Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. Commentary (films not included). Pages: 23. Chapters: Adam and Evelyne, Beware of Pity, Blithe Spirit (film), Freedom Radio, French Without Tears (film), Hamlet (1948 film), Henry V (1944 film), In Which We Serve, Odd Man Out, The Gentle Sex, The Lamp Still Burns, The Net (1953 film), The Rocking Horse Winner (film), The Way Ahead, The Way to the Stars, This Happy Breed (film), Trouble in Store. Excerpt: Hamlet is a 1948 British film adaptation of William Shakespeare's play Hamlet, adapted and directed by and starring Sir Laurence Olivier. Hamlet was Olivier's second film as director, and also the second of the three Shakespeare films that he directed (the 1936 As You Like It had starred Olivier, but had been directed by Paul Czinner). Hamlet is the only one of Olivier's directorial efforts to be filmed in black and white, and was the first British film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture. It is also the first sound film of the play in English. A 1935 sound film adaptation, Khoon Ka Khoon, had been made in India and filmed in the Urdu language. Olivier's Hamlet is the Shakespeare film that has received the most prestigious accolades, winning the Academy Awards for Best Picture and Best Actor and the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival. However, it proved controversial among Shakespearean purists, who felt that Olivier had made too many alterations and excisions to the four-hour play by cutting nearly two hours worth of content. Milton Shulman wrote in The Evening Standard "To some it will be one of the greatest films ever made, to others a deep disappointment. Laurence Olivier leaves no doubt that he is one of our greatest living actors...his liberties with the text, however, are sure to disturb many." The film follows the overall story of the play, but cuts nearly half the dialogue, leaves out two major characters, and...