I suspect it was others, largely, who brought franchise knowledge of the characters and plots as well as a sense of urgency and motivation. Many scenes are clear-cut with Zhao's easily recognizable eye for cool palettes, natural lighting, and relative stillness centered on a horizon; these are hugely important in introducing and establishing the enormous cast of characters in ways any screenplay would struggle to accommodate. On the other hand, when things do get expository, and messy plotwise, you can feel the pull of other artistic voices to "do the genre thing" and have more action, more cuts, brighter colors, louder sounds. That's not necessarily a bad thing, and the film is pretty darn coherent for all it's trying to do.

But it does make me wonder what would have happened if directors had swapped so that Eternals had the spectacle-oriented director Cate Shortland, and if Zhao had in turn directed Black Widow. I imagine a more character-driven focus with the latter, one rooted in time and place in a way that film, frankly, squandered in favor of admittedly brilliant action sequences. The former, however, would have embraced a bit more of the "wow" factor, turning the Eternals into full-on gods with all their magic on spectacular display, while sacrificing the existing film's determination to make the characters real people with a sense of age and belonging. Fruitless considerations, perhaps, but an interesting way to rethink how these iconic characters materialize in the public consciousness and how easily things might have been different.

I guess, in the broadest terms, I most liked the cast of this movie and the casting. Easily the most diverse group of performers yet in the MCU, they also play diversity in a way that does not feel forced or contrived. Salma Hayek plays the leader Ajak, Gemma Chan's Sersi is the protagonist of sorts, Lauren Ridloff plays the Deaf superhero Makkari, and Brian Tyree Henry's gay hero Phastos has a husband and son. Who else? Well, there's the hunky Richard Madden's Ikaris and equally hunky Kumail Nanjiani's Kingo, there's Lia McHugh as the androgynous and youthful Sprite, Don Lee as the strongest of them named Gilgamesh, and Barry Keoghan as the funny but creepy Druig (which totally checks out for him). Perhaps most interesting for me was Angelina Jolie as the warrior Thena; the way the film sensitively handles her mental illness is wonderfully refreshing. More surprising still, this marks what I think might be the first sex scene in a franchise literally built upon muscular models in tight outfits (I don't count Tony Stark falling off the bed with a reporter in Iron Man). It's nice to finally see some superheroes acting like real adults for a change, rather than just flirting or posing suggestively, and it adds a nice level of complexity to these characters in particular, due to their immortality and experience.

*** Upon a second viewing, I'm inclined to increase my rating for this movie. My concerns about the adaptation process and undercooked contextualization still hold, but this time I just wanted the movie to take me on an adventure. And I left the cinema this time with a profound sense of awe and warmth. This is, by far, the most theologically complex film in the MCU and possibly of 2021. Its entire premise questions humanity's relationship with the divine on a global scale rather than in culturally or religiously specific terms. The Eternals poke reverent fun at each other for being gods, historically, in the eyes of humans, and it's fascinating to see the way they (mostly) humbly shrug those titles off as cultures evolve. But then, right around the halfway point of the film, when the true stakes are revealed and apocalypse draws near, they band together to (SPOILER ALERT) stop a newborn Celestial. Essentially, they aim to kill a god, and it's viewed by the film as not only a good thing but as an imperative. It's fascinating and shocking -- less so due to a screenplay determined to not use the phrase "kill god" and by Zhao's wonderfully calm tone and pace -- and will surely lead to quality post-screening discussions.

Nomadland (2021)

 Score: 3 / 5

The problem for me is that it's so boring. I felt similarly about First Cow and Roma, though I only actively hated the latter of those. And I certainly found this movie more interesting, more engaging, and more satisfying than the former. "Slice of life" movies can be important, and Nomadland arguably fits the bill for that distinction. Quiet chamber pieces reflecting on lives on the edge of civilization can be nice, though I prefer horror movies to Wild or Land or similar Oscarbait, which is what this flick certainly is. While its star is digging deep into herself to carry this movie, the rest of it feels voyeuristic and transitory, largely inconsequential despite the growing movement it seeks to unveil and the increasing need for legal and political aid for people forced into this lifestyle.

What lifestyle? That of a nomad, of course. Frances McDormand plays Fern -- although I don't know why they didn't just call her Fran in accordance with the cinema verite style of this picture -- who loses everything. Actually, you could rightfully say everything has been taken from her, as the film's beginning describes how once the manufacturing plant in rural Nevada closed, the town quickly became a ghost town. In half a year, its zip code was eliminated. It was the company that employed Fern and her late husband for many years, so she sells everything and buys a van as her home. Quite alone, she hits the road in pursuit of seasonal work in the wide plans of the American West. Typical for movies starring McDormand -- is it her talent that shines through, or her choice of roles, or a result of rare, brilliant typecasting -- the film focuses tightly on an unusual kind of person for movie subjects. More importantly, given the increasing polarization of wage gaps in this country, this movie is at once fiercely political and hauntingly poetic.

During her travels across sometimes bleak, often deserted landscapes, Fern connects occasionally with a community of nomads. That is to say, with communities of nomads, sometimes finding familiar faces at seemingly random sites and often making new friends. And while the people seem to know they may never meet again, their interactions are not shallow. Sometimes they barely talk, if their business with each other is transactional: bartering for goods, networking for jobs, offering advice on living well out of your vehicle. But as they sit by a fire, share canisters of water and pots of food, conversation dives much deeper than casual small talk. These people know how to really connect with strangers in ways most of us living in towns and cities, attached to social media, with filled schedules and no room for adjustment will never understand.

This came across to me quite clearly as a result of the film's unflinching desire to understand Fern's adopted (or forced) lifestyle. She seems to drift at times, and at other times her drive is infectious. She's often alone but doesn't seem to deserve pity. Though she's of course sad, about many things, she rarely shows it, preferring to simply live the life she's determined to eke out. Director and writer Chloe Zhao has no interest in forcing this character into dramatic tumult or stretching an otherwise honest portrayal into sensationalism. It's an exercise in empathy, and so it is only fitting that McDormand -- even more nuanced than usual, which is extraordinary -- is her star. She always imbues her briefest of scenes with history and pain and curiosity and strength, but with the slightest of looks; it's calculated, make no mistake, but so are the many ways she counters any ingrained attempt to "act" or, heaven forfend, overact. People will call her performance raw and earthy, but that's not to say it isn't stunningly smart.

I do wonder, though, how much (if any) of the film was unscripted. So many of Fern's interactions with fellow nomads feel improvised. Not in a showy way, but truly unrehearsed and perhaps unwritten. Knowing that many people filmed are actual nomads, not actors, increases my suspicions. Apart from that, though, is the beautiful weight these people add to what must be the film's primary conceit: a simple reminder of how large and wide our country is, and how many people live and work in places we often forget make up a huge swath of our geography. Each of these people, like Fern, have a story to tell, probably many, and how few of them are heard any measurable distance from their little, moving communities. It's sad, I suppose, especially in our viewing of it, filtered as it is through Fern's grief and loss. But this is not a tragedy, and it's not an example of a "woman takes off to discover herself" film. It just exists. Which is why it is often so transcendentally beautiful and so frustratingly dull at the same time.