The performances across the board here are really great. Buckley, Mescal, and J. Jupe are the standouts. The cinematography of the pastoral is sublime. You feel the wind blowing through the trees, the rustling of the leaves. The premise is moving, and the use of the arts as a way to work through grief and trauma, as displayed in the film, was poignant. That being said, I couldn't help but feel that this film felt rather hammy and ham-fisted at times. I could not connect with it in a way that I probably should have. While I understand intellectually and academically that this should have brought me to tears, the way some scenes unfurl and play out felt stilted and contrived. I hesitate to say this, but I could see some viewers considering this film a kind of grief/trauma porn due to how histrionic the film can feel at times. Agnes as a character felt a tad too anachronistic and modern for the time period. She just felt far too outspoken and forthright. And the scene where Shakespeare is formulating and verbalizing the famed "To be or not to be" speech for the play inspired by his son, which comes to be known as Hamlet, felt strangely inorganic. And the use of Max Richter's song "On the Nature of Daylight" really sullied the immersion and felt tacked on. For those not in the know, this very song has been used in a number of popular films and TV series in recent years; and so to hear it once more in this film, which seeks to feel raw and pull at the heartstrings, feels untoward. Mind you, I love Richter's music in general, but here in this context it felt weirdly commercial, plastic, and trite, which, juxtaposed with the subtle, quietly powerful sentiment of the film, didn't work. But I can see how this film can be really cathartic, affecting, and beauteous for many people.

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