HAMNET

For anyone who has been living under a stone, this is the adaptation of Maggie O'Farrell's novel about the death of the son of Anne Hathaway and William Shakespeare.

Since the film is undeniably a powerfully emotional experience the main criticism that can be levelled at it is that it's just skilful manipulation, lacking in artistic merit, because of course the death of a young child is bound to be upsetting. 

Well, I think that to create something so emotionally shattering (and yet also uplifting) is very difficult, which is why so very few films achieve it.  It requires at the very least the superlative level of craftsmanship on view, from the towering performances by Jessie Buckley and Paul Mescal to the exquisite score by Max Richter.

Having said that, if the film had ended with Hamnet's death, heart-breaking though that is I might have agreed that this film does nothing that exceptional. 

What really elevates it are the final scenes at the Globe theatre which take the emotional intensity off the chart as we share Anne's realisation as to how deeply his boy’s death has affected William, leading him to express it in the play 'Hamlet’.  

Her desperate desire to lock eyes with him so as to console him, and our first sight of Hamlet on stage, clearly intended to be an older version of Hamnet, are moments that are going to stay with me for a long time.

And although it is Buckley's extraordinary performance that underpins the entire film, Mescal standing on stage as the ghost of Hamlet's father had me in bits.

I guess Buckley and Mescal are going to receive most of the accolades to be showered on this picture (understandably so) but credit must also go to director and co-writer Chloé Zhao.  I really do need to seek out her Oscar-winning 'Nomadland'.