After winning two Academy Awards for Nomadland and taking a detour into the divisive blockbuster world with Marvel movie Eternals, writer-director Chloé Zhao returns with Hamnet, an intimate, devastating portrayal of grief and maternal love, starring Irish actors Jessie Buckley and Paul Mescal.
Adapted from Maggie O’Farrell’s novel of the same name (co-written for the screen by O’Farrell and Zhao), the film presents a fictionalized portrait of the marriage between Agnes Hathaway (historically Anne), William Shakespeare, and the family life that precedes – and then is ruptured by – a loss that will inspire Hamlet.
Hamnet is not an easy watch, and it isn’t meant to be. It asks audiences to sit with raw, painful emotions. Zhao’s trademark naturalism and restrained visual style create space for magnetic performances from Buckley and Mescal. Vulnerable, angry, and shattered by loss, Agnes is rendered with remarkable emotional precision; Buckley commits fully to every moment she’s on screen. Awards attention seems inevitable, but what lingers is how clearly she communicates the complicated, contradictory reality of motherhood.
Mescal’s Shakespeare is equally compelling – reimagined not as a marble monument but as a man split in two. He plays him in silences and half-swallowed feelings, capturing the uneasy bargain between creative ambition and family duty – the pull of London and an artistic dream, the guilt of absence, and the knowledge that the work he’s chasing will cost him something he can’t replace.
Some have labeled it “Oscar bait”, as if the film’s emotional core exists primarily to court awards. Reducing this film to a mere exercise in style, however, misses the subtext and power of its message, as well as the incredible craft behind the scenes. The final sequence, filmed in a replica Globe Theatre, was powerful enough to leave half my screening room in tears (me included), and is the film’s most eloquent response to online detractors. It sums up the film’s thesis: art can’t undo loss, but it can shape it into something we can carry.
With impeccable writing, Hans Zimmer’s intense score, Łukasz Żal’s beautiful cinematography, and two of the best performances of 2025, Hamnet delivers an emotional punch that’s impossible to shrug off. Zhao has made a mesmerizing film about love, art, and grief with an ending that stays with you. Highly Recommended.
Why should public libraries add this movie to their shelves?
Hamnet is a richly accessible companion piece to Shakespeare: a fictionalized window into his family life and the personal grief that informed his writing of Hamlet. It’s a strong resource for students, book groups, and readers in literary history and adaptation.
Is this drama a good fit for campus screenings?
Yes, its themes of motherhood, bereavement, artistic catharsis, and the cost of ambition are immediate and discussable. It’s the kind of drama that naturally sparks conversation, from literature and film studies to psychology and ethics.
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