Arthur Clutton-Brock

Based on Academy Award-winning director Tony Richardson's theatrical production at the Roundhouse Theatre in London, 'Hamlet' is a powerful adaptation of William Shakespeare's epic tragedy. Eschewing the big-budget production values of other film versions, it instead focuses on great performances from Nicol Williamson as Prince Hamlet, Academy Award-winner Anthony Hopkins as the villainous Claudius and rock-and-roll singer Marianne Faithfull as Ophelia.

Her name is Puabi-and she's an Immortal High Witch whose past is littered with dark secrets. Convinced she has eluded death for the last time, she is shocked to find herself being rescued by a mysterious stranger who fills her with a desire she thought was lost forever. His name is Matthew Fairchild-and he is a millionaire tormented by guilt over the tragic death of his wife. The last thing he expected to encounter was a beautiful woman who possessed an uncanny resemblance to the woman he loved and lost. But Puabi is like no one he's ever met before. Is it possible this enigmatic beauty can heal the bitter wounds that have nearly cost him his heart?

There is in the world to-day a conviction of sin about art. People realize more every year that the badness of our architecture, decoration, music, drama, which has been our legacy from the immediate past, is an offense against the highest that is in us; they are discarding both the bleak indifference of our puritan tradition and the decadent hedonism which was a reaction against it : everywhere in all the arts there is improvement a return to sincerity, simplicity, beauty; and the improvement is due to the growing conviction of the high seriousness of art. We are less tempted to regard the arts because of their delightfulness as a mere pastime; we are discovering that in them we touch the eternal world that art is in fact religious. The object of art is not to give pleasure, as our fathers assumed, but to express the highest spiritual realities. Art is not only delightful : it is necessary.