Hamnet (c) Focus Features
Film: Hamnet
In Cinemas
Even since Hamnet premiered at this year’s Telluride Film Festival, Oscar buzz has followed the film leading up to this week’s opening. Based on the acclaimed novel by Maggie O’Farrell and unflinchingly directed by Oscar-winner Chloé Zhao (Nomadland), Hamnet turns out to the third of a trilogy of 2025 films that focuses on the unbearable being of motherhood, with Jessie Buckley joining Jennifer Lawrence in Die My Love and Rose Byrne in If I had Legs, I Would Kick You. Buckley plays Agnes, wife of William Shakespeare (Paul Mescal) and the mother of their children. Agnes, whom people around town call a forest witch (and yes, we do get to hear some of the opening dialogue of Macbeth), is deeply connected to nature, so she’s not surprised when she gets pregnant so soon after the birth of their first daughter Susanna (Bodhi Rae Breathnach) as she’s always had a vision of her two children at her deathbed. But during the birth of their son Hamnet, it turns out she/s carrying twins and although baby Judith at first seems to be stillborn, she does survive. As this film and the book is named after Hamnet (played with maturity beyond his years by Jacobi Jupe) and not Judith (Olivia Lynes), one can gather that when Judith is struck down by the plague, things may not happen as Agnes thinks.
Hamnet (c) Focus Features
This is an intense film, as it mostly sees things through Agnes’ eyes, and she feels every emotion deeply. If there is one thing that’s for sure about Hamnet, Buckley will surely be the one to beat for Best Actress in the awards chatter. Her raw passion and animalistic instincts are palpable, and you can’t take your eyes off her. She is equally matched by Mescal as Shakespeare, but the movie’s insistence that the Bard naming the character Hamlet makes the play a tribute to his son. They try their hardest to pretzel this theme into Hamlet’s premiere production, especially by having Shakespeare play the ghost of Hamlet’s father, and Noah Jupe, Jacobi’s older brother play Hamlet. The ending feels very similar to the ending of Shakespeare in Love, and even though I found its logic suspect, Buckley and Mescal handle this sensitive finale with grace. At the screening I attended, some people said they brought tissues because they heard it was needed. They heard right. Expect to ugly cry.
Sauna (c) Breaking Glass Pictures
Film: Sauna
On Streaming Services
At this year’s Sundance Film Festival, the queer film sucking up most of the air and discussion was Twinless, which won some awards, and the leading man, Dylan O’Brien, was appropriately praised. However, there was another equally effective and daring LGBTQ+ film, this one by young Danish director Mathias Broe called Sauna, about Johan (Magnus Juhl Andersen), who works at the Adonis sauna that doubles as a sex meet-up place for gay men. One night at a club he starts flirting and making out with college student William (Nina Rask), before realizing he’s a trans man. Their relationship makes up the focus of “Sauna,” and it’s the latest of in-depth films that realistically depict the trans experience, following films like Mutt, A Fantastic Woman and Monica. Although Johan makes some questionable choices towards the end of the film, Andersen makes him believable in his motives, and Rask is just so good as William. While I would have loved to have seen this in theaters, Sauna is now having its commercial U.S. release on streaming, and it’s certainly worth catching.
Wicked: For Good (c) Universal Pictures
Film: Wicked: For Good
In Cinemas
A year after the first part of Wicked premiered (and later to be showered with ten Oscar nominations and two wins), we finally get to see what happens to the friendship of Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo) and Glinda (Ariana Grande) after Elphaba defies gravity and gets labelled Enemy No. 1. Turns out the second part, entitled Wicked: For Good, is a variation of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead in which the witches’ story is superimposed onto the The Wizard of Oz. The concurrent narratives are clever enough, although it doesn’t always make sense (if taking animals are forbidden in Oz, why does the Cowardly Lion get to freely talk with the dulcet tones of Coleman Domingo). Still, I think I like this second part more as it actually has more plot to its narrative. And while the songs are not as memorable in part one, I appreciated the two new Stephen Schwartz songs. Sadly, newly minted sexiest man Jonathan Bailey doesn’t have as much to do here (except smolder), but the vocally sensational Erivo and Grande are still effective, though better together than apart. Critics are divided on Wicked: For Good but its box office success should drown out the negativity.
Jay Kelly (c) Netflix
Film: Jay Kelly
In Cinemas and on Netflix December 5
Noah Baumbach’s Jay Kelly would seems like an odd choice for a writer/director most associated with New York as it follows an aging Hollywood superstar who must confront the hard choices that made him become actor George Clooney … I mean, actor Jay Kelly as played by George Clooney. The movie, co-written by actress Emily Mortimer (she has a small part as a make-up artist), is similar in themes to this year’s Sentimental Value by Joachim Trier, which focuses on an aging director and his life choices, especially in regards to neglecting his two daughters. Jay Kelly also has two daughters, Jessica (Riley Keough) and Daisy (Grace Edwards), who are unimpressed with their father’s stardom. Jay’s longest relationship is with his manager Ron (Adam Sandler), who tries to keep a normal life but has to deal with Jay’s demands and whims. After a confrontation with an old friend (Billy Crudup, in a great extended cameo), Jay imagines himself literally revisiting major moments in his life (similar to A Big Bold Beautiful Journey). Clooney is game, tweaking some of his autobiography into the fictional Jay Kelly (including an amusing montage of Clooney’s film), and doing a variation of the awkward running he displayed in The Descendants (no Tom Cruise he) in an odd heroic moment in the plot. Sandler is fine, as is Laura Dern as Jay’s publicist, but Jay Kelly doesn’t generate the emotional catharsis Sentimental Value achieved. Still, it has a lot of enjoyable moments perfect for Thanksgiving viewing. But like all those uneaten cheesecakes in the film, a lot of potential is left unrealized.
Eternity (c) A24
Film: Eternity
In Cinemas
The depiction of the afterlife on film has taken many forms, but there always seems to be bureaucratic red tape in a waiting room before the great beyond. Whether it’s the cartoony one in Beetlejuice, the judicial one in Defending Your Life or the cloudy one in Heaven Can Wait, there’s always a chance for people to process that they’re dead before boarding a train (in many films like Departures) or an elevator (like in Soul) to the Great Beyond. In the case of Eternity, director David Freyne and writer Pat Cunnane don’t diverge much from this formula. Poor Larry (Barry Primus), whose wife Joan (a nice appearance by Betty Buckley) has warned him about always popping those nuts, chokes on one and dies. In the train station limbo, he gets to choose his favorite version of himself (he chooses the Miles Teller one) and picks his eternity scenario (he picks the beach). But then Joan arrives (as Elizabeth Olsen) and while Larry is sure she will join him on the forever beach, it turns out that Joan’s first husband, the handsome Luke (Callum Turner), who died in WWII, has been waiting decades for her. Who will she choose? This is probably the most conventional film A24 has ever released as it’s a simple love triangle, and while all three actors are funny in their parts, the familiarity of the story is never taken to the next level. There are also way too many endings, the best one left in the dust by a predictable Hollywood one. Eternity is a sweet but unsurprising movie, which is hardly what one expects from A24.
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