Hamlet To The Powers Of Ten

I kept being told that today was a historic day due to the fact it is October 10, 2010, or 10.10.10. A cousin of mine told me that in 1977, Charles and Ray Eames made a nine-minute film called Powers of Ten, which enhances the viewer to distance from a couple’s lakeside picnic 10⁴⁰ meters, until the Earth is just invisible in the majesty of the universe. Afterwards, it’s the opposite, the audience is brought back to the couple’s lakeside picnic, and then taken 10¯¹⁶ meters, beyond the subatomic particles that build upon every human cell. And now that I sit upon my computer, a priori writing a blog entry about two different interpretations of Hamlet’s soliloquies, I think about this video. I think, and I think again and I realize that coincidence cannot be just the word that describes my case, but instead, I argue that the video might be relevant to what I am about to write.

“When you go to a play, you don’t sit there to see the play, you sit there to see how the play is adapted. Everyone knows Hamlet, but still, people pay to see how Hamlet is brought to the stage, or to the screen.”

As I watched the video, I thought about these two different adaptations of Hamlet. To make my point, Kenneth Brannagh’s interpretation of Hamlet’s first soliloquy is just as travelling in negative powers of ten (10¯¹⁶). Meanwhile, David Tennant’s is just the opposite, like travelling far away from the lakeside picnic in powers of ten (10⁴⁰). Brannagh recreates the details of a very accurate imitation of 1600s Denmark, just as Shakespeare would’ve done it. He goes deep into the skin the body, until reaching the subatomic particles that build it. He takes into consideration the details, and achieves a quite accurate representation of what could’ve been Shakespeare’s dream-adaptation. As a result, Brannagh is just simply adapting Hamlet himself, rather than interpreting him. Yes, we all know Hamlet, from the play we can infer he is melancholic and introspective. Therefore, if the movie portrays him just exactly, how are we going to know those details that aren’t written in the lines of the play? How are we supposed to answer those enigmas left by each of Hamlet’s soliloquies? There are things that words can’t tell, and that’s where the interpretations might come to be very profound.

O that this too too solid flesh would melt,
Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew!
Or that the Everlasting had not fix’d
His canon ’gainst self-slaughter! O God! O God! (I, ii, 129-132)

Suicide? Death? Unconformity?

But if we take the other direction, and we travel backwards, in powers of ten, we might get a better vibe of Hamlet’s thoughts. In the case of David Tennant’s interpretation (yes, an interpretation), portrays a rebellious Hamlet, displaying anger, disappointment, melancholy, and defiance. The audience is able to feel his sensations more directly as Hamlet makes eye contact with the audience, destroys the camera, and shows more evident expressions of his feelings, in contrast of Brannagh’s passive Hamlet. Now, how does this relate to The Powers of Ten? Well, just as we travel further from the Earth, and observe at what we call the ‘big picture’ we are able to give importance to what we cannot see, instead of giving importance to what’s explicit from the text, or in this case, image. We stand back, distance ourselves from the play, and as a result, are able to interpret those themes written in between the lines.

Oh, and by the way, the line that I was assigned a couple of weeks ago appeared in the second soliloquy: “The play’s the thing, / Wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the king” (II.ii).