The Ghost Scene of William Shakespeare's Hamlet

The Ghost Scene of William Shakespeare's Hamlet

We have been studying the play 'Hamlet' by William Shakespeare. We

have read the original text as well as watching three film versions of

the play one by Zefferelli, Branagh and Almieda. We have been

concentrating mainly on the ghost scenes in these three films. We also

worked on an unusual ghost scene, which we made into a comical ghost

scene in a little booklet.

I have chosen to do a film production. I have chosen to do this

because after watching the three film versions of the ghost scene it

has given me ideas of costumes, settings and how to produce the ghost

to make him stand out, also in the film you can use special effects

and a lot more than you can do in a theatre production of the ghost

scene in 'Hamlet'.

I want my setting to be set in a castle on a staircase leading down

towards the cellar/basement of the castle. I want the set to seem very

cold, dark and musty with a real feel of tension in the air. I want

the sound of the ghosts voice to be unnatural and decayed, with slow

unnatural music playing quietly in the background and I want a sharp

possibly loud noise of music on certain words Hamlet or the ghost use

to emphasise them so people know the word has some sort of strong

meaning to it. On this ghost scene at first the only lighting will be

Hamlets candle as he is walking towards the cellar/basement staircase,

and then when the ghost appears I want the lighting to be a pale blue,

with a slight mist in the air to show the coldness and darkness of

this scene. I will be using quite a few camera techniques during this

scene. When either Hamlet or the ghost are talking I will have close

up shots of just there faces, I will have the camera focus onto

Hamlet's face when the ghost says something to describe the murder

which will then lead the a flashback of that image, and then to see