What do Niel Diamond and William Shakespeare have in common? See Hamnet and Song Sung Blue.

One about the tragic death of William Shakespeare’s son, Hamnet and how that death intertwined into Hamlet and the other about a Neil Diamond tribute duo who experience tremendous highs and lows, both Hamnet and Song Sung Blue are ultimately about fate, catharsis and the community of grief. 

Hamnet is one of the best movies the Conservative Critic has ever seen. It receives the highest marks in every category including performances but especially in composition and direction by director Chloe Zhao. Hamnet has stayed with this critic for days. It has seeped into my bones. It has the power of something far beyond a movie. I could not more highly recommend viewing this film and if it does not win Best Picture it is for political reasons only (not that the film is political, the campaigning and intrapolitics of Hollywood). This is not unusual of Zhao’s work (such as Nomadland). 

Hamnet’s lead is William Shakespeare’s wife, Agnes played by Jessie Buckley. It follows her story from young woman to wife and mother. Agnes is deeply in tune with nature and believes she has dreams that show her the future. In these dreams ,she believe she knows the fate of herself, her children, her husband and her life. But she didn’t understand what the dreams were telling her and the movie is about how even when we believe we are prepared for grief, we can never truly prepare and we do not know what life holds, even when we do.

It’s also about catharsis. By the end of the film, Agnes sees that her grief is seen. That her son is remembered, and felt. This is visually stunning in the film and the closing scene is one of the most powerful in my recent memory. Especially considering the implication that every person who experiences Shakespeare’s Hamlet has, in a sense, shared her grief. All these hundreds of years later. 

Song Sung Blue is also a great watch. Kate Hudson who plays Claire is up for Best Actress at the Academy Awards (and she sings in the movie!). The movie, like Hamnet, is based on a true story that follows two impersonators, Claire and Mike who become a Niel Diamond tribute show called ‘Lightening and Thunder.’ The movie follows their meteoric rise to popularity and their unexpected traumas and loss.

Song Sung Blue explores the concept of fate head-on. The characters express to each other that fate brought them together and there is a consequential scene where something deeply implausible happens twice (invoking the joke “I guess lightning can strike twice”). The incident implies that a particular tragedy is destined to occur and yet another tragedy entirely occurs instead. This concept is a mirror of Hament and makes the two films unlikely thematic cousins. One about Shakespeare’s family in 1590s rural England and the other about a Niel Diamond tribute band in early 1990s Milwaukee, the movies have a shared spirit and one that was deeply moving in both cases. 

Additionally, the idea of catharsis is present in Song Sung Blue and even expressly stated which is a core them of Hamnet. And the entire concept of performance as therapy is core to the purpose of both movies. 

Song Sung Blue is worth watching and both films viewed in sequence make for an interesting exploration of grief, pursuit of art, the fickle nature of fate, and healing.