Hamlet

There's a lot of intrusively leaden, urban-industrial style and distracting, pop-edited minutia masquerading as cleverness in experimental writer-director Michael Almereyda's modern Manhattan Hamlet adaptation. Just the inordinate amount of supposedly symbolic product placement ("To be or not to be" takes place in a Blockbuster store, for cryin' out loud) is by itself enough to obscure Shakespeare's profundity and passion. But while it's burdened by such shortcomings, this Y2K date-stamped take on the melancholy Dane--appropriately played by Ethan Hawke as a brooding GenX heir to a business empire--is nonetheless a mildly compelling meditation on the Bard's most complicated tragic hero, driven mad by his mother's marriage to his father's murderer. The supporting cast includes Diane Venora, Kyle MacLachlan, Julia Stiles, Liev Schreiber, Bill Murray, Sam Shepard and Steve Zahn. A strong optional purchase. (R. Blackwelder)