Ophelia's Madness In The Movie Hamlet

Madness derives from great grief. Gibson and Zefferelli were effective in showing that Hamlet and Ophelia were mad. However, the movie did not show that most of the time in madness they spoke the truth as it did in the book. Throughout the entire movie, Hamlet was wearing black almost the entire time. He was wearing black due to his mourning of his father, even though the death had happened two months beforehand and everyone else had moved on. King Claudius said that the mourning Hamlet prolonged was just out of “impious stubbornness” (Act 1. Sc 2. Ln 98.) because it had lasted so long. Hamlet’s main conflict was due to his father’s death and trying to resolve his grief.
In the movie, Hamlet ran after the ghost instead of staying in the safety of his friend’s presence. He did not know if the ghost was his father, so this was a very risky move on his part. In the book, he followed the ghost after the ghost beckoned, but there are no stage directions that imply Hamlet chasing after the Ghost. (Act 1. Sc 5. Ln 97) The movie added an aspect of how Hamlet might have been mad before finding out that Claudius was the one that killed his father. After the conversation with the Ghost, Hamlet ran around striking rocks with his
sword. This action did nothing to help Hamlet, but showed that he was starting to not think straight. Again, the director added this scene to emphasize how Hamlet’s sanity is not stable. Hamlet, going and meeting with Ophelia and Polonius, looking very disheveled in his clothes. He hadn’t brushed his hair and wore dirty clothing. In the scene with Polonius and Hamlet in the library, Hamlet had only one shoe on. He was put together enough to wear both shoes. His appearance plus his relaxed and carefree comments towards Polonius shows that Hamlet had very few cares in the world. The play never specified Hamlet’s attire throughout this scene, so the director’s choice just emphasized Hamlet’s disheveledness and showed that he was slowly losing care and going mad. When the players arrive, Hamlet keeps looking around himself suspiciously which led the audience to believe that he was going mad. He had no reason to be suspicious of the Players since he has known them for a very long time. Hamlet talks to the Players about performing a play about his uncle and his father’s death. At the play, Hamlet displayed much anxiety by biting his nails. To the other characters, he just seemed crazy because they did not know what was happening. His dirty comments to Ophelia caused Ophelia to be very cold to Hamlet. He spoke merrily about laying his head upon her lap (Act 3. Sc 2. Ln 119) and other dirty comments. Ophelia saw Hamlet as mad and wrote off all his derogatory comments.
When confronting Gertrude, Hamlet was very physically aggressive.
This was not written into the play. It could have been interpreted as aggressive in the book, but the stage directions made no implication of him actually pushing her around as the movie portrayed. Hamlet had loved his mom a lot, and to be physically aggressive showed that Hamlet was not in a great state of mind. He had promised to only be intimidating by his voice, not physically. The movie included the detail that Gertrude did could not see the Ghost when he entered Gertrude’s chambers. Gertrude did not hear or see the Ghost (Act 3. Sc 4. Ln 153) while Hamlet spoke to him. This detail causes the audience to wonder if Hamlet ever did see the Ghost or if all of this was made
up.
Ophelia madness derived from Polonius’ death. She came out into the hallways disheveled and with bags under her eyes. Her appearance showed that she was not sleeping which would lead her to be mad. Ophelia’s comments were also spoken in complete confidence. She didn’t know that she wasn’t supposed to be making those comments which was a sign of madness. In the movie, when she was singing there was no comment of Laertes commenting about Ophelia’s comments making sense. He commented that in her madness that her “thoughts and remembrance fitted” the situation. (Act 4. Sc 5. Ln 202) In the production of the play, the director chose that Ophelia would not actually pass out rosemary and pansies as she said she was. In the movie, she just passed out straws of wheat and rocks. This conveyed that Ophelia did not actually know what was going on. Ophelia ended up drowning and it was conflicted if it was an accident or not.
The play portrayed madness as being more truthful than being sane. The movie fell short of this, though. The movie focused on making the characters seem mad instead of focusing on how their madness affected the characters around them.