KCxBCC: Haider

We wait, so, Spencer, twenty twenty four has been an interesting year for the two of us. We have attempted to record, not once, not to twice, but this is the thrice time we have attempted to record, and this time it happened. Yeah, I guess so, I will say though, and I think maybe not to just spoil the whole thing here, but I think you would agree that of the three movies that we were meant to talk about this year, this is the least fun in a lot of ways. It's maybe not fun. It's not the right word.

How fun can an adaptation, or I guess an adaptation, but a retelling of Hamlet really be? The story Hamlet of Hamlet ain't exactly a positive, uplifting story. Including the original ending of Hamlet, the movie decides to do something vastly different, but the story of Hamlet is not an uplifting tale that people sit around and talk about positively. That's it's a very much one of the I would say, like the Shakespeare and Shakespeare thing of all of them. Yeah, but it is Hamlet's pretty funny though, Oh yeah, I mean Rosencrants and Gildenstern are I mean, look, Rosenkrantz and Gildenstern are Dead is one of my top five like things of all time.

So I can't pretend Hamlet exists. Existing isn't a isn't a good thing. But like Hamlet itself is. Yeah, it's not an uplifting story, but it's pretty funny, it is. Yeah.

Yeah, Shakespeare got a lot of laughs out of it. It's yeah, it's it's it's interesting. I mean, I guess, I'll I'll just uh, I'll lay down on the table that I wish this movie was not an adaptation of Hamlet. I guess, I guess goes to the center of it. But but it's, uh, there's really there's some really interesting stuff in it, and some of it is Hamlet related, but I guess, I guess I'll just say that, like it's it's approach to some of uh, the issues around you know, the Kashmir conflict.

Uh, it feels to me like doing that through a Hamlet adaptation trivializes the topic and all so the way that they are going to some severe trouble to shoot in Kashmir, and I don't I don't want to be I don't know. It's it's it's this is a really interesting kind of problem movie because there is really stuff that I like about it, and I'm not enough of an expert on you know, Hindi cinema. There's uh, you know, definitely uh a fair amount that I've seen and this is not exactly like anything that I've seen before, So so I guess I would I would put out that disclaimer before you know, I go into stating problems with it, but I will. Yeah, it just it kind of hits me as like the Hamlet part of it trivializes the Kashmir part of it for me, and especially given that in the middle of the film, it really does take the Kashmir conflict fairly seriously and it's not something that I know a lot about, but I kind of feel like, oh, I want to know more about this and I want to get into the reality, but then I'm sort of pulled back out by the by the Hamlet of it all.

So that's that's my thesis statement there. It is, Ladies and gentlemen, on this episode of the Culture Cast, I am still your host Christashue, much to the chagrin of many, and I'm joined this year finally by film professor all the way from the Midwest. He is, I don't know. We have some great conversations on the show. Spencer Parsons, Hello, glad to be here, Ready to talk Shakespeare because yeah, on this episode of the Culture Cast, we are still watching Indian cinema because it is my birthday and that's what I wanted to do this year.

So this episode will show up, thank you. This episode will show up on the Bollywood Cinema Club feed as well because it's an Indian cinema film and we are going to be talking about a Indian remake retelling of Hamlet titled Hater from twenty fourteen at Merida and Eby said, call me pulling your dog now conseils tomorry mom, but for him, tell you jelly Jelly. It's a jelly sy in but not to be disappeared Dagon. Would you remind me disappeared local book Sabo Auto say a capacity pony. Okay, your khurassity.

I've loved you more than my life. Why don't you pulling up my journey? Didn't? So? Hey many John good Johnny and then hoday t Hello, Hello, Mike testing one two three, Hello about that Applongo Hello, Hello, Hello, Hello.

So the film is directed by Vishwal Bardo, was written by Bisharat Peer and again Vishwal bar Wardwage and the story by Vishwal Bardwag. But again it is also just kind of Hamlet. So it's based on Hamlet by William Shakespeare, who to thunk it, And yeah, it is, like Spencer kind of already mentioned a retelling of Hamlet with some changes made, some choices made that definitely changed, like you've already alluded to, the thematic meaning of Hamlet is kind of played with. But yeah, so if you kind of are familiar with the story of Hamlet, Hamlet Hater is played by Shahid Kapoor. His father is played by Narendra Jah who is doctor Hillel Mir who dies at the beginning of the movie.

He is the Hamlet stand in. And then we have Tabu who plays his mother and kk Manon who plays his uncle, the Gertrude and Claudius stand ins, and the always fantastic Shada Kapoor plays both Ophelia and the Horatio character because they don't differentiate in this one. And then Erfon Kahn gets to play the ghost of Shahid Kapor's father, which is in and of itself a separate character in this retelling, not one and the same, and Lalied Paramou plays the Polonius stand in as well, oh and Amir Bashir as well as the Lairties stand in, which, Yeah, like just sitting here and saying that all this to this, it's like, this is too much. It's not needed this movie. This movie could be genuinely again, this movie is entertaining, but the Hamlet parts of it take away from the movie for me, And I think this movie would be a lot better if it was just its own thing.

So yeah, just to give my opinion immediately. But Spencer, I'm gonna kick it to you, what did you think of Hater? Yeah, I think it's I think it's an interesting movie and it did you know, I've been kind of out of the gate. I'm being critical, but it's it's interesting. It did.

It did grow on me a bit as as it went along. It definitely the back half has the most exciting stuff in it. I'll be I'll be perfectly frank in the in the front half of the movie. And it's a two and a half hour movie, so it's nice and long but in the front half of the movie, it is it definitely is kind of stiff and doing a lot of setup and there's a lot of pipe laying for later stuff. I get it, I get it.

But the movie doesn't really come alive until the ghost arrives. Yeah, which is which is the beginning of actual Hamlet. You know, the first the first scene of Hamlet is the ghost's arrival and and the filmmaking kind of becomes a lot more interesting from from that point onward. There's you know, a lot more a lot more life to it. There's a couple of musical numbers like you know, no no music for a really long time in this movie, or you know, song and dance kind of stuff, and then they're too and you know, interesting interesting choice about how to how to do that how it's justified you know, within the film.

So there there's a one way in which the movie does become like more activated the more hamlety it gets. But then there's also this kind of side to it where yeah, it uh it, it feels like a real engagement with this horrific conflict, and it's a horrific conflict that that actually uh, you know, there there are like nuclear ramifications to the Kashmir conflict. This is really this is like no joke, whether you know locally to to South Asia or internationally, you know, for the whole world, this is a really really serious conflict. And so you know, maybe maybe part of this is is me as an as as like an American audience going oh, wait, I don't know much about this. I want to learn more, and then going wait, I know enough about Hamlet, like I don't need that part, And that's that's maybe the combo that doesn't work for me.

But to be fair to the filmmaker, this is part of a trilogy of Shakespeare based works, so there's a longer game. You know that the director is playing. You are muted to your point about this being the third of Vishwal Barboise's films that are Hamlet adaptations. This one best Shakespeare adaptations, the best I can tell. This is the one that doesn't hew the closest.

It's the one that kind of strays the furthest away. And it's also the one that best I can tell adds in other things from other things, if that makes sense, like it this one, this one, this adaptation of Hamlet has some Othello or Notthello, some Oedipus Rex stuff to it. There's an oedipal thing, right, and like that's not in the original Hamlet, right, not the way this movie goes out. Not the way that this movie doesn't controversial and just enough, right, Like various, you know, various productions have played up the Hamlet and Gertrude kind of thing, but this this definitely goes farther into the autopole than most, which is interesting, right, Yeah, I mean it ultimately goes nowhere, and I feel like the Hamlet of it all is the reason it doesn't go anywhere, because to your point, so much of what it's not that I didn't like of this movie, but it's like, man, this shit is dragging.

So much of that is just the Hamlet of it all. And look, I've seen Hamlet a handful of times. I've read it in high school. I read it within the last ten years. It's fine.

I mean, it's not it's not that it's the Shakespeare that I like. It's just I know the story like at this point, like and you know, the story of Hamlet is as a revenge story, and in the actual source material, they take it to the furthest logical final step, and the movie chooses not to do that, which I kind of don't. I don't know. We're talking spoilers obviously about this movie, but I kind of lives Hamlet. Yeah.

It's fucking weird to me that that is the way this movie ends, because it kind of undercuts the entire emotional climax of the movie in a way. I agree. I agree. It's uh. I mean, I know what they're going after with the Kashmir stuff, like that's I get what they're getting at.

That's where the Kashmiri and the Hamlet, you know, Shakespeare do not match because I get what he is going for by not having him take revenge on you know, Karam, his father's killer, you know, and I get it, But that character, the Claudius character, like Hamlet has to die, like it's part of this. Like, I don't know, it's such a weird change that it doesn't make any sense why you would change it unless it's for the Kashmir of it all, which is fine, but then just don't adapt fucking Hamlet. Yeah, oh man, it makes no sense. It it does, It doesn't really because it doesn't. Yeah that he doesn't Die doesn't seem to add any new element or or revision with either within the terms of the story or the terms of an adaptation of Hamlet.

And then also just given the historical situation, and this is not the part of the play that most people care about so much. But you know, the arrival of fortinbra Prince of Norway at the at the end of Hamlet is uh is kind of this extra you know, twisted the knife for the whole situation, Like this royal family. You know, they're all they're all dead, their bodies are littering the stage, you know, by the end, and it ultimately meant nothing because Forton Brass, Prince of Norway has arrived anyway and would have taken over. Uh and and and so the particulars of this line of succession uh is all rendered meaningless. And of course you know this is a Shakespeare having some nice ironic jokes.

Uh it's funny. I mean it is funny, like that in and of itself is pretty funny. Yeah, So there's nothing quite like that within this I guess there's uh uh yeah, they're that they're they're the different. Here's the thing. Hamlet's a story of family skullduggery and of a family coming apart.

And I guess I am not as sure that a family coming apart is quite the best vehicle for a geopolitical situation with a lot of animosity between, you know, two sides at war for a really long time and at like enormous enormous risk to the world, to nation states in the area. Yeah, so I I just you know, I guess, you know, not to go all sharks and jets, But Romeo Juliet seems like maybe the I don't I wouldn't exactly want to see that one either adapted to the Kashmir situation. But it just seems like you've you have like these two kind of clear sides. And what's most the nature of the tragedy in Hamlet is that it's this family that is, you know, coming apart from all all these different sides. You know, Hamlet goes against his mother because his father is dead and Claudius, you know, his uncle has stepped into the breach and and uh, and Hamlet is suspicious of of how how this has happened.

And then you know, his girlfriend Ophelia gets pulled uh into all this, and and then we have a number of other characters, you know, Polonius and uh, you know, the mayhem of Hamlet is actually a thing. It's really like going in all these different directions and and not I don't know. Maybe maybe again, maybe I'm showing my my ignorance of this particular geopolitical situation. But and maybe it is Mayhem in every possible direction, and so it does make a good metaphor, but maybe it becomes hard hard for me to quite capture with with a arganized But no, no, that's sad. Let's talk about some of the good things in the movie.

What did what did you like? What was what jumped out at you? Chris Shahid Kapor is amazing? I mean, that's that's the problem is, like you you kind of already alluded to it, Like there is parts of this movie that are taken whole cloth from Hamlet, and it's just a redone version of some of the monologues, and they picked the right person to do them. I mean, I think about the one where we see him once he shaved his head and he's kind of, you know, lambasting the idea of like law and order, and what is law and order?

If you know and where do we fit into the India Pakistan conflict being here? I love I love what he brings, the energy that he brings. I also, I don't know if I like what kk Manana is doing, but it's an interesting version of that character of Claudius because he's not as like mustache twirling as you would think, and in that character can sometimes be a little mustache twirling. And I also like Tabu as his mother. I think she in a lot of ways gets almost as much screen time as Hamlet does, and I think she's fantastic.

I think, look, I think everybody's great in the movie. I mean, when you know kind of already mentioned Erfon Khan, but when he shows up as the ghost, the movie really picks up because his energy is I don't know, he has really weird energy in this movie, and it kind of is just there. And then you know, you mentioned the Rosencrantz and Guildenstern characters and this they are two guys obsessed with Solomon Khan, absolutely obsessed with salmon con and they work in a video store seemingly so all the characters have really weird idiosyncrasies to them. But yeah, I again like the Hamlet thing, Like the monologues are there, so like all the stuff that's good about Hamlet is there. But I just yeah, it's so weird to me that some of the things that they do because like the Schroda Kapoor character, she really doesn't get a whole lot to do.

It's kind of a shame because she's two characters, right, Yeah, yeah, she doesn't get a ton to do. I mean, whenever at the very beginning of the movie, she kind of lights up the screen in a way that that that that like, you know, got me a little bit excited for where things might be going. Like, uh, there's good chemistry. You know, there are our Hamlet and Ophelia. Uh, and then and then there are moments, there are moments later on.

Uh but uh yeah, I don't know as as you mentioned the the scene you know where he's shaved his head and he's kind of delivering stand up comedy that is uh, you know, sort of taking the idea of to be or not to be and playing around with how how how that works in this context, what it you know, to believe or not to believe in all this this this stuff that you know, messing around with that I think is really really interesting and sort of playing around with with that as as uh with that speech as as part of a notion of holding together other a nation state, you know. So uh so that's that's interesting. And the performances really really elevate things. And then you know when we get to the play uh, and and it's it's done as a as as a dance number, it's done really well.

But I will say that, uh, you know, given other Bollywood films that I've seen, I felt like this was such a westernized version of you know, uh, a Hindi movie a dance number that it was. It felt a little bit to me, I'm being so mean, but it felt to me like an American movie that wanted to do a Bollywood dance number. It didn't. It did not. Actually, it felt like really cleaned up and uh and not as formally inventive and just like wild as as so many of those dance numbers are.

It was really much more staid and western. I kind of liked the uh the musical number in in the cemetery, the poor yoric moment better, uh, you know, among the grave diggers. Uh, It's brief, but that that one, that one felt a little bit more surprising, maybe because there's no dance in it. Uh, but but the the dance, the dance here felt like it was you know, very you know, straightforward and not as uh not as intense as I'm used to. And so there was a part of me again it was like as much as I might as much as I liked, for instance, this earlier scene that we both talked about where you know, with with with with importing Hamlet into this context.

Then later the the sort of the justification for a big song and dance number in this particular movie, uh by by using the play it kind of it It felt it felt easy and a little too. It felt like the easy choice and the safe choice to kind of, you know, justify this thing that actually really distinguishes Hindi cinema, well, I mean Indian cinema more more broadly, because you know, obviously there's a the song and dance infuses the other traditions in India as well. So so I don't know, I mean, I feel divided on it. I don't know you. I think I think you know more about Indian cinema than I do.

What was your impression? Am I? Am? I a spoil sport here. No, I think you're right.

I mean, it definitely is. I wouldn't say lacking in musical numbers, but it only has what three three? Three? I guess the third one is the kind of music video of the of Hamlet and Ophelia, the like sexy time, yeah, hooking up, having a good time. And then there's the so I guess there's three musical numbers, and then there's but technically four musical numbers, but only three of them have like choreographed dance because the grave Digger one, like you mentioned, doesn't.

I mean, I've seen Indian cinema recently that is without music numbers at all, and that always is kind of again like for me, it's like they're trying to make a more Western style movie. I don't like that. I mean I do, but I don't, But I do, like I understand that these movies are significantly longer. If there's four ten minute songs, it's forty minutes of a movie. Yeah, But at the same time, that's part of this and like you have kind of alluded to, like it maybe is a little it's not whitewashed, but it's is there something odd about Indian actors and an Indian director actively wanting to adapt Shakespeare.

Yeah, I don't know. I mean should be for everyone. I agree with that, but like it's a weird thing because the British colony, I mean, the British were obviously colonizing everywheres and including India. So it's weird that they're like, there's this long British tradition of Shakespeare and we want to I would feel like it'd be like, no fucking way are we doing Shakespeare. Well, I mean they have their own, like, they have their own traditions, their own literary traditions, right, Like Shakespeare is just another fucking white Yeah.

Yeah, well yeah, I don't know. I mean interesting, interesting to consider the particular desire maybe to colonize you know, Shakespeare, right, taking it back, But I think the sad thing is like the parts of the movie that are not Shakespeare related are the better parts of the movie, and they co opt their they co opt their movie to be a Shakespeare movie when it did not need it. You want to tell a story about Kashmir in nineteen ninety five, okay, I mean Sarfarash is a pretty good example. That's a a meir Kan movie that takes place during and kind of around the Kashmir conflict. And there are a couple other movies I've seen that's like this is about the Kashmir conflict and this one I don't know.

Like the idea of this being part of the Kashmir conflict I get, but I don't know. It almost makes them too important when they don't need to be important at all, not to the conflict as a whole. Does that make sense? Yeah, no, it's yeah, it's really it's tough. It the stuff about the Kashmiri conflict in it feels more kind of reverential and and and sort of stiff in some of the filmmaking.

And I think quite possibly that's you know, that that springs from the very natural situation of taking on a very intense and important kind of topic and and wanting to do justice by it and and kind of freezing up just a little bit. But that said, uh it, it really did draw me in wondering about, you know, the nature of this conflict, and of course, the the the particular manifestations of terrorism you know that are that are that are within this story, the particular manifestations of you know, how justice is meted out by an unfair government, uh, in the midst of such a conflict, the way that people are disappeared and what happens to them in jail, and you know. Uh, one thing that I did find really interesting was the metaphor of the ghost being sort of like a living person who's been disappeared is a is a ghost?

You know? That was that was kind of one of the things of importing the idea of the Shakespeare in that I did. I did find to be really working, But then it had to get back to its Shakespeare plot and I was kind of like, oh, no, no, no, no, I want to learn more. And so it was. It was a little Yeah, it was a little tough that way.

I mean, to your point, the idea that the movie needs some sort of Shakespeare framework to make the story of the cashmir conflict compelling is odd to me. Like that that conflict has enough going on. You can set the story in any time during the conflict. I think it would be interesting. Look, I'm not a huge fan of Hamlet two thousand either.

It's fine, It's perfectly fine. I think anytime we try to do like an adaptation or a retelling of Shakespeare. You always get to the point where you're like, why don't I just do something else? Well, like I would be more entertaining. I guess, like the Kashmiri stuff is so good, I don't care about the Hamlet stuff.

It's yeah, Kashmiri stuff is so interesting that the Hamlet stuff is secondary. And I know that's not what they were going for because it feels the other direction, it feels weighted the other way. Yeah. Well, it also raises a question for me about what we want from Shakespeare and what is best in Shakespeare. And I'm not totally sure that the plots are the best thing about Shakespeare.

I mean, you know, there's fine construction, but Shakespeare mostly stole the plots and delivered them. Well, it's the it's the poetry and the intensity of the characterizations that's that's most exciting. I Mean, my own favorite Shakespeare film is Orson Wells's Chimes at Midnight, where he really took a part, you know, three plays and put together his own version that that is an alternate plot about about Falstaff. Uh and and that is a that's a that's a fascinating thing to do with with Shakespeare. Uh.

It elevates what Shakespeare is best at, which is, you know, the character and poetry. Uh, and shifts the emphasis away from precisely what the plot is. In addition to doing kind of a beautiful not to get too far down the road with horse and Wells, but I'm going to do it. Uh. It does a beautiful and radical thing with uh these you know Henry history plays and Mary wives to kind of take Falstaff and make the tragedy about a supporting character, you know, shifting that the kings are now the supporting characters and the ordinary man.

Uh is is uh is the the the tragic He wrote of it. This this is a more exciting kind of cinematic engagement with uh, with with Shakespeare than a lot of straight adaptations are. One thing that this made the hater made me think of a lot was a Shakespeare adaptation. I really don't love the uh. The Ian McKellen UH version of Richard the Third where they kind of, you know, they they said it in uh in sort of a crypto fascists between World War One and World War two.

UH kind of aesthetic world, which which does make some sense, you know, as a as an updating or uh, a kind of fantastical placement of Richard the Third. You know, nothing particularly wrong with that, but there was something there was something about, uh, you know, similar to in Hater, there was something about taking Richard the Third and trying to graft it onto the rise of fascism between World War One in World War Two that was sort of trivializing ultimately and did not turn out to be the best at least, you know, for me, the best kind of adaptation as Hamlets go. I really like Michael Almereda's really swift version of it from the late nineties with Ethan Hawk. You know, it's like ninety minutes.

He really cut the thing down Hamlet two thousand. Yeah, it's fine, right, Like, yeah, you know, I will say I applaud Kenneth Browno for saying I'm gonna do Hamlet, and I'm gonna do the whole goddamn thing. Like, you know what, Kenneth, good for you. We get it, we get it. But yeah, like for me, when I think of something like this, or when I think of adapting Hamlet or Shakespeare in general, Hamlet specifically, I would say that this does a good job of adapting Hamlet.

If we talk about again, like we have to deal with the fact that this movie has Hamlet in it, and that the things that we want out of the movie all are less Hamlet, more everything else, or at least I don't need you to acknowledge in every fucking scene this is a Hamlet retelling. This movie I think is very well shot and looks rather well done in terms of production design. And to your point about that one musical number, I mean, I think it's pretty it's pretty visually arresting, though thankfully it is. Yeah, yeah, no, I feel like I'm a little unfairer. No, but I mean I agree with where you're going with it, but like, at the same time, like it's visually arresting.

The costumes are great, the dance moves are great. The puppets that they use in the sequence really really terrific kind of kind of work. Yeah, I don't know, I think, yeah, probably I'm probably being unfair. I just you know, I do show up for the really creative shooting and cutting of a Bollywood dance number that no one in America has ever tried, right, you know, right, totally shooting and cutting of this stuff is like such amazing, pure cinema and a whole language. I mean I say, like I say, nobody tries over here, I wouldn't try.

I would have no idea how to do that. Part of my love of of you know, Indian musical numbers is is like it's unimaginable to me and somebody did it, and it's it's just there's there's just like a pure excitement about a thing that I could I can't imagine how to put together. I'm with you, but this number I kind of could imagine how to put it together. It starts to look a lot more, a lot more traditional, but but beautifully done. Beautiful design to it.

The costumes are great. The it is actually a sequence where the drama functions really well, cutting back to you know, to Hamlet's parents, Hater's parents, uh, in the audience, their their eyes kind of getting wider and wider as the play is the thing. So there's a lot that works about it. But yeah, it's it's it's rough because the filmmaking energy picks up. I don't know, there's just a this is this is a movie very much divided against itself ultimately, like the first half, which is more glum and that I don't have as much fun with and uh and is maybe a bit more stiff.

Is also the part of the movie that I'm a little bit more invested in, whereas like the second half that has more of you know, pizazz and jazz hands to it, you know, and putting on Hamlet. Uh. Yeah, it feels feels like it trivializes things. And when I get to images, when I get to images like Gertrude showing up strapped with grenades around her body, you know, to uh, to kill everybody who's near at the end of the movie, I'm kind of like, that's a big image, but has it really earned this within a context of you know, horrific rorism and you know, crimes against humanity that are committed in the name of this this conflict. And so it was it was kind of hard for me to it was it was hard for me to take that as Hamlet at the end.

And then also that the Hamlet character doesn't get blown up, you know, by by his his his mother's uh you know, self fumilation. Uh. You know that that to me felt like really not paying off the the greater oedipal attention to that relationship. And you know, she's among other things, I'm not remembering the name of the actress. She's Taboo.

She's fucking gorgeous in this movie. She's really really beautiful and uh and you know, looks her age, but is also gorgeous. And so the scenes between her and Hater really, you know that, like the way that they play against each other, these two like really high human beings in this mother son relationship. It definitely, even even in fairly ordinary scenes and not the ones that are more played up for the edible quality they've done, you know, casting and acting work that is that is emphasizing that. And so when the ultimate tragedy is supposed to be occurring, for for Hamlet to get away and not to go up in flames along with his mother feels to me like such a sheet of the potential of using using the imagery this way.

But then I also I also really feel like that imagery is cheapening the approach to the Kashmiri conflict. It's a it's a tough, weird movie. This is a weird movie. No, And I'm with you, you know, having I mean again, having Hamlet survive proves the point of the Kashmiri conflicts side of the movie, which is revenge solves nothing. Vengein you know, if you're going to dig a grave, you better too.

I mean that's essentially what we're talking about here. And then the other side of the movie is like no revenge is needed, and like revenge is part of this. And it's interesting that the movie comes down on the side of no revenge because again I get why they're doing that, because they want to have a moral compass that points in a certain direction. But to your point, it's just to me. By the end of the movie, I was just thinking to myself, if Hamlet survives, then what is the point of this story?

Yeah, like, actually what is the point of the story? I mean that that gets it like a really interesting problem of how movie storytelling works. Actually, you know, it's the structures that we follow. Are the structures of tragedy, you know, you know, behind Save the Cat and Robert McKee and all the other screenwriting gurus, you know, lies Aristotle who is is laying out, you know, the workings of tragedy, which then you know play out in five act structure instead of three act structure with Shakespeare. But tragedy is a death drum and so much of popular cinema uses the energy of tragedy plots to then manufacture happy endings instead of endings about sacrifice and endings about human machinations resulting in horror and sadness and grief.

You know, tragedy really is, you know, a death drum. It's and I think especially when you stick this close and when you stage the conflict at the end in the way that this is staged. I mean, there are a lot of dead bodies left in this cemetery at the end of this movie, snowy cemetery full of red, bloody dead bodies, and it's it. It does really feel to me like we're we we lose something in that storytelling by not seeing our you know, the true horror. This is the thing like Shakespeare is doing horror in a way at the end of Hamlet by choosing this ironic approach of not only did everybody kill each other and not only did not add up to anything, but this other, this other army has just come in and they're taking over the place anyway, right, you know, it was all for not all for not this is you know, there's there's a certainly there's a cynicism to it, but there's also a sense of you know, the real, uh, the real cost of of violence and of the violent emotions that everybody is going through and so to land here, especially in this kind of conflict where uh, that is a potent reality.

You know that the people involved, whatever side they're on and are engaged in not just a homicidal but a suicidal gesture is yes, it's it's it's real trouble. And I don't know again, you know, maybe maybe someone who's more versed in the politics of this particular conflict would maybe see how Hamlet surviving is a gesture toward hope. But to me, I'm with you, I get that part. It feels it feels instead like a kind of get out of jail free card and not not up to the Yeah, the horror that's been set up, the horror that's in the background of the whole thing. Well, and to your point about Hamlet, you know, being rather cynical, I wouldn't say that this is an uncynical film, but it's it's I don't know, like the idea of Hamlet not dying at the end would lead me to believe the film is again trying to have a message or have a point or you know, get to the point already movie.

And I don't know. I'm not saying I don't know. I'm not saying that if you're not gonna end Hamlet low way Hamlet ends, you shouldn't do Hamlet. But it's kind I don't know. Hamlet dying at the end is kind of part of this.

It'd be like in it from Romeo and Juliet, Romeo and Juliet, just one of them survives, just because it's a part and parcel to the entire plot that those things have to come to fruition for Hamlet as a play, like you've already alluded to, for it to make sense narratively, Hamlet has to die. It's not my choice. I didn't write it. But if I did write a movie that was Hamlet adjacent, the ending is probably one of the few things I don't touch. Yeah, I mean, I retell it, redo it my own way, but which the movie does do.

I mean, that's the other thing that's kind of bizarre to me is the movie's not above making changes. I don't remember in the original version of Hamlet, shake Shakespeare writing Rosencrantz and guildensdur And get pludgeoned to death with rocks. But that happens in this movie pretty graphic, pretty shockingly graphic too, at least in terms of the way these two characters are being treated that up until this point have been again the way Rosenkrantz are Guildenstern are portrayed for the most part in Hamlet, other than the fact that these guys seem to be more malicious than normal. Yeah, well no, it's it's interesting because, of course Hamlet does send rosen Krantz and Guildenstern off to their deaths, right, but he sends them off to their death, to their death.

He doesn't kill them directly. I guess he does the mob boss kind of killing, which is interesting. And that's that's part of the transgression of Hamlet that you know, revenge tragedies always involve a transgression where the revenger goes too far, and this is like one of those key moments. It's it's not it goes further than killing Polonius by mistake, right, no, right, legends them to death with rocks, like yeah, yeah, yeah, no, I like I like that, and I like comic relief characters and comic relief characters that are introduced the way that they are in the video store, dancing along, you know, with the with a movie on TV. You know that's I do.

I do think that that's great, that's kind of bold. It's a I don't know, I don't know. It's uh, there's a lot that I keep Yeah, I don't know, there's it's it's a problem movie, uh, in the sense that, like as we talk about it, there are there are moments and touches that I do really like. And you're reminding me that like killing the Rosencrantz and Guildenstern characters with rocks, the grotesque intensity of that, that's a change that I'm all. I'm all for, right same, But in the moral universe of the film, that's also Hamlet going more personally over the edge as a revenger, and what what does it mean for that revenger to survive?

Does it become that much more cynical? You know that the that that all the the violence caused by everyone's conflicting moralities doesn't ultimately come back to get hater who has been immoral, you know, right right, well, And that's the thing you kind of already talked about. Like, the morality of the movie is strange to me because I don't necessarily understand because again Hamlet and the Kashmir conflict don't really go hand in hand. The movie doesn't really have much of a moral compass, which is again kind of odd given that the Kashmir conflict is driving so much of it. You would think that that would have some factor in the movie's moral compass.

But I can't tell what the movie's moral compasses, if it even has one, because again, the Kashmir conflict it's I'm not saying it's black and white, but like, there are clearly aggressors and there are people that are defending against those aggressors on both sides. This movie doesn't make that very clear. This movie is just again opting it in a way that does trivialize what it's actually about. Well, and it starts in a place that is maybe trying to find a complexity within this which again is it's it's tricky, Like I didn't love the dramaturgy of this moment, but it's setting me up for the rest of the movies, which is that, like you know, Hamlet's father is going to die because he is a doctor that is going that that decides he is he's going to save the life of someone on the enemy side, you know, uh, And it's because he's a doctor.

And there's a there's an exchange between him and UH and Gertrude at the beginning when she asks, you know, what side are you on? And then, you know, in a very TV movie kind of way, he says, I'm on the side of life and it's my doctor hipocratic exactly, and it's it's it's a cheesy underlining of something that I already know going on in the movie, but but it is it is this interesting place to start that I just don't. I don't, I don't know, I'm not I'm not quite able to track that the movie takes life that seriously by the end. You know, the doctor at the beginning, he's gonna save this guy because he believes in life and because every human being should be, you know, rescued from dying a very painful death of appendicitis.

Okay, okay, great, but being on the side of life is not something that I see through this And in fact, that to me is even more reason why our Hamlet has to die, right, he should be sacrificed in order for us to be in favor of life in a way, you know, that's that's the kind of that's the tragic morality, as the revenger goes too far, but the revenger sacrifice and then you know, suggest can can can suggest, you know, not just Cattharsis for the audience, but a better world that is, that is possible. And that's not the case in every single tragedy, but tragedies often do you know, like in a way Oedipus recks for instance, because that's one that probably people are are pretty familiar with. You know, Oedipus finds out he's the problem, and he tears his eyes out.

He doesn't actually die, he tears his eyes out and he leaves, but he has to leave in order for things to be better. He has to. You know, he's like a he's a detective who solves the crime and finds out that he's the one that committed it. And so, you know, cosmic justice demands that he be banished, and his own morality demands that he must blind himself after he's seen what he's seen, and this is for the good of others. You know, it's we're the tragedy isn't just oh, what a terrible thing happened to someone, it's the moral conflicts that result in a you know, in a horrible end for a character, but that can nevertheless sort of change their world for the better.

Well, in Hamlet, by the end of Hamlet, by the end of the play, I don't remember so much being the case. But in this movie, by the end of the movie, he's kind of like a rabid dog, and it's like, this is a dog that needs to be put down because again old yeller, yeah, well hater. At the end of the movie, he walks away from killing his uncle to what end, to what life does he like? He just walks back to the institute where he was and just goes, okay, put me in here for good and for real this time. Yeah, I don't yeah like.

It undercuts the idea of what the character of Hamlet means to the narrative of Hamlet, which is Hamlet is a device, just like so many other things in Shakespeare. He's the device through which Shakespeare can act to get things to happen. In a similar way, the Ophelia character is in the story and she is woefully sidelined in the second half of this movie in a way that I was not expecting given how much of the first half of the movie she's in. But then they look away from her and it becomes more about Hater and his mother, and they kind of lose a lot of the screen time together, which Shrada Kapor is great, but you're not gonna get a whole lot out of her if she's not on screen. Yeah, yeah, that's that's really true, and sort of a fascinating idea to mix Ophelia with Horatio, you know, conceptually from the for the beginning of it, but Horatio then is not present for the end, and you know, it's kind of like, wouldn't it be interesting if Ophelia slash Horatio could be the one that makes it to the end of the movie, as in the play, that Ophelia by becoming Horatio, manages to make it to the end, you know, doesn't doesn't have to kill herself.

So yeah, it's sort of It's interesting the way that these changes to the plotting and characterization don't quite add up, but nevertheless produce some really fascinating moments, some great yeah, some great moments. Of acting and behavior well, and to your point, Shradakapoor's character not making it to the end but being a character who makes it to the end along with obviously being Ophelia. Not only do they kind of leave her out of the second half of the movie, she just essentially dies off screen. Yeah, which has shot that to me was maybe the most shocking part was that she dies off screen. Yeah.

Yeah, it's interesting, Like, you know, the play, she kind of has to die off stage. But Ophelia's death has been treated, you know, as an occasion for all manner of art, even before even before cinema. It's it's uh, it's a moment that really sticks in the brain for people in a in a way that makes them want to see it. And in the other film adaptations of Hamlet, it is something that we that we see and feel horror in, you know, when when Ophelia, you know, kills herself and I, yeah, I don't, I don't, I don't know. It's uh there, it's like a couple of missed opportunities rolled into one here, right, there's an opportunity to really let her be Horatio and make it to the end instead.

Uh, and and and perhaps inform how this all can be seen, how it goes down, and then we also lose the opportunity of of of being with her in this moment of choice, right right well, and and to your point, you know, not seeing it as one thing, but in this movie, her dying it barely even does anything. And that's the sad Again. The sad part is the first half of the movie, her and Shahid Kapor have great chemistry together, and then in the second half of the movie she gets sidelined because again it's more about hater and his mother and kind of the machinations between the two of them. And so not only does she get essentially forgotten in the second half of the movie, but because we don't see the act of suicide, it barely even matters that she was ever there.

Like, she's less of a character in this than she really she is less of a character as both of the characters than both of those characters are on their own and Hamlet, it's shocking, it is, it's really shocking, and it yeah, and she's just Opelia, isn't she. Like effectively they say she's Apelia and Horatio, but the fact that she's Horatio comes into this not one bit. She's Horatio just for the very beginning, you know, like right to be the first you know, the first real interface with Hamlet and to sort of get the story going. But then she turns completely into Ophelia and is a particularly sidelined Ophelia. I mean there there's there's some actually like beautiful charming work between the two of them in uh uh in this this sort of in the Honeymoon music video, right they get uh there there really there really are some uh some some beautiful human moments between them, uh and what is essentially just a montage, so you know, it's not it's not like human moments with dialogue that is that you know, the dialogue that they have is fine, but it's it's actually you know, more more of this kind of uh young lover's behavior between them that is uh, you know, very sweet and compelling, but also only go so far right in a way that like she's almost not needed, like if you're just gonna be the Aphelia character, that could have been a change that was completely necessary, which was just you know, there is no female companion for Hamlet in this version.

Yeah, and in a way, like in a way you could write her character out of this movie completely, and I don't think the movie would be less for it. I mean, it would suck that she's not in the movie, but I think you would be like, well, what an interesting choice that Hamlet doesn't have a love interest as opposed to like his love interest is undercooked. And look, you know what's sad about her character being undercooked is Schroda Kapoor is a great actress. So it's unfortunate that she's kind of not able to do what she normally does in the things that I've seen her in, which is being a really good actor. And she's just again, it's not that she's not given a lot, it's just they don't think that the character is important enough to have her be one or the other.

They just kind of have her be the least present version of Ophelia that I've ever seen in an adaptation of Hamlet. You mentioned Hamlet two thousand. What is that, Julia Stiles? That's a now one. She's all over that, isn't it.

She's all over that movie constantly, Like in this, it's like Shrata Kapur is there. But if she's meant to be portraying two characters, she's barely there as one man. All right, Well, so let's let's emphasize positive again. Yeah, I want recommendations. I loved her for as much as she's in this movie.

But tell me other Shrata Kapor movies. So I want to say, I'm trying to remember the name of Okay. So Boggy three is a lot of fun if you're looking for something that is. I don't know. Boggy and Boggy three are very different movies, but they're very over the top crazy.

I don't know, like it's kind of a weird thing in Indian cinema that I don't think gets represented in this country a lot through Indian cinema, which is there are Indian action movies and they are absolutely off the wall in terms of what they're doing with the genre of action. So the Boggy series with Tiger Shroff is fun. I think she's I want to say, she's the lead. She's the lead in Stree, which is I think the thing I remember her being in the most and Stree is a horror movie, but it's based on a like an Indian legend that has then come to life, and she plays that come to life. I've seen her a lot with Tiger Shroff, who she runs circles around because he's not necessarily a great actor.

He's more of a face. And I mean, look, he's a really good looking guy. Like that's the thing. And that's the thing that you kind of alluded to. Every time I watch one of these Indian movies, I'm like, these people are fucking gorgeous, like all of them, every single beautiful.

But it's this thing is gorgeous. But it's that thing that it feels like. It feels like the old Hollywood way, right, like where being a movie star meant something as opposed to anybody can be a movie star now that they've got cameras and just point them at ourselves Like that, for me is the thing that Indian cinema has never lost. The acts and the big name actors feel like a big deal, and they are good looking, and they have to be able to dance, and some of them don't do their own singing, and some of them do, Like you know, do you You have to be a little bit of everything to be a Bollywood actor or an Indian cinema actor, which I think has been lost in the compartmentalization of this the industry as it is in our country.

Yeah, we want people that went to the gym constantly, right, that's our that's our main standard now and a lot of people, look, I know, it's really it's unfortunate, and it isn't you know, like, uh, I'm no fan of the Marvel movies, but I'm not going to blame the Marvel movies because it started well before you know that we just kind of decided that that you know, certain certain kinds of you know, really built or really thin looks are the most important thing. And then you know, do they do they give decent reaction shots and and whatnot. Yeah, it is a thing about right Indian cinema that's really exciting. The stars are really really stars. Yeah, it's still a thing.

Yeah. And I haven't seen Shahid Kapor in anything else, but I think that the energy that he brings to the Hamlet character is is pretty good. Like He's is intense, very intense, and I think that intense is kind of what you want with this version of Hamlet because this is I mean again, this is similar to the two thousand Hamlet, and that it's like kind of crime adjacent. Yeah. Again, like you know, they're kind of like small time crime lords or like gorilla warriors, and like that's you know, I mean again like I understand that transposition, like transposing Hamlet onto that kind of conflict makes sense.

And yeah, I like him a lot. I actually like again, I like all the actors in this movie a fair amount. I think kk Manon's Claudius is interesting because he's a lot more. He's more sympathetic. He's sympathetic then I would have ever thought that character could be, which is again another interesting change in terms of the narrative.

But again, like, to what end do you make the guy who is the ostensibly the worst character in the entire movie or narrative? Why make him sympathetic? It doesn't necessarily get much for the audience. Well, I guess, I guess, Like you know, I could weird see it. I could see an argument of going that direction of sympathy if if it was going to play out in the kind of morality of all the mayhem that that occurs, you know, and the Kashmir side of it, if it were that it's like under you know, be more understanding and sympathetic of people.

It's like, but it's not that it's this is the Hamlet part of it, and that that change is being made in such a strange way. Yeah. Interesting, right, it's such a weird like again, like Claudius is the is not a sympathetic character. He's not meant to be right, like, not in the ways I've seen him before. Yeah, I mean I've seen a couple of different approaches to him.

He becomes sympathetic. So one of the things that he becomes the most sympathetic in the moment just before Hamlet is going, you know, plans to kill him, and he can't. You know, he can't kill Claudius while he's praying, and you know, Uh, that's that's like a beat that's done well here. But but yeah, you know Hamlet uh, you know, doesn't kill him in the clutch, which then results in even more mayhem to follow, uh in the original play. But but yeah, that's that's a sort of interesting turn that we Uh.

One of the reasons for him to be a little bit more conventionally villainous or at least oily, uh, is it is so that in this moment of of empathy, uh, that that there can be a really you know a nice turn there, and it's not an automatic thing that oh well, Claudius is actually too nice for Hamlet to kill, right, right, it's not it's not that, and it's not that in this movie. But he's the least villainous of the versions I've seen he. I mean again, like in a lot of ways, like it almost feels like again like did he do what he did by accident? Like I don't know, kind it kind of like right, like he killed Hamlet's father by accident in this one. No, Yeah, I mean I think effectively that's that's right, and that right, which is fucking bizarre in and of itself, Like now he is kind of a sympathetic character.

Well and and I guess, you know, to go back to the original, there's a lot of diddy or didn't he it was the ghost lying as Hamlet just sort of you know, conjuring fantasies because he's you know, upset that his father has died and sees his uncle as a usurper? Is it something that Hamlet is picking up in his mind? And that's a kind of drama, But yeah, I hear it feels a little too set as an answer that like, oh, it's by accident rather than that, it's an ambiguity up until you know, the sort of moment of confession, which is also the moment of greatest humanity, when Hamlet can't kill him right. Well, and I mean what's also interesting is so we have Hamlet unable to kill him twice. Right, But the mother in the original doesn't blow everybody up with a suicide vest.

No, it's it's wonderful. She she drinks she drinks poison, right, yeah, the yeah, the poison is and the poison and the poison in that final scene kind of kills everybody, right, you know, it's exactly it really, you know, even if you get stabbed, you're being stabbed by a sword rapier that has poison on it. So it's the big metaphor there, Shakespeare, right, the poison to the whole scene. So I do find there to be something compelling about the like suicide bomb scenario. Yeah, me too.

It's just they don't do it the way they're supposed to. Yeah, it's just or yeah, well, and again you know that kind of imagery from this particular kind of conflict just becomes really troublesome as a clever way to replace the poison and Shakespeare. I don't know. Again, to me, it's just it feels it feels like, much as I love Shakespeare, Shakespeare cheapens what's going on. Well, and I would say it cheapens what's going on the most when we have Hater killing the layer Tes version of that character in this movie, well, that's also kind of accidental too.

Yeah, it's not you know in the play that I mean, it's a gnarly accidental that I definitely okay spoiler alert, but you know, falling and hitting your head on a gravestone, that is that legit filmed well and also a particularly like nightmarish death scenario right, rather ignominious end as it were. Yeah, yeah, but I as much as I enjoy that scene, I think the fact that it's like Hamlet adjacent undercuts undercuts the scene because again it feels like it feels like it's forced into the movie. Like we understand that Hater and Lartes have a conflict, but they haven't really shared screen much in this movie with one another, you know, if at all I think there may be in one scene together. Well, again, it's it's the way that the Ophelia of this story disappears.

That also means that Laertes tends to disappear. So it's yeah, it's a kind of and then do you need Yeah, it just becomes like, well, why don't you just get rid of that character? Right? Yeah, that's what I mean, Like it deserves no purpose. This is like always one of the big things about Shakespeare cutting is that like people will actually preserve two much and they won't cut the right kinds of things.

You know, like, if you're going to cut down a Shakespeare you have to it's not just being judicious. You have to throw some babies out with the bathwater. Yeah, if you're going to cut certain elements, you are then following threads because it is so Hamlet is so tightly knit, you know, the poetry of it, and everything is so tightly knit. And again this is the Hamlet two thousand thing where I do really like the Michael Armereta version. He was ruthless in cutting out anything that did not fit, you know, the main thrust of this.

And so it's like, you know, this speech is out, that speeches out, this famous line is out, that famous light is out. We are whittling this down to you know, a ninety minute, you know, contemporary set version of the story, and yes, there will still be the poetry in there, but it's going to be one thin selection of the poetry. And so in a way that, yeah, it brings up the problem of cutting Shakespeare. You're gonna make certain changes, like just cut these characters. They don't make any sense in this setting.

You don't need them for all of this conflict to work right, And and the ones that you do need are done well, but the ones that you don't need stick out like sore thumbs, like Laerties in this or even the Forton Brass stand in, who's barely in the the Ashwath bought characters barely even in the movie, Like why why have a stand in for that character when that literally doesn't matter in this No, no, it doesn't come in. I mean, like the whole importance of Forton Bras is we're going to talk about him every so often, and then at the end, only at the end does he finally arrive, you know, Like, but this is the opposite. It's kind of like we get this brief, we get this brief glimpse for I'm not sure what purpose, and then it's not it is not the same kind of uh a, right of all that that that uh yeah, just blows everything up, you know, right right well, And I think to your point, like the the suicide bomber of it all, that would have been the way to have the movie end is with you know, Hater and his uncle both dying in the in the same explosion.

Absolutely, we're not dying immediately, but you know, I mean we kind of see that his uncle is San's legs by the end of the movie, or San's feet at least, so he's he's going to bleed out unless someone comes and saves him. I just having Hater walk off into the sunset effectively, just for me, it it undercuts what Shahid Kapor has been doing all film. It kind of undercuts what Tabu's been doing the entire film, which is building up to this moment where their two characters are now connected because we see earlier in the movie she threatens to kill herself with a gun if he doesn't decide to go away as opposed to that mother, right, And that's the thing, like you you would think that that seen at the end of the movie would be the moment of fruition.

Finally, coming into effect, and instead it kind of is in the sense of the narrative, but he should have been part of that. There's no universe where this makes any sense. It would not be more Oedipus Rex, but it would be more Oedipal to have you know, Gertrude, Hamlet, and Claudius all go up in the same flames right at the end. There really would be you know something there, And again speaking to the end of the original Hamlet, that's where the poison sort of comes into it, right singularly as it were. Yeah, so, yeah, I don't know.

I want to like it better. Well, and that's you know, that's the thing. It's like I do as well. But at the same time, it disappoints me that it's a Hamlet adaptation, Like that was the reason I wanted to watch it, because like, oh, that sounds interesting Hamlet adaptations set during the Kashmir conflicts of ninety five. But maybe it would there have been a better Shakes, I mean, other than Romeo and Juliet.

Would there have been a better Shakespeare play to do over a military conflict? Well, I'm trying to remember what the one with rape finds is. They adapted it rather recently, but that's a Shakespeare thing about like military, right, yeah, yeah, yeah, was it? I'm trying to remember which one it was. I didn't see it, so I'm having trouble, sir.

Was it did an episode? Was it Coriolanus? Yeah, that's what it was. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, Coriolanus might be better. You would have to kind of choose a side if you did Macbeth.

But Macbeth is a you know, really Macbeth makes for a particular kind of statement about you know, violence and power relationships, though I don't know that that necessarily best fits this one. I mean, I wouldn't want to see Romeo and Juliet in this setting because I feel like that really would trivialize. But at least, at least the central situation would kind of, you know, make make some sense, you know, the Capulets and Montague's arrayed against each other or uh in a way that is ultimately uh, you know, fruitless and and horrific. But but yeah, yeah, maybe there would be there would be better, better tragedies to go with. Uh.

I mean, you know, lear doesn't really fit. That's another you got me going down a route of thinking, oh it is Lear work. No, Lear doesn't. Lear doesn't work either, And let's let's save Leir for Ron. Anyway, you know, I have mentioned I mean very very different kind of context obviously, but but but the Carasawa Shakespeare adaptations create an interesting comparison point.

And and you know, it's funny. I've seen Ron and I remember enjoying it. But again, like that's more I don't want to say it's more straightforward, but it kind of is. Like that's the thing about this is like, if you're gonna do Hamlet, don't set it in the Kashmir conflict. Just set it in I mean, I mean again, like I'm not saying do something really pedestrian, but I'm saying do something that's a little less heated than this already is to begin with.

And how not problematic, but again like how opinionated an incendiary that this can get very quickly or if you want to be ironic, nuclear it could go right yeah, yeah, Well, and you know, Corosawa sets his versions in a fantasy Japan of the past, so it's there's something very pure in the adaptation of those, you know, so yeah, that the sort of I don't know, again, I'm not against contemporary updating. May everybody can everybody should own this. I am. I will say that I am most interested in the way that to be or not to be, which is the most famous part of Hamlet, does get a kind of serious change to being more about an more about a people, more about a kind of civic identity than it is about an individual person in this context, That's where it feels.

And that's if I were to guess what the inspiration for the whole thing was, it might be that you know that that's the thing that it that that that we start from as like why Hamlet is best to adapt here? But yeah, I kind of it just it runs away with itself. Uh, and it's no strange brew which is a great Hamlet adaptation the best one might say. Yeah, I'm I'm with you. I'm not against updating the Hamlet or or any of Shakespeare's kind of stories, but I do think sometimes trying to ground them in reality as opposed to I mean, the Coriolanus film, if I remember it correctly, it's just set in some Eastern European state kind of like ron Is.

Where it's like, it's just where it's being set is not important. If it factors into it. That's the choice that we're going to make, but it doesn't necessarily have to influence everything. And that's why I think this movie against succeed fails. However, you want to look at it like it's a failure and a success at the same time, which I think to your point, it makes it kind of a weird movie because for me, the places where it succeeds and the places where it fails are happening at the same time, on top of each other, as it were.

So yeah, I don't know, like I would be curious to see some of the other adaptations that he's done of Shakespeare. Vishwal Barboige has a very interesting eye in terms of production, in terms of the way things are shot. He uses zooms a lot and like focus zooms a lot, which is kind of fun. But I like his ie for cinema and the filmic language that he uses. However, it's just a little too much here to try to make two things be one, So that's kind of yeah, that's my kind of eh.

With Shakespeare's, especially with this kind of Shakespeare, it's kind of hard to do a lot with it. You have to kind of pick your battles accordingly and wisely, because otherwise you will get bugged down in all of this, and this movie with a two and a half hour time limit, it's only what, it's only like thirty minutes forty minutes shorter than the Kenneth Brana one, which is everything that's like three hours, right, Like it's yeah, runs close to four hours. Actually, uh, this is only an hour and a half away. Like that's not that much ground to cover, It's really not. No, well, there are ways to get it there, especially when you're I mean, the big changes that are made are are big.

But one of the things that's really funny is the Hamlet plot really starts properly with the arrival of the ghost, which is held off until fairly late. There are Hamlet elements before that, you know, it's sort of like rearranged, so I don't want to I don't want to be like, oh, there's no Hamlet before that, but it's like within the hamlet ness of the movie, it really gets going when the ghost shows up, which is not surprise because the ghost is in scene one of uh of of Shakespeare's Hamlet, and that's that's where the plot really gets going because it requires this not just jealousy of Claudius, but suspicion of Claudius. Uh and and so there's you know, Hater is jealous, but he's kind of hanging out for a long time, and so is the rest of the plot.

But the hanging out again, you know, I gotta say, the purpose of the hanging out is actually making room for more serious consideration of Kashmir than we get in the second half. So it's it's I don't know, it's a fascinating mixed bag. And I guess, especially talking about it, I am now really glad that I saw it. There was a there was a point where I was cursing, oh, not enjoying the film. I was like, oh no, I gotta do this, another bad movie on the culture cast.

Huh, well, you know, a different, different kind of thing, like we did Roman Polanski's Pirates, which is an utterly horrible film. This is so far superior to Roman Polanski's Pirates. This is a movie. This actually is a movie. Yeah.

Yeah, Roman Polanski's Pirates is like it's a lot of sets and costumes and people, but I'm not sure that there is a movie. But at any rate, you know that has a different kind of angle because, like you know, I've seen most of Roman Polanski's other films, and this is this one that stands out as particularly bad. Its reputation precedes it, and so there's a fascination and seeing that this this was one where it's I don't have that sense of the reputation preceding it, but there was there was a point of a slog for me where I was like, oh, no, I gotta talk about this, but I came around on it, and then especially talking to you, it's yeah, I'll give it more. I'll say that's problematic rather than bad, and I think interesting for people that want to look at you know, Shakespeare adaptation, I'll give it that.

And look, we are also kind of in the minority here because it is a rather well received movie. I would have to be beloved. And I'm like, yeah, it was a major commercial success. And also at the Filmfare Awards it received five awards, which was Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor, and Best Supporting Actress were part of that. I think also I think they probably won Best Film, Best Director.

I'm assuming, but I mean, okay, I mean again, like we're in the wrong here. That's fine. Like, you know, yeah, so did La La Land for a minute. Yeah, well yeah, Lala Land almost did. And there's you know, the Paul Hagies crash, not the one true crash by David Cronenberg, right right, you know exactly, there's you know, the Oscars have given awards to lots of lots of worse movies than this.

Yeah, for sure, for sure. No, it's well made, well acted, but there, you know, therein lies the problem, Like the problems are not easily spottable by just looking at the movie. It's part part and Parcel. I wonder if you'd never seen Hamlet, if you would enjoy this more. Yeah, you know, so I the thought experiment we can't do.

But I didn't say this, but I did. I did go in cold, and I didn't know I was getting Hamlet. And then I clocked it in the scene where he walks in and he sees you know, Gertrude and Claudius, and I was like, oh, wait, is this Hamlet. And I'm like twenty minutes into the movie, by the way, I know, I went for a while, you know, kind of taking it on its own terms and everything. And then and then I was like, I think I think this might be Hamlet, and I looked I looked it up and then it was so so I had a brief you know, maybe maybe I uh, maybe I would have had the full experience that I had.

I been in a movie theater and not at home where I read, you know, break out my phone and go, okay, am I gonna have to rewind the movie a little bit on netflixer, but I you know, I had to Wikipedia. And then of course the first thing it says is an adaptation of Hamlet, and I was like, ah, this is what I'm watching now. Yay is what you were saying clearly Yay, Spencer. Final thoughts on Hater. Thoughts on Hater.

Yeah, interesting, interesting, interesting movie, interesting kind of artistic problem, and uh yeah, I would I would highly recommend students of Shakespeare watch it as an adaptation to sort of check out the workings and misworkings of it. It. Also, I guess, uh, I'm gonna have to look up a bit more about the Kashmir conflict because I I feel like I know just enough to be dangerous before watching this, and then it tells me a little bit more. Uh. But uh, that was the part of the movie that was the most fascinating to me, and I feel like I need to know a lot more because this, in fact is not a good movie for learning about the Kashmir conflict.

No, it is not a better piece of media to learn about the Kashmir conflict. Maybe Curfewed Night, which this movie is also based on, but I think that's more the idea of setting it in Kashmir, because no, Hamlet is not set in Kashmir originally. Wouldn't that be fun if it was? I think for me, I enjoyed this movie just fine. Hamlet and Shakespeare are things that for me, I have a very interesting relationship with, just given the fact that I grew up in this country and I was in advanced English classes where that was taught, that was drilled into me how important it was, and then I realized, in the real world it is not really that it's important.

It's that it sets the stage for other things to come in and be much more important. But because of what it is, it sets the stage, so that has to be acknowledged. And again, sometimes that's the best way to adapt Hamlet is to just use Hamlet as set or any shape experience for that matter, as it's set dressing and then have your own world within that doing its own thing. This movie kind of does a little bit of column A, a little bit of column B, which is kind of why we're at the point we are with this movie, with it being kind of a success kind of a failure. I'm with you.

I think it's an interesting movie for anyone who wants to see a version of Hamlet that is not just a bunch of white people for the most part, because again Kenneth Rano's version just a bunch of white people. The Hamlet from two thousand just a bunch of white people. Best I can remember this one. The white actors in the movie are the worst part of the movie. That's the worst part of the movie.

For the three times we see like English actors who are just going ooh ooh in one scene and then in another scene just randomly like b rolled in there for no reason. I had perverse enjoyment from those moments. In Indian movies though, me too, It's like that's what they think. Huh, that's that was like my favorite thing about Lagon, you know, back back when. Yeah, that is it like just how mean it is to the white people.

I'm like I'm here for it. They deserve it. And in Lagan, I mean they're British in this movie they could be we never we who knows? Like forests, yeah, tourists in Kashmir of all places, like well, there's a conflict going on, like are you all lost? But I think for me again, like I picked it because it was a Hamlet adaptation and I wanted to see what that looked like.

And I had heard the movie was well received, So that's why we're here. That's why we watched it. I don't think it disappointed. I just think it definitely left me wanting more of something else that it does give from time to time, which is kind of the strange the fuck aoo of it all. So so on that note, we'll take a break, play some ads, and when we come back, we'll talk about what Mike White and I are covering next week.

From weirding Way Media, Cambridge, and with Shan is a podcast about two guys obsessions, passions and hobbies. Those two guys are Mark Bigley, host of Wake Up Heavy recollections of Horror, and Ronald Zuriggian, host of the Skelevator YouTube channel. Each month, we talk about the toys, comics, movies, books, TV shows, and other cultural phenomena that captured our imaginations and helped shape who we are today. From Masters of the Universe to Saturday Night Live, Star Wars to Harry Houdini the Muppets to The Elephant Man. Ronnie and Mark dive deep into the recesses of their minds to pull out treasured memories of things lost but never forgotten.

Join us on the first Tuesday of each month over at weirdinwaymedia dot com, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Join me Jamie Benning on the Filmmentary's podcast, particularly if you enjoy stories like designer Nilo Rhodis Jamiro convincing George Lucas to push him around to help gain the support of his crew on the Ailing Howard the Duck Plam, the Door opens to George, everybody gas. George makes a b line to me, I'm literally back against the wall or here puppeteer Tim Rose's emotional story behind that iconic Admiral Acbar shot in Return of the Jedi. I believe it or something to be proud of, but not the Celburg or how Star Wars editor Paul Hirsch tackled cutting so many successful films. The thing that I learned from working with the Parliament is that tension depends on a clock.

You need to have the sense that time is running out. Maybe Oscar winning sound designer Mark Mangini's insightful chat about his work on Blade Runner twenty forty nine. Not a single sound from the original Blade Runner in the new film, A great deal of inspiration. That's the film Youmentary's podcast with me Jamie Benning, Hello, Twisted Humans. Do you find yourself wanting to know more about the latest murder, conspiracy, cult or haunting than this is the podcast for you.

In nineteen fifty two, there was a record high of UFOs reported fifteen hundred sightings. There has been evidence of human sacrifice, double worship, and it is haunted by more spirits than can be counted. A family of two adults and two kids reportedly saw a giant flying thing with glowing red eyes. And meanwhile, the family's nanny that helped Veronica to care for her and Lucian's children, was found bludgeoned to death in the basement of their family home. I'm Alicia and I'm Sierra, and this is twisted and uncorked connection.

We know camal Gesa, Why why you dooze Jada Strong i a connections this darning dam m h. You say fans starting da Gary Lack. There was God Trophy and Arian Ariana war fan a small bird they give to the love of my life, Arian Karna happy bird. You fan play cold Arianna. Listen to me carefully, You're to make we call it many the motor could a fan to me as bollo hapy life parts.

When it wins again, it is nice time for a part. Second wikid play a fan start give pach about a star fan, keep it cha bargain m h. Now blue is a race of one concha kobb think your time of Guardian God of nice. So on the next episode of the Culture Cast, Mike White and I are going to be watching Fan, which is a shahru Khan film where he plays a fictionalized version of himself and then an obsessed fan version of himself digitally deaged. It sounds fucking insane.

The trailer for the movie is fucking insane, and I hope that the movie is fucking insane because it sounds pretty high concept to me. Like I mentioned, Mike White will be joining me, so that should be a good time. We've been talking about doing that movie for a year and a half now, so we're finally gonna get to watch it and you'll get to hear the episode here in about a week. But until then, Spencer, where can people find you and the things that you work on? Oh?

Well, you know, I suppose I'm on social media, but you know, I'm on Twitter, which I'm not gonna call x I guess I just did. But I'm on I'm on Twitter, which is a pathetic, sad shadow of itself that I'm enjoying on some level seeing immalight. But it's getting boring. I gotta say it's last that Twitter has lasted a lot longer, uh than I expected. When I was like, you know, ride or die, I want to see it die.

Uh Now I'm kinda I'm a little bit like, I think I got to get away from here. It's the decay is is not not as fun as I expected. And I'm on Instagram, which is all ads, you know, telling me how I can poop better. Those are for whatever reason, and now everybody knows too much about me. Uh.

The Instagram algorithm wants to tell me how to poop. I you know, but uh but at any rate, I'm there. I teach a Northwestern university working on a film that, uh, you know, hopefully and by by fall is going to be done. But I feel like, uh, for for luck on knocking on wood right now because I spoke of uh an end date for this film, but it's got to be done really soon, and uh so then I'll be putting it out in the world and uh, you know, letting people tear me apart from right right do what we do, but someone will do that to you, that's what we definitely, yeah, I will. I will shut down my letterboxed the day that that movie becomes publicly available.

I'm better off not knowing. That's fairly well. Speaking of knowing and knowing where to look for things to hear people talking about things that they know. Birding Way Media is the place to listen to anything pop culture, be it movies, TV, true crime, paranormal. That's where you need to go, including the projection booth where Spencer and I met many moons ago.

I can't even remember what on at this point. Was it some sort of African or South American movie? Mike White's program, right, it was all over the place. Might have been checked, I get played. Did we do the commentary together?

Was that how we well? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, okay, there we go. So yeah. You can actually hear Spencer and I in physical media form in the second run film release of All My Good Countrymen, which is a check film, and as you can tell, Spencer and I are check film experts. I mean, truly one of my favorite films that I've seen in the last few years.

Yeah. Well, and hey, you know, getting to do a commentary A A ain't to complain either. That was twenty twenty, by the way, that was April of twenty twenty. So known each other for about four years now, but Spencer's been on a couple episodes of the Culture Cast before. He's been on the projection Booth, and it was also on Scary Stories We Tell, which is kind of sitting waiting for the moment.

But all those things, including a whole host of other things, can be found at Weirdingwaymedia dot com. Side for one thing, which can be found at patreon dot com slash Culture Cast, which is Rankin' on bond where every month Mike White and Richard had him and I sit and talk about James Bond chronologically, movie by movie. If that's something you're into, ten dollars on Mike White's Patreon or my Patreon will get you monthly access to that spencer. Thank you so much for joining me, I would say, finally, finally about I'm well, we'll uh, we'll do those other movies soon enough. I know the movies that are that are more fun.

Theoretically, I'm excited. I'm really excited for they are more fun. But but this always a pleasure always Yeah, likewise and as uh and as always, we'll catch on the next episode.