Hamlet (Kenneth Branagh's Hamlet) (Hamlet)

- Who's there? - Nay, answer me. Stand and unfold yourself.

Long live the king?

- Barnardo? - He.

You come most carefully upon your hour.

'Tis now struck 12. Get thee to bed, Francisco.

For this relief much thanks.

'Tis bitter cold, and I am sick at heart.

- Have you had quiet guard? - Not a mouse stirring.

Well, good night.

If you do meet Horatio and Marcellus, the rivals of my watch, bid them make haste.

I think I hear them. Stand! Who's there?

Friends to this ground. And liegemen to the Dane.

Give you good night.

Farewell, honest soldier. Who hath relieved you?

Barnardo has my place. Give you good night.

- Holla, Barnardo. Say what, is Horatio there?

A piece of him.

Welcome, Horatio. Welcome, good Marcellus.

- What, has this thing appeared again? - I have seen nothing.

Horatio says 'tis but our fantasy, and will not let belief take hold of him...

...touching this dreaded sight twice seen of us.

Therefore I have entreated him along with us to watch the minutes of this night...

...that if again this apparition come he may approve our eyes and speak to it.

Tush, tush, 'twill not appear.

Sit down a while, and let us once again assail your ears...

...that are so fortified against our story, what we two nights have seen.

Well, sit we down, and let us hear Barnardo speak of this.

Last night of all...

...when yond same star that's westward from the pole...

...had made his course t'illume that part of heaven...

...where now it burns...

...Marcellus and myself, the bell then beating 1-

Peace, break thee off. Look where it comes again.

- Same figure as the king that's dead. Thou art a scholar. Speak to it.

Looks it not like the king?

- Mark it. - Most like.

It harrows me with fear and wonder.

- It would be spoke to. - Speak to it, Horatio.

What art thou that usurp'st this time of night...

...together with that fair and warlike form...

...in which the majesty of buried Denmark did sometimes march?

By heaven, I charge thee speak.

It is offended. See, it stalks away.

Stay, speak, speak, I charge thee speak.

'Tis gone, and will not answer.

How now, Horatio? You tremble and look pale.

Is not this something more than fantasy? What think you on't?

Before my God, I might not this believe...

...without the sensible and true avouch of mine own eyes.

- Is it not like the king? - As thou art to thyself.

Such was the very armor he had on when he th' ambitious Norway combated.

So frowned he once when in an angry parle...

...he smote the sledded Polacks on the ice.

'Tis strange.

Thus twice before, and jump at this dead hour...

...with martial stalk hath he gone by our watch.

In what particular thought to work I know not...

...but in the gross and scope of my opinion...

...this bodes some strange eruption to our state.

Good now, look here, and tell me, he that knows...

...why this same strict and most observant watch...

...so nightly toils the subject of the land...

...and why such daily cast of brazen cannon...

...and foreign mart for implements of war...

...why such impress of shipwrights, whose sore task...

...does not divide the Sunday from the week:

What might be toward that this sweaty haste...

...doth make the night joint-laborer with the day...

...who is't that can inform me?

That can I.

At least the whisper goes so:

Our last king...

...whose image even but now appeared to us...

...was as you know by Fortinbras of Norway...

...thereto pricked on by a most emulate pride...

...dared to the combat. In which our valiant Hamlet-

For so this side of our known world esteemed him.

did slay this Fortinbras...

...who by a sealed compact, well ratified by law and heraldry...

...did forfeit with his life all those his lands...

...which he stood seized of to the conqueror.

Against the which a moiety competent...

...was gaged by our king, which had returned to the inheritance of Fortinbras...

...had he been vanquisher, as, by the same cov'nant...

...and carriage of the article designed, his fell to Hamlet.

Now sir, young Fortinbras, of unimproved mettle hot and full...

...hath in the skirts of Norway here and there...

...sharked up a list of landless resolutes for food and diet to some enterprise...

...that hath a stomach in't, which is no other-

And it doth well appear unto our state.

but to recover of us by strong hand...

...and terms compulsatory those foresaid lands...

...so by his father lost.

And this, I take it, is the main motive of our preparations...

...the source of this our watch, and the chief head...

...of this post-haste and rummage in the land.

I think it be no other but e'en so.

Well, may it sort that this portentous figure...

...comes armed through our watch so like the king...

...that was and is the question of these wars.

A mote it is to trouble the mind's eye.

In the most high and palmy state of Rome, a little ere the mightiest Julius fell...

...the graves stood tenantless and the sheeted dead...

...did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets.

And even the like precurse of feared events, as harbingers preceding still the fates...

...and prologue to the omen coming on...

...have heaven and earth together demonstrated...

...unto our climatures and countrymen.

As stars with trains of fire and dews of blood...

...disasters in the sun.

And the moist star...

...upon whose influence Neptune's empire stands...

...was sick almost to doomsday with eclipse.

But soft, behold. Lo, where it comes again.

l’ll cross it though it blast me.

Stay, illusion.

If thou hast any sound or use of voice, speak to me.

If there be any good thing to be done that may to thee do ease and grace to me...

...speak to me.

If thou art privy to thy country's fate...

...which happily foreknowing may avoid, O speak.

Or if thou hast uphoarded in thy life extorted treasure in the womb of earth...

...for, they say, spirits oft walk in death...

...speak for it, stay and speak. Stop it, Marcellus.

- Strike it with my partisan? - Do if it will not stand.

'Tis here. - 'Tis here.

'Tis gone.

We do it wrong, being so majestical, to offer it the show of violence...

...for it is as the air invulnerable...

...and our vain blows malicious mockery.

It was about to speak when the cock crew.

And then it started like a guilty thing...

...upon a fearful summons.

I have heard the cock, that is the trumpet to the morn...

...doth with his lofty and shrill-sounding throat...

...awake the god of day...

...and at his warning, whether in sea or fire, in earth or air...

...th' extravagant and erring spirit hies to his confine.

And of the truth herein, this present object made probation.

It faded on the crowing of the cock.

Some say that ever 'gainst that season comes...

...wherein our savior's birth is celebrated...

...the bird of dawning singeth all night long.

And then, they say, no spirit can walk abroad...

...the nights are wholesome.

Then no planets strike...

...no fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm...

...so hallowed and so gracious is the time.

So have I heard and do in part believe it.

But look, the morn in russet mantle clad...

...walks o'er the dew of yon high eastward hill.

Break we our watch up, and by my advice...

...let us impart what we have seen tonight...

...unto young Hamlet.

For upon my life, this spirit, dumb to us, will speak to him.

Do you consent we acquaint him with it, as needful in our loves, fitting our duty?

Let's do't, I pray.

And I this morning know where we shall find him most conveniently.

Though yet of Hamlet our dear brother's death...

...the memory be green, and that it us befitted...

...to bear our hearts in grief, and our whole kingdom...

...to be contracted in one brow of woe...

...yet so far hath discretion fought with nature...

...that we with wisest sorrow think on him...

...together with remembrance of ourselves.

Therefore our sometime sister...

...now our queen...

...th' imperial jointress of this warlike state...

...have we as 'twere with a defeated joy...

...with one auspicious and one dropping eye...

...with mirth in funeral and with dirge in marriage...

...in equal scale weighing delight and dole...

...taken to wife.

Nor have we herein barred your better wisdoms...

...which have freely gone with this affair along. For all, our thanks.

Now follows that you know young Fortinbras...

...holding a weak supposal of our worth...

...or thinking by our late dear brother's death...

...our state to be disjoint and out of frame...

...colleagued with the dream of his advantage...

...he hath not failed to pester us with message...

...importing the surrender of those lands lost by his father, with all bonds of law...

...to our most valiant brother. So much for him.

Now for ourself, and for this time of meeting...

...thus much the business is:

We have here writ to Norway, uncle of young Fortinbras...

...who, impotent and bed-rid, scarcely hears of this his nephew's purpose...

...to suppress his further gait herein, in that the levies...

...the lists, and full proportions are all made out of his subject.

And we here dispatch you, good Cornelius, and you, Voltemand...

...for bearers of this greeting to Old Norway...

...giving you no further personal power to business with the king...

...more than the scope of these dilated articles allow.

Farewell, and let your haste commend your duty.

In that, and all things, will we show our duty.

We doubt it nothing, heartily farewell.

And now, Laertes, what's the news with you?

You told us of some suit. What is't, Laertes?

You cannot speak of reason to the Dane and lose your voice.

What wouldst thou beg, Laertes, that shall not be my offer, not thy asking?