Hamnet (film)

• 1. A Name Written Twice

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  Hamnet, a 2025 historical drama directed by Chloé Zhao, opens with a single written line about the English town of Stratford. In Stratford, the names Hamnet and Hamlet were treated as one and the same. The film then follows William Shakespeare and his wife Agnes, played by Paul Mescal and Jessie Buckley. Zhao co-wrote the screenplay with Maggie O'Farrell, whose novel gave the film its story. Who was Agnes before she became a playwright's wife? What happened inside the Shakespeare household that a famous tragedy could grow from it? And how does a quiet family drama arrive, at its close, on a theatre stage?

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• 2. A Witch's Daughter

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  In a forest near a mysterious cave, Agnes calls a hawk down onto her falconry glove and gathers herbs. William Shakespeare, meanwhile, works as a tutor to help pay off a family debt. When he catches sight of Agnes, he walks away from his students. His mother, Mary, tells him the rumour that Agnes is the daughter of a forest witch who taught her the lore of herbs. Agnes later uses that knowledge to treat a cut on William's forehead.

  When William visits her in the forest, Agnes asks him for a story. He tells her the legend of Orpheus and Eurydice, and she is delighted. Agnes then reads his palm. She foresees a successful future for him, and two children at her own deathbed.

  Agnes becomes pregnant, and her family disowns her. She is forced to move in with the Shakespeares. In 1582 the couple marry, and Agnes gives birth to their daughter Susanna in the woods.

  William's father, John, beats him for refusing manual labour, and William retaliates. Seeing how frustrated William is with his writing, Agnes suggests that her brother Bartholomew send him to London for a theatrical career. That plan leaves her and Susanna behind in Stratford. A while later, Agnes is pregnant again.

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• 3. The Twins

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  Heavily pregnant, Agnes tries to go outside to give birth. William's family tells her the river has flooded and restrains her inside the house. There she delivers twins, Hamnet and Judith, and Judith seems to be stillborn. Agnes remembers being kept from her own mother's deathbed. She demands to hold the baby despite the superstition, and Judith wakes.

  Eleven years later, William is successful and returns only now and then. The twins have grown very close. They believe they look alike, so they often fool relatives by wearing each other's clothes. When Agnes's hawk dies and is buried, she tells the children to make a wish to its spirit, which she says will carry them in its heart. She foretells that Hamnet, who hopes to join his father's theatre company, will flourish.

  In London, an outbreak of bubonic plague sends William wandering the streets. He watches a puppet show in which the plague carries people off to death. In Stratford, Judith catches the plague. Hamnet recalls the story of the hawk to encourage her and lies beside her. He says he wants to take her place, to trick death. Judith recovers, but Hamnet falls gravely ill and dies at the age of eleven, in 1596. On his deathbed he pictures himself on a stage, calling for his mother, and Agnes's hawk appears.

  William rushes home and is distraught to find Hamnet lying in repose. His absence strains his marriage as the couple try to cope. William buys the largest house in Stratford and leaves for London again. Agnes holds his hand and tells him she now sees nothing. Back in London, the play William rehearses next is Hamlet.

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• 4. Hamlet at the Globe

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  In London, William is frustrated with his cast's flat delivery of Hamlet. In despair, he leans over the edge of a jetty on the River Thames and recites the "To be, or not to be" monologue.

  Back in Stratford, Agnes's stepmother Joan shows her a playbill for a London production of Hamlet. Joan scolds her for marrying William, and Agnes rebukes her in return. Agnes and Bartholomew travel to London to find William. He is not at home, so they resolve to attend the first performance at the Globe Theatre.

  At first Agnes is offended, because she thinks her son's name is being profaned. Then she sees William playing the ghost of Hamlet's father. She realizes the play is a tribute to Hamnet. The scene between Hamlet and his father moves her to tears.

  Backstage, William has noticed Agnes. He breaks down in tears as he listens to the play, then returns to see her from the wings. The performance moves through scenes of sword-fighting, which fulfil Hamnet's dream of such a role. In Hamlet's death scene, Agnes reaches for the actor's hand, as she once held William's when they first met. The rest of the audience reaches toward him in turn.

  Agnes then sees Hamnet on the stage, just as in his dying vision. His face moves from sadness to a smile, and he disappears backstage through a hole that resembles the forest cave. For the first time since his death, Agnes laughs and smiles.

  The Globe she enters on screen is not the famous reconstruction. Production designer Fiona Crombie built a replica on the Elstree Studios backlot, because she and Zhao found the real one too ornate for the film.

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• 5. Building the Film

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  Before O'Farrell's novel was even published, London-based Liza Marshall and her company Hera Pictures had acquired the film rights. They then partnered with Neal Street Productions. In November 2022, a stage production of the novel was announced.

  In April 2023, Chloé Zhao was hired to direct and to write the screenplay alongside O'Farrell. In May 2023, Paul Mescal and Jessie Buckley entered negotiations to star. Mescal confirmed in a January 2024 interview that the two would play the leads.

  Photography was first scheduled to begin in London on the 3rd of June 2024. Instead, production began in Wales on the 29th of July 2024 and wrapped on the 30th of September. Most of the film was shot in Herefordshire, England, including the village of Weobley. In London, the Charterhouse served as the production's largest location.

  In August, Joe Alwyn and Emily Watson joined the cast, and Steven Spielberg joined as a producer. Łukasz Żal served as cinematographer. Max Richter was the composer, and his role reached well beyond a conventional score.

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• 6. Sound and Spell

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  Max Richter wrote 30 minutes of original music before cameras rolled. Zhao played it on set to set the tone for actors and crew. Only afterward, in post-production, did Richter work on the official composition.

  During filming, Jessie Buckley shared Richter's 2004 track "On the Nature of Daylight" with Zhao. The track inspired Zhao to reframe the original ending. She played it on a loop throughout the three days of shooting the final sequence. It became the foundation for Agnes's reach through time and across the veil of death. By the time Richter offered his own ending music, Zhao had already committed to the 2004 track. His piece plays over the credits instead.

  The film's words have older roots too. It repeatedly quotes the Nine Herbs Charm, an alliterative spell from Anglo-Saxon England written in Old English. Such a spell is called a galdor. The film draws on two translations, one by philologist Joseph S. Hopkins and one by Stephen Pollington.

  Hopkins called it "a great joy to play a role in presenting the Nine Plants Spell to such a large audience". He added that this was surely the widest exposure the spell had received since Anglo-Saxon England.

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• 7. Festival Circuit

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  Focus Features acquired worldwide rights to Hamnet in August 2024. Its parent company, Universal Pictures, handles international distribution. In December 2025, Reliance Entertainment acquired Indian rights under an existing output deal with Amblin Entertainment.

  The world premiere came at the 52nd Telluride Film Festival on the 29th of August 2025. In July 2025, the film was announced for the Gala Presentations lineup of the 50th Toronto International Film Festival, where it won the People's Choice Award. In October 2025, the 20th Rome Film Festival showed it in its non-competitive Grand public section. On the 27th of October, the 70th Valladolid International Film Festival included it in its official selection for the Spanish premiere. The 38th Tokyo International Film Festival closed with it on the 5th of November.

  In the United States, a limited release followed on the 26th of November 2025, and a wide release came on the 5th of December. The United Kingdom saw it on the 9th of January 2026, and Australia on the 15th of January. By the 24th of January 2026, it was playing in 1,276 theaters. It ranked tenth at the box office with $1.8 million, and its domestic total was approaching $18 million.

  Home viewers could watch it by streaming first. It then arrived on DVD, Blu-ray and Ultra HD Blu-ray on the 3rd of March 2026.

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• 8. Praise and Prizes

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  David Fear of Rolling Stone predicted that people "will be talking about Jessie Buckley's performance for years". Tim Grierson of Screen Daily felt Mescal's role echoed his earlier work. He called "the regularly superb Buckley" "revelatory as a wild creature who experiences the exhilaration of motherhood as well as the heartbreak of loss."

  Johnny Oleksinski of the New York Post wrote that Buckley gives "one of those rare turns that simply beggars belief." Bilge Ebiri of Vulture called the film "devastating, maybe the most emotionally shattering movie I've seen in years." Angie Han of The Hollywood Reporter summed it up as "a tremendously acted heartbreaker." Richard Lawson of The Guardian gave it four stars. BBC critics Nicholas Barber and Caryn James named it the best film of 2025.

  Not every critic agreed. Kyle Smith of The Wall Street Journal called it "quintessential Oscar bait" and said it was dogged by "intellectual anachronism."

  The awards bodies leaned toward the admirers. At the 98th Academy Awards, the film earned eight nominations, including Best Picture and Best Director for Zhao. It won one, with Buckley taking Best Actress. The 83rd Golden Globes gave it six nominations and two wins. Those wins were Best Motion Picture in the drama category and Best Actress in that category for Buckley. The 79th British Academy Film Awards gave it eleven nominations and two wins, including Outstanding British Film. Buckley also won the BAFTA for Best Actress in a Leading Role.

  The 31st Critics' Choice Awards gave it eleven nominations, and Buckley won their Best Actress prize. She also won the Actor Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role. The American Film Institute chose it as one of the top ten films of 2025.

  For David Ehrlich of IndieWire, it was hard to imagine "a more fitting tribute to Shakespeare's most widely interpreted play."

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