Hamnet Review: Will Leave You Devastated

Chloé Zhao’s exceptional Hamnet will leave you devastated, thanks to incredible performances from Jessie Buckley and Paul Mescal.

Like the novel by Maggie O’Farrell that this is based on (O’Farrell co-wrote the script with Zhao), the premise of Hamnet comes from a curious fact. Hamnet and Hamlet were seen as the same name, interchangeable in records from the 16^th and 17^th centuries. The indication is that Hamnet inspired the title for Hamlet. What this reimagining posits is what if that connection goes further? What if this great piece of art came from a just-as-great personal loss? And what if we saw it all through the eyes of the Bard’s wife, Agnes?

Those questions guide this film from the very start, which sees Agnes (Jessie Buckley, Women Talking) meet William (Paul Mescal, Aftersun). He is a Latin tutor working to pay off his father’s debts. She is a woman surrounded by rumours that her mother was a forest witch. There is evident mutual attraction between them. The two marry against their family’s wishes (William’s mother Mary, played by Breaking the Waves’ Emily Watson, will figure the most into their lives) and have three children: eldest Susanna (Bodhi Rae Breathnach) and twins Hamnet (Jacobi Jupe) and Judith (Olivia Lynes), who often pretend to be the other sibling. Zhao takes time to show us the family’s deep love for each other during William’s rare visits from London. Then the plague arrives, and the defining event comes, shattering everyone.

It is true that child mortality was common in this era. “What is given may be taken away at any time,” Mary says at one point, quietly ruminating on the deaths of her daughters. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t overwhelming hurt with Hamnet’s death. No gulfs created between the parents, as Agnes and her husband’s already-long-distance relationship becomes even more fraught. She has to tackle her grief at home whilst William pours more and more of himself into his latest tragedy.

However, in keeping with O’Farrell’s novel, Zhao relegates Shakespeare’s writing and rising stature, making his perspective a supporting (if no less sorrow-filled) one. Instead, Hamnet is all about Agnes. That is confirmed by a spellbinding performance from Jessie Buckley. She embodies Agnes’ free, ‘of the land’ spirit (we first see her curled up underneath a tree) whilst also being guttural, determined and utterly raw. Meanwhile, though the Bard is not the focus, Paul Mescal is very good as the distant, agonised, sometimes infuriating genius. Mescal excels in melancholic roles like this one, but he manages to add touches of self-loathing and naturalism (the quick cycle of emotions when he sees Judith and then his dead son sticks out). Both he and Buckley are incredible, adding layers of depth to the individual grief in their performances.

Zhao has called Hamnet a grown-up fairy tale, and she delicately places us in a world of natural wonders, from the trees to the earth through shots of greenery, of sunlight streaming through the leaves and of the soil. It is enrapturing work once again from DP Łukasz Żal (The Zone of Interest), who uses handheld shots to show the closeness between Agnes and William during their early courtship. A closeness that begets a deep connection. At times, Żal also deploys a fixed and distant camera that provides shots looking down, tableaus that force you to focus on the frame’s subjects.

The camerawork pairs very well with Max Richter’s score, which alternates between gentle ambience and forebodingness. It also features his famous track ‘In the Nature of Daylight’, which may be overused (you can hear it in Shutter Island and Arrival), but is still effective.

That track appears when Hamnet is in the Globe Theatre for its final moments, where Agnes sees for the first time how William has processed the indescribable loss of their son. The play’s the thing to see his consciousness unmasked. Chloé Zhao had already made a mesmerising film, told with stark emotion and lyricism. Then comes that coda. Using some nifty casting for the Danish Prince, ‘In The Nature of Daylight’ and close-ups of the remarkable Buckley, Zhao builds and builds the poignancy of the scene before paying it off spectacularly. In other words, it’s an exceptional ending to an exceptional film.

Hamnet was screened at the BFI London Film Festival on 11-19 October, 2025. the film will be released in select U.S. theaters on November 27, 2025, nationwide on December 12, and in U.K. and Irish cinemas on January 9, 2026.