Favourite scene in a Movie Number ONE: Withnail Hamlet’s Soliloquy

 

Withnail and I... Hamlet Soliloquy

I have of late, but wherefore

I know not, lost all my mirth

and indeed, it goes so heavily with my disposition;

that this goodly frame the Earth, seemes to me a sterrill

Promontory; this most excellent Canopy the Ayre,

look you, this brave ore-hanging firmament,

this Majestical Roof,

fretted with golden fire: why, 

it appeares no other thing

to me, then a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours.

What a piece of work is a man,

How noble in Reason, how infinite in faculties, 

how like an angel in apprehension

how like a God ! 

the beauty of the world,

the paragon of animals. and yet to me,

what is this quintessence of dust?

Man delights not me; no,

nor Woman neither; 

—The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark (Act II, Scene ii, 285-300)

Richard E. Grant and Bruce Robinson on WITHNAIL AND I