This is "Hamlet 2000"..... Yes that's what its called. This is basically a modernization of the classic William Shakespeare play with the same title. Sounds like a.....good....idea? Well though it can definitely get pulled off BUT much like the modern day Romeo and Juliet the dialogue is identical to the play from 400 years ago. So there is old English and it doesn't fit at all with the modern day setting. It's incredibly distracting and unfitting. "Modernizing" all the dialogue not even a little bit just doesn't work and you better don't give me the business as a excuse to keep this movie timeless because it's already 15 years old and incredibly out of date. There are fax machines, VHS tapes, and hilarious early 2000s outfits scattered out throughout the movie, it already doesn't hold up.Unlike the Romeo and Juliet (96) which had a ton of stylized cinematography and pacing Hamlet 2000 is mundane, grey and not fun to look at. The setting is in some generic apartment building witch isn't visually stimulating. Though there is occasional creative shots here and there, they are far and few between. But to be honest Hamlet 2000 was pretty low budget and it shows its measly 2 million dollar budget in the lack of visuals and couldn't get close to the epic scale, beautiful shots, from the Oscar nominated Hamlet 1996Little skill was used in the directing as most scenes were people sitting around barely moving. Acting for the most part is wooden and unconvincing. Half the lines are barely audible and most people speak in mumble. I felt like the actors had no clue what they were saying. I barely knew what they were saying. The casting wasn't that good either, Ethan Hawke as Hamlet; Bill Murray as Polonius? What? That doesn't sound right and they just phoned in every scene. Julia Stiles's character Ofelia has a scene where she screams in fear comes off as unintentionally hilarious because it looked like she didn't care at all. One take seems like most they ever did and it makes the movies genre to be a "Thriller" to be underwhelming.The respect for the source material could be taken as offensive. The famous "To Be or Not To Be" speech is filmed in a blockbuster while Ethan Hawke has the goofiest outfit imaginable. Nice product placement there buddy! Then all of a sudden you see Hamlet 2000 watching the actual Hamlet on TV? Wh-what?! How does that even work? Just imagine if its Back to the Future 2 and in it the main characters are seen watching Back to the Future 1 on television. It shouldn't even be in the same universe. The play Hamlet puts on is changed to a pretentious "The Ring" like VHS tape though I kind of like that scene. Sound mixing is muffled a bit though it could've been the VHS copy I was watching. But there was barely any music in the movie when there was it was incredibly generic. There's a scene that takes place in a party and the characters are still mumbling to each other while blaring music is playing. How do they hear each other? This could be the fault of some mediocre editing which has some flashbacks or visions that don't really add to the film at all.This is one of the shorter Hamlet movies to get released just running less than 2 hours which is definitely useful if you wanted a quick summary of the story. And its not a horrible film its definitely watchable and its pretty innocent experiment. When it was released it was well received surprisingly reaching a 70/100 on Metacritic it hasn't aged well however. Hamlet 2000 is still fun to poke at with a group of people. But still there are tons of other adaptions of Hamlet that should be checked out like the 1948 and 1996 ones. Hamlet 2000 gets a 4/10

Hamlet (2000) was adapted to the screen and directed by Michael Almereyda. This Hamlet is set in contemporary New York City, but Almereyda has retained Shakespeare's language. Naturally, this makes for anachronisms and awkward moments. However, the transformation from Denmark as a nation to Denmark as a giant corporation worked for me. (Normally, I like Hamlet to be set in medieval Denmark, Romeo and Juliet in Renaissance Verona, etc. However, this particular leap over the centuries was interesting and effective.)For example, Hamlet's soliloquies work brilliantly on the stage, but they're a daunting challenge to a film director. Almereyda solves the problem by having Hamlet speaking into a video camcorder, so that we can hear him, although he's literally talking to himself.Ethan Hawke as Hamlet was excellent. He's a talented, solid actor in any movie in which he appears. He's even better in Hamlet--sullen and disaffected, with scorn for his mother's corporate lifestyle. Kyle MacLachlan plays Claudius, obviously a no-nonsense executive. With his cold demeanor and Cary Grant good looks, you can understand why Gertrude was drawn to him.To my mind the acting honors belonged to Julia Stiles as Ophelia. Stiles was 19 when the movie was made, and she was able to combine the eye-rolling behavior of an adolescent at one moment with the hurt, betrayed feelings of a young adult at the next moment. (One decision that Almereyda made didn't make sense to me. It looked as if Ophelia lived alone in a rough tenement building, which doesn't fit Shakespeare or NYC in the year 2000.) However, Stiles, with her exotic good looks, carried off her role like a seasoned professional.I greatly enjoyed this movie, and I was amazed to see that it has a truly dismal IMDb rating of 6.0. Why? In my opinion, the film's much, much, better than that. My suggestion--rent or buy the DVD, see Ethan Hawke as Hamlet, and then judge for yourself.

Despite a solid, understated performance from Shepard (I'll echo that his is one of the best Hamlet's Ghosts ever), and some clever innovations with Shakespeare's play, this version is woefully lacking...mostly due to the sub-par acting from otherwise solid performers. Do NOT, as others have suggested, show this to your high school students -- unless you hope to pander to their level of media-induced mediocrity. I showed scenes from it to my freshman comp students and they laughed in all the wrong places....even more so than the Mel Gibson (Zeffirelli) version.Ethan Hawke...whom I've admired in other films...just does not have the chops to carry such an important role. And whatever team decided to cast Bill Murray and Julia Stiles as Polonius and Ophelia, respectively, must've been seriously deluded with the idea that they'd cast a wider net to lull an unsuspecting audience to their lackluster production.I expected Murray to play Polonius in all its campy potential, only to be sorely disappointed at his taking the role way too seriously. He wasn't successful. As for Stiles, every time I see her in any film I wonder how she manages to get any sort of acting gig. Her Ophelia is so wooden and boring that she becomes a laughing-stock in every scene...not what we should expect from such a tragic heroine. Her Ophelia's descent into madness becomes a silly, drunken Guggenheim art-party rant rather than the telling evocation of her frailty and vulnerability and is, as a result, diminished to the point of absurdity. While we can blame the director more than the actor for that decision, after seeing her scene earlier with Murray when he advises her not to pursue Hamlet, we ultimately realize that Stiles couldn't have carried that scene no matter the direction. She's just bloody awful.I kept hoping the movie would get better, and it just never does. All the clever, well intended innovations the director tries to bring to the production just fall flat without the necessary cast to carry them.

Originality counts for much when presenting a 400 year old play. This movie has freshness and originality in abundance. The direction, photography and above all casting are innovative.The real star is the city of New York with its nighttime magic and varied neighborhoods from the tenements of the East Village where film student Ophelia dwells to the luxurious high rises of the rich and well-insulated.For once, the roles of Ophelia and especially Hamlet are played by age-appropriate actors. Ethan Hawke was nearly thirty but looks and sounds like the college student Prince Hamlet was intended to be. That he does not employ the pear-shaped tones of the accomplished Shakespearian only adds to the freshness and realism of the film.As the ghost, Sam Sheppard is just outstanding, magnetic even when absolutely silent. He delivers his few lines in an intense burst such as never seen before. Diane Venora's eloquent performance as Gertrude, Hamlet's mother, shows the intelligence of a mature actress and credible sex appeal sufficient to drive a man to murder his own brother. Liev Schreiber is solid and does have a Shakespearian's voice, Kyle Maclaghlan acts with feeling and range, and Bill Murray shows a side of him previously unseen--comic yet touchingly fatherly in his scene with Ms. Stiles.