Riz Ahmed Reimagines Hamlet In Modern London Thriller

Shakespeare’s Hamlet has always been a story about ghosts, guilt, and the messy tangle of family ties. But in the latest film adaptation, director Aneil Karia and screenwriter Michael Lesslie have stripped the play down to its rawest nerves, dropping the Danish prince into the shadowy, high-stakes world of modern London. Here, the familiar tale of betrayal and revenge is recast amid property deals, luxury SUVs, and family dysfunction that would make even the most seasoned soap opera watcher wince.

On February 4, 2026, stars Riz Ahmed and Morfydd Clark sat down to discuss their roles in this striking new vision of Hamlet, a film that doesn’t so much update Shakespeare as it does detonate him into the present. According to The Associated Press, Ahmed—who takes on the role of Hamlet himself—explained one of the film’s boldest decisions: the famous “to be or not to be” soliloquy is delivered not on a castle parapet, but behind the wheel of a speeding car. “We wanted to capture Hamlet’s inner turmoil in a way that felt urgent and real,” Ahmed said. “There’s something about being in motion, in a car, where you can’t escape your thoughts. It felt right for this Hamlet.”

This isn’t just a stylistic flourish. As The Guardian reported in its February 5, 2026 review, Karia’s Hamlet is a stark, severe, and rigorously modern interpretation. The film trades the foggy battlements of Elsinore for the neon-lit streets of London, where family business is as likely to be conducted in a boardroom or an SUV as in a throne room. The adaptation strips down Shakespeare’s text, making sharp cuts and transpositions, and what remains is an austerely challenging tale of grief, suspicion, and psychological unraveling.

Ahmed’s Hamlet is a man convulsed with weakness and self-hate, reeling after the ghostly vision of his dead father (played with chilling intensity by Avijit Dutt) appears to him on a bleak urban rooftop. The ghost accuses Hamlet’s uncle, Claudius (Art Malik), of murder—a charge that sets the plot’s wheels in motion. But Karia’s film doesn’t let the audience off easy. As The Guardian notes, there’s room to wonder: what if Claudius, however ruthless and predatory, is in fact innocent? What if the ghost is just a projection of Hamlet’s own disgust and psychological torment?

Claudius, in this telling, is a hard-faced property speculator who has just evicted a tented community led by Fortinbras from some prime London real estate. He’s also planning to marry Hamlet’s mother, Gertrude (Sheeba Chaddha), a move that only deepens Hamlet’s sense of betrayal. The family dysfunction at the story’s core is rendered in all its modern bleakness—wedding parties, scheming associates, and the ever-present threat of violence lurking behind every polite smile.

Timothy Spall brings a mix of ingratiating menace and tragic pathos to the role of Polonius, whose murder at Hamlet’s hands is depicted as brutally explicit and shockingly deliberate—a far cry from the accidental killing in Shakespeare’s original. This act of violence is a turning point, not just for Hamlet but for the film’s entire moral universe. The consequences ripple outward, ensnaring Polonius’s daughter Ophelia (Morfydd Clark) and son Laertes (Joe Alwyn) in a web of grief and revenge.

Clark’s Ophelia is given slightly more prominence in this adaptation. Some of Hamlet’s dialogue with his friend Horatio is rerouted to her, emphasizing the depth of her connection with the prince. Still, the film controversially omits Ophelia’s famous mad scene—a decision The Guardian describes as a misjudgment. Yet Clark’s performance manages to convey Ophelia’s heartbreak and confusion as she is caught in the crossfire of Hamlet’s rage and the machinations of those around him.

One of the most daring aspects of Karia’s Hamlet is its treatment of Shakespeare’s soliloquies. Most are excised, including the iconic “Alas, poor Yorick” scene, which traditionally serves to humanize Hamlet and win the audience’s sympathy. Instead, the focus is on the raw, immediate drama of the characters’ interactions. The exception, of course, is “To be, or not to be.” In this version, Hamlet nearly screams the lines while driving—a choice that, according to Ahmed, was meant to “bring the audience right into the eye of the storm.”

This approach results in a film that is, as The Guardian puts it, “intelligent and focused,” but also unrelentingly chilly. The psychological tension is palpable, and the audience is left to question not just Hamlet’s sanity, but the very nature of truth and justice in a world where everyone has something to hide. The film’s modern setting—complete with speeding SUVs and stark urban landscapes—serves to heighten the sense of alienation and moral ambiguity.

For all its departures from tradition, this Hamlet remains deeply rooted in the play’s central concerns: the corrosive effects of grief, the search for meaning in a world gone awry, and the impossible choices that confront those who seek revenge. Ahmed’s performance anchors the film, capturing the prince’s oscillation between paralysis and fury, while the supporting cast brings new shades of complexity to familiar roles.

The adaptation has sparked lively debate among critics and audiences alike. Some praise its willingness to challenge conventions and strip away the “richly empathetic and redemptive” qualities found in other recent adaptations, such as Chloé Zhao’s Hamnet. Others lament the loss of Shakespeare’s poetry and the omission of key scenes that have long served as emotional touchstones for generations of theatergoers. Yet even its detractors acknowledge the film’s rigor and the fresh questions it raises about the nature of guilt, memory, and the stories we tell ourselves.

In the end, Karia and Lesslie’s Hamlet offers no easy answers—only a rigorous chill and a lingering sense of unease. By reimagining one of literature’s greatest tragedies for the fractured, fast-moving world of today, the filmmakers invite us to confront our own ghosts, and to ask, as Hamlet does, what it truly means “to be.”