Hamlet (1948 film)

Hamlet is a 1948 British film adaptation of William Shakespeares play Hamlet, adapted and directed by and starring Sir Laurence Olivier. Hamlet was Oliviers second film as director, and also the second of the three Shakespeare films that he directed the 1936 As You Like It had starred Olivier, but had been directed by Paul Czinner. Hamlet was the first British film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture. It is also the first sound film of the play in English. A 1935 sound film adaptation, Khoon Ka Khoon, had been made in India and filmed in the Urdu language.

The film follows the overall story of the play, but cuts nearly half the dialogue, leaves out two major characters.The action begins on the battlements of Elsinore where a sentry, Francisco, John Laurie is relieved of his watch and questioned if he has seen anything by another sentry, Bernardo Esmond Knight, who, with yet another sentry, Marcellus Anthony Quayle, has twice previously seen the Ghost of King Hamlet. Marcellus then arrives with the sceptical Horatio Norman Wooland, Prince Hamlets friend. Suddenly, all three see the Ghost, and Horatio demands that the ghost speak. The ghost vanishes then, without a word. ........

Source: Wikipedia