Movie Review: Hamnet (2025)

Genre: Romantic Drama  

Director: Chloé Zhao  

Starring: Jessie Buckley, Paul Mescal, Emily Watson  

Running Time: 126 minutes  

Synopsis: In rural England of the late 1500s, Agnes (Jessie Buckley) is a free spirited daughter of the forest. She meets and falls in love with William Shakespeare (Paul Mescal), who is tutoring in the area. She gets pregnant and they get married, then Agnes senses that William's creativity is stifled in the countryside. She encourages him to spend time in London, and she raises their three children mostly on her own, before a tragedy tests their relationship.

What Works Well: This mostly imagined recreation of the love and passion in Shakespeare's private life is a showcase for Jessie Buckley, as she carries the weight of believing in her man but on her own terms, giving birth to his children, and raising them on her own and through adversity. Director Chloé Zhao finds several devastating and emotionally charged highlights in the courtship and family-building scenes, Agnes' core connection with nature a source of strength and belief, but also foreboding. The production design merges the idyllic with the organic in creating a muddy peasant milieu.

What Does Not Work As Well: The final act unfortunately displaces all the character investment onto a stage filled with irrelevant actors, immediately robbing the drama of a well-earned payoff. Buckley and Mescal are reduced to unworthy reaction shots as Hamlet plays out with amplified emotions and the intrusion of Shakespeare's dense prose. 

Key Quote:

Agnes: He loves me for what I am, not what I ought to be.

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Movie Review: Aftersun (2022)

Genre: Drama  

Director: Charlotte Wells  

Starring: Paul Mescal, Frankie Corio  

Running Time: 101 minutes  

Synopsis: The story is predominantly a flashback to the 1990s, when 11 year-old Sophie (Frankie Corio) went on a vacation to Turkey with her divorced father Calum (Paul Mecal), and captured memories on a digital video camera. They lounge by the pool, meet other vacationers, scuba dive, and take in the local sights. Sophie interacts with vacationing British teenagers and is exposed to early adolescent experiences. Calum works hard to make sure his daughter is having a good time, but subtle signs betray his inner sadness.

What Works Well: Layers of lament gradually emerge from a deceptively simple coming of age story nestled within a father-daughter bonding experience. Through the fractured lens of a pre-teen's memories, the grown-up Sophie (Celia Rowlson-Hall) is looking back at the closest interaction she ever had with her dad, now recognizing distress signals in the form of self-help books, awkward attempts at meditation, financial strain, and oscillating mood swings. Director Charlotte Wells finds audacious camera perspectives and packs every frame with rich details, often finding innovative ricochet angles to add an understated edge to Sophie and Calum's interactions. Frankie Corio's bright performance anchors the drama, her Sophie observant, perceptive, and curious, but far from artificially precocious.

What Does Not Work As Well: The camerawork overindulges in fragmentation and the narrative leans into abstractions, demanding substantial connect-the-dots work with multiple possible interpretations.

Conclusion: A search for turmoil lurking below the surface.



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