Dana Stevens

I would say in the case of both book & film Hamnet is not guilty on that score. The child is a significant character--whole sections of the book take place in his consciousness--& the little boy who plays him in the movie is sensational.

As the essay gets into, the film is _way_ less successful than the book at maintaining the mystery of the connection between Shakespeare's life (what little we know of it) & his work. As a movie critic I am far from always thinking the movie is worse than the book, but in this case? Read the book.

Thanks! In the book it's clearer--because you're hearing the Agnes character's thoughts--that he has basically switched places with Hamnet by taking the part of the ghost. But you're right, really the ending is about the power of art to transmute our experience into something new & be changed by it.

Thanks, Corey! I really recommend reading the novel, however you felt about the movie. It's phenomenally good & all those moments of magic realism feel completely earned.

Many thanks!

I wrote something--4000 words' worth of something!--for the Yale Review about Hamnet the book, Hamnet the movie, & the riddle of representing Shakespeare's life on the page & on the screen.

Yes! The shape is kind of a throwback to 100 years before.

1910 Poiret design that I would happily wear to a formal event in 2026. That embroidered sash—so whimsical! And the sheer jacket over the stripes!

His name is Statler?! 😭

Happy happy! Hope you have a great day & a year in which all those goals--even writing three new songs!--are achieved.

Like the 160 schoolgirls. They surely held that false belief.

She’s the entire Village People

Give the people their goose

The moon going from full moon to a red moon and starting to go back to a normal full moon, then my camera battery door fell off.

Here's my first edit on the March 3rd Lunar Eclipse. 15 moon shots, 1 foreground. Taken over a 3 hourish period.

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Adding an indirect way of murdering Minnesotans to the more direct method of shooting people in the street.

"all me Ishmael" would be a very different opener.

Close reading is a powerful method.

This particular snowfall is so soft it's like being pelted with meringue. They just want something to whine about/retaliate to.

It's just good stuff! & every time I read about him I find new titles I want to watch. Have never seen Aspen or the movie about Maine.

Really excellent analysis of what made Wiseman's work so special, and what it meant that he rejected such documentary clichés as "cinéma vérité" or being a "fly on the wall."

Watching his silents is interesting on this score--there's actually a lot of mobile camera, along with other elements of classic film grammar (dissolves, closeups) that he discards later on.

Congratulations to Dr. Öztürk! (PS, we are going to win)

Thank you! Loved reading you on Wuthering Heights & Hamnet (& you're right that the nadir of the latter is the "to be or not to be" speech. Whyyyyyy?). Now I need to see Abismos de Pasión.

I think it was a perfect phone call? Anyway they all are

Series of tubes, baby!

Rare is the day when someone in my home doesn't lay claim to being a "stable genius" who has just written a "perfect email."

This is also a missed comedic opportunity. Show some hustle!

What he gets at so well is that the problem isn't that this adaptation isn't faithful to the novel or is a fanfic-style riff on it or whatever. It's that this version of the book doesn't offer any alternate interpretations or points of view on the material. It isn't _about_ anything.

OK, the title is hilarious, but this is seriously a brilliant takedown of Fennell's film that doubles as a passionate appreciation of Emily Brontë. My review gave this movie an "eh, not for me" shrug bc at least it was not as actively evil as Promising Young Woman. But it really is stupid as hell.