Royal Deceit

I'm immediately thrown off by the costumes, which are all new fabric. Nothing is worn looking, all of it looks straight out of a fabric store. Leather for belts brand new. This is first time I have felt such a distraction over costume design.

The sets also seem to new to believe. New wood on boat, sail brand new material. All the pitchers on tables match along with drinking glasses. Candles all burning exactly. It is a "set" in the worst possible way.

Building appear to have been created hours before filming. Cute little community but no authenticity.

It's a shame that no one associated with the production/filming/director/actors brought up the obvious flaws in creating this movie.

Before I watched this movie I quickly checked the user reviews, as I usually do, and was excited to see that it came from the source material for Hamlet. So I settled down with the dog and the popcorn. Half-way through I paused the movie and came back here to see if I could find out what the people who posted positive reviews were drinking or smoking because the movie I was watching was awful. From what I can tell it really, really, really, REALLY matters which version you are seeing. If it is not a very long movie, run away. Run. Very. Far. Away. The short version is a hacked up mess that makes no sense and the actors (except Byrne and Mirren and sometimes Bale) look wooden. And the 'crowd' scenes. Oh dear. (By the way this review would have been a lot shorter except for this odd length rule. Hope you weren't bored.)

There was a 5 catalog titles for a dollar special, but the selection was terrible and I couldn't find a 5th title I hadn't seen that looked watchable. Finally, I stumbled across this movie. I'd never heard of it, but considering The Usual Suspects, Miller's Crossing, & The Cook, The Thief, His Wife, & Her Lover are some of my favorite movies, and Bale is also talented, I figured this should be a winner. Big mistake!

The writing was all around horrible. Generic 4th grade script where some things happened, but you could see them coming a mile away and even if you couldn't you still weren't given any reason to care. The movie was half over before Bale was sent off and it became remotely interesting. Bale did a great job considering he had nothing to work with, but that was the only positive of the movie. Byrne gave his usual professional performance, but the weakness in the scripting of his lines undermined it. Mirren tried, but her only scenes that could have had potential were in the first half when there was no emotion to be found anywhere else, so she almost seemed insincere in trying to bring some. Kate Beckinsale also made an appearance, but her part was basically just smiling at Bale, who quickly married her. Aside from the script, the movie was also filmed with all the style of the various Saturday WPIX TV series. 2/10

When I got over the initial surprise of what this movie was,(for some reason the writers of the blurb on the tape packaging don't want you to know), I found myself enjoying it.

This is not Shakespeare's Hamlet, with poetry, dramatic speeches and opportunities for showy histrionics but a steadily paced re-telling of the original Norse legend.

It's not for everybody but I found the combination of bleak Jutland scenery, calm voice-over narration and the momentum of the Royal intrigues fascinating and hypnotic.

Good acting by the principals.

I liked this. It was the only version of the Hamlet story I've ever seen that used the Saxo Grammaticus original, and I got a kick out of that. The costumes, sets and locales were authentic, for once. I particularly like the addition of a sauna. If you didn't recognize this as the Hamlet story, you might think it simple-minded, but I thought it was wonderful to see Hamlet's bare bones, as it were.