Mystery Science Theater 3000: Hamlet (2011, Shout! Factory)

Here we have another episode of the great Mystery Science Theater 3000 put out by Shout! Factory.  This time, Mike Nelson, Crow T. Robot and Tom Servo tackle a laughably dubbed, German,  made for television production of Hamlet, starring Maximilian Schell.  Being the poorly read chap that I am, I have never actually read Hamlet nor seen any movie adaptions so this is probably the worst way to first see Hamlet.  Then again, I couldn't give two shits about Shakespeare so this is really the only way I would.

For anyone interested, Hamlet is the story of a guy whose father has been killed by his uncle, who then marries Hamlet's mother.  Hamlet then sees his father's ghost and goes crazy.  At least that's what I got from it.  I could be totally wrong, but once again I just couldn't care less about the story.  What I do know is that Mike and his robot sidekicks seem to know the story well because they do a good job of narrating and keeping the characters straight, all while killing the dark, serious tone of the film with their machine gun fire quips.

Like I stated before, I don't know much Shakespeare so what's great about this episode is that it is both hilarious and a learning experience.  The MST3K boys usually are forced to sit through low budget sci fi, monster or other b movie oddities so Hamlet is not what one would expect to see on the show.  True it is a cheesy, low budget Hamlet but it's still Hamlet.  That to me proves how inventive and brilliant this show is.  This episode is quite funny and I found myself laughing out loud several times throughout.  The movie was hard to sit through but Mike, Crow and Servo (I'm sorry, I mean Sirveaux) made it tolerable, even enjoyable.  There were some parts that were even a little too slow for the crew's comical anecdotes, but it's still definitely worth a watch.

RATING: 7/10

MST3K: Hamlet is a Shout Select title, only available through Shout! Factory's website.  You can pre-order it HERE or it is also available in a bundle with Gunslinger with free shipping and a free MST3K stress ball HERE and a 4 DVD Select Bundle with Gunslinger, Beginning of the End and The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies HERE with $10 off, free shipping and a free MST3K stress ball.