HAMLET 2
/
2008
DIRECTOR: Andrew Flemming
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Alexander Gruszynski
WRITER: Pam Brady, Andrew Fleming
BUDGET: $9,000,000
GROSS: $4,925,288 (worldwide)
Hamlet 2 is about a failed actor, now high school drama teacher (Steve Coogan). When he finds out they’re canceling drama he writes an original work to put on with the class, in an attempt to save the program. He writes Hamlet 2.
However, as we all know, everyone dies at the end of Hamlet, so he needs a device to make the sequel work. That device is, and how can it really be anything else, a time machine.
The film is very funny and much of that has to do with Coogan, who is just great (as usual). I saw him in the same vain as Christopher Guest's character in Waiting For Guffman - in that they are both 'theatre directors' who… let’s just say, they aren’t as talented as they think they are.
However, unlike in Waiting For Guffman, I think that the world around Coogan's character is a little more realistic. I should also say that the Hamlet 2 play actually looked not bad, as compared to the Waiting For Guffman play.
Watching the film, there was something about it that felt a little different. And for me the comparison to it as a high school musical production as opposed to a broadway play seemed apt. The film isn’t slick, or as smooth as a big Hollywood movie. And I don't mean this to be a criticism because it fits given that it’s about a high school musical.
Director Andrew Flemming pulled off a teen comedy set in the Richard Nixon White House with Dick, and almost 10 years later he pulled off a high school comedy with a play about a time traveling Hamlet.
And while I guess anything is possible and they could have screwed up a movie that features a song called 'rock me sexy Jesus' in it… They sure didn't!