Give the gift of Criterion!
Live stream preview

Watch this video and more on The Criterion Channel

Watch this video and more on The Criterion Channel

Start your free trial

Already subscribed? Sign in

The Play’s the Thing

Hamlet

2h 33m

Directed by Laurence Olivier • 1948 • United Kingdom
Starring Laurence Olivier, Leslie Banks, Basil Sydney

Winner of four Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Actor, Sir Laurence Olivier’s HAMLET continues to be the most compelling version of Shakespeare’s beloved tragedy. Olivier is at his most inspired—both as director and as the melancholy Dane himself—as he breathes new life into the words of one of the world’s greatest dramatists.

Up Next in The Play’s the Thing

  • To Be or Not to Be
    1:39:14
    To Be or Not to Be

    To Be or Not to Be

    Directed by Ernst Lubitsch • 1942 • United States

    As nervy as it is hilarious, this screwball masterpiece from Ernst Lubitsch stars Jack Benny and, in her final screen appearance, Carole Lombard as husband-and-wife thespians in Nazi-occupied Warsaw who become caught up in a dangerous spy plot. T...

×