“What do you see?” That's the first question whispered through the newly released teaser trailer for Chloé Zhao's Hamnet, and it feels less like dialogue than an invocation. We're not watching a glossy Shakespeare biopic here. This is Zhao—Oscar winner, festival mainstay, poet of fractured Americana—returning to intimacy after Marvel's Eternals. And the shift is almost startling.
Focus Features dropped the Hamnet teaser this week, ahead of its world premieres at Telluride and TIFF 2025, with a U.S. release set for November 27, 2025—yes, Thanksgiving Day. It's a pointedly emotional slot, practically begging families to confront the knot of grief and art that defines this story.
Adapted from Maggie O'Farrell's acclaimed novel, Hamnet turns the camera toward Agnes Shakespeare—Jessie Buckley at her most quietly volcanic—as she navigates the unimaginable: the death of her 11-year-old son, Hamnet. Paul Mescal plays William Shakespeare, but Zhao (and O'Farrell before her) resists the easy mythmaking of “The Bard.” Instead, the focus rests on Agnes, the woman often relegated to footnotes, who becomes the emotional architect behind the creation of Hamlet. TIFF's program notes put it bluntly: Shakespeare wasn't just a cold genius—he was a husband, a father, a man whose greatest tragedy bled into his greatest play.
The teaser itself is all restraint. Brief flashes of Max Richter's score swell and collapse like waves. A candle flickers. A hand lingers too long on a child's sleeve. Then silence. Zhao isn't chasing the melodrama of prestige period pieces; she's suffocating us with intimacy. Gorgeous. Grating. Gorgeous again.
And the casting—stacked without ever feeling indulgent. Alongside Buckley and Mescal are Joe Alwyn, Emily Watson, Jacobi Jupe, David Wilmot. Actors who know how to sit in silence without losing an audience. That matters here. Because this isn't a story of battlefield speeches or balcony sonnets. It's about what's left unsaid, the breath between loss and creation.
Behind the camera, Zhao co-wrote the script with O'Farrell herself, grounding the adaptation in the novel's elegiac rhythm. Producers include heavyweights like Sam Mendes and Steven Spielberg, a pairing that in any other context might feel like Hollywood overkill—but here it signals the level of faith in Zhao's vision. She's not just retelling Shakespeare; she's reframing him through the domestic lens history often ignores.
Watching this teaser, I felt something I didn't expect: resistance. Do I really want to see Shakespeare stripped of his myth? Do I want my “Hamlet” reframed through a child's coffin? And yet… that's the trick. Zhao knows the resistance is part of the experience. The grief doesn't just crush; it lingers, reshapes, leaves scars. Maybe that's what this film is really after—not answers, but echoes.
What Stands Out About the Hamnet Teaser
Jessie Buckley in Full Command
Her Agnes feels both mystical and grounded, a woman carved out of grief yet still radiant with life.
Paul Mescal as a Vulnerable Bard
Not the untouchable Shakespeare, but a man hollowed by loss, raw in his fragility.
Zhao's Return to Intimacy
After the sprawling spectacle of Eternals, this is Zhao back in her element—quiet, devastating, elemental.
Max Richter's Score
Even in fragments, the music deepens the emotional gravity, promising a score that could haunt awards season.
A Thanksgiving Release That Stings
November 27, 2025—family holiday, collective grief, shared ritual. It's a release date that doubles as a statement.
