&lt;div class=&quot;track&quot;&gt;&lt;img alt=&quot;&quot; src=&quot;http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.22.2/81683?ns=guardian&amp;pageName=Hamlet%2F+King+Lear+*+DVD+review%3AArticle%3A1647138&amp;ch=Film&amp;c3=Obs&amp;c4=William+Shakespeare%2CBoris+Pasternak%2CDVD+and+video+reviews%2CWorld+cinema+%28Film+genre%29%2CFilm%2CCulture&amp;c5=Not+commercially+useful%2CFilm+Reviews%2CTheatre&amp;c6=Philip+French&amp;c7=11-Oct-16&amp;c8=1647138&amp;c9=Article&amp;c10=Review&amp;c11=Film&amp;c13=Philip+French%27s+classic+DVD+%28series%29&amp;c25=&amp;c30=content&amp;h2=GU%2FFilm%2FWilliam+Shakespeare&quot; width=&quot;1&quot; height=&quot;1&quot; /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;p class=&quot;standfirst&quot;&gt;(Grigori Kozintsev, 1964/ 1971, PG, Mr Bongo Films)&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Grigori Kozintsev (1905-1973) was a prominent figure in Soviet cinema from his late teens until his death, making ambitious political films until after the second world war when he turned to literary adaptations, concluding with his classic versions of &lt;em&gt;Hamlet&lt;/em&gt; and &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B005FXO5Q2/ref=nosim?tag=guardianreviews-21&quot; title=&quot;&quot;&gt;&lt;em&gt;King Lear&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/a&gt;. Both were shot in black-and-white and widescreen on austere Estonian locations beside the Baltic using Boris Pasternak&#039;s translations (with Shakespeare&#039;s text as subtitles) and music by Shostakovich, and they&#039;re based on years of thought and study as revealed in Kozintsev&#039;s book &lt;em&gt;Shakespeare: Time and Conscience&lt;/em&gt;. The great Russian actor Innokenti Smoktunovsky is a forceful, sane, sensitive Hamlet trapped in a prison of political intrigue, and the film, set in a Tudor Denmark, is vigorous, intelligent and visually stunning. Lear is played by the Estonian actor J&uuml;ri J&auml;rvet (dubbed into Russian) and is truly old, mad and heartbreaking, and the picture has a consistent tone and numerous incidental felicities. The texts are cut and rearranged, but with great care, and both movies, initially patronised in English-speaking countries as academic, are wearing extremely well.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;div class=&quot;related&quot; style=&quot;float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;&quot;&gt;&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/shakespeare&quot;&gt;William Shakespeare&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/boris-pasternak&quot;&gt;Boris Pasternak&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/dvdreviews&quot;&gt;DVD and video reviews&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/world-cinema&quot;&gt;World cinema&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class=&quot;author&quot;&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/philipfrench&quot;&gt;Philip French&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;div class=&quot;terms&quot;&gt;&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.guardian.co.uk&quot;&gt;guardian.co.uk&lt;/a&gt; &amp;copy; 2011 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our &lt;a href=&quot;http://users.guardian.co.uk/help/article/0,,933909,00.html&quot;&gt;Terms &amp; Conditions&lt;/a&gt; | &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.guardian.co.uk/help/feeds&quot;&gt;More Feeds&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;p style=&quot;clear:both&quot; /&gt;