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Cinema Excelsior Hall 2
Free admission while seats are available.
8:30 PM – WHY HER by Jonathan Elia and Tommaso Furgione – 7 min
Followed by HAMNET by Chloé Zhao – 125 min
SYNOPSIS
Hamnet – In the Name of the Son, directed by Chloé Zhao, is a deeply intimate exploration of loss, love, and artistic inspiration, told through the eyes of Agnes (Jessie Buckley), the wife of William Shakespeare (Paul Mescal).
Set in rural 16th-century England, the film immerses us in the couple's everyday life as they raise their three children—Susanna (Bodhi Rae Breathnach) and the twins Judith and Hamnet (Olivia Lynes and Jacobi Jupe)—balancing the fragile harmony of family life against the demands of the outside world. When the untimely death of young Hamnet shatters the family, Agnes is forced to confront an overwhelming grief. Through her perceptive and deeply compassionate perspective, we witness the fracture that opens within the family and the struggle to piece together a life forever changed.
This is not the story of Shakespeare as an isolated genius, but of a man profoundly marked by personal tragedy—one that would ultimately find its echo in his most celebrated work. In Shakespeare's time, the names Hamnet and Hamlet were often used interchangeably, and the film draws on this historical ambiguity to suggest that the loss of his son inspired the creation of the stage tragedy Hamlet. Yet at the heart of Hamnet stands Agnes, whose quiet strength, enduring love, and fierce resilience shape the emotional core of the story.
The result is a moving meditation on what endures: love, memory, and the mysterious alchemy through which life and death are transformed into art.
