In widescreen splendor, Elsinore shines and bursts with color, the better to contrast the original Man in Black brooding over the recent death of his father. The director pitched his version as a David Lean-style screen epic to be shot on 65mm film (and projected in Panavision Super 70), gathered a staggering ensemble of stage vets and movie stars, and set about crafting his version of the play widely regarded as the best piece of dramatic literature ever written.Īt least partly in reaction to what had already been done by Olivier and Zeffirelli, Branagh sets his Hamlet in an opulent 19th-century palace (Blenheim Palace provides the exteriors). Branagh upped the ante when, in the mid-'90s, he set his sights on Hamlet. Much Ado About Nothing first demonstrated Branagh's true intention: to bring the masses back to Shakespeare with all-star casts, energetic pacing, and good, old-fashioned sex. In the 1990s, Kenneth Branagh staked his claim as the cinematic heir to Laurence Olivier, scripting, directing and starring in Shakespeare films: Henry V (1989), Much Ado About Nothing (1993), for starters (in 2000, he helmed Love's Labour's Lost and in 2006 As You Like It). Inside the Actors Studio: Robin Williams (2001)Ĭheers-The Complete Seventh Season (TV) (1988)Īmbition, thy name is Branagh. The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1989) Pierrepoint-The Last Hangman) (2007)Įternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

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