By Dan Skip Allen 

The anime style of animation has been around for a while now. There have been many television shows with this style of animation but not as many films as I used until recently. Sure, there is Studio Ghibli, who have been doing it for years in their films. Legendary filmmaker Hiyo Miyazaki has made some amazing animated movies using this style of animation. Recently, though, GKids and others have taken up the mantle of using this style of animation and have done some incredible films like Suzume, Your Name, and Weathering With You. The filmmaker behind “Scarlet” Mamoru Hosoda is another prolific director who has made some amazing films. His latest is inspired by one of the great literary writers of all time, William Shakespeare. It’s not quite Hamlet, but it’s close.

Princess “Scarlet” (voiced by Mana Ashida) is the daughter of King Amleth (Masachika Ichimura). They seem to have a happy life until the King’s brother Claudius (Koji Yakusho) plots to overthrow the kingdom and kill the king. All the while taking his bride, Gertrude ( Yuki Sito) for his own. This leaves “Scarlet” upset and mad, which drives her to train as a warrior to try and get her revenge for her father. She plans a scheme to try and poison the king, but it backfires on her, and she ends up in a state of in-between. Not dead but not alive, either.

The land she ends up in is a desolate place that feels very different from the colorful world she came from. There are threats everywhere, including a giant electricity breathing dragon that flies around the skies and emerges as a giant storm once in a while. Also, dead soldiers hunt her down at every turn. While there, she meets a couple of interesting characters. An EMT Hijiri (Masaki Okada) who becomes her best friend while she’s navigating this strange land and an old woman (Kayoko Shiraishi) who tries to give “Scarlet” advice on her journey of discovery. All the while, she can think of nothing else but revenge. 

This film is an animated retelling of the classic tale “Hamlet” from William Shakespeare. The writer/director Mamoru Hosoda, gender swaps the main character, though, from a boy to a girl. In the context of this particular story, it works very well. It even has the two bubbling guards named Rosencrantz and Guldenstern (Munetaka Aoki, Shola Sometani) from the original text. This legendary play from Shakespeare works well with the revenge plot Hosoda is telling. He infuses his own brand of humor and dramatic moments into the story. As the main character is now a female, she has a specific personality that boys don’t have. That plays into the story perfectly. 

I was blown away by the animated style of this movie. The background animation and mat paintings looked absolutely gorgeous. The setting of the world that was designed for this story was perfectly fleshed out. Mix that with the hand drawn anime style animation, and you have a beautiful mix of colors and aesthetic. From the beginning of the film all the way until the end, the animation jumped off the screen. Especially in the dreamland or in-between the reds and stormy sequence were breathtaking. This is the director who made the animated Oscar nominated Mirai a few years back, so he knows how to meld great anime with great backgrounds. The look of this film is one of the main reasons to see it.

In a way, this is a coming of age story but through the lens of a revenge story. The main character finds a friend she can talk to about her life and problems even though they are from different worlds. They tell each other about where they come from and what their lives are like. This friendship blossoms nicely in the context of this story. It’s just weird how these two people from different places and times have come together to become friends in this weird desolate land. The coming of age stuff naturally comes while the story unfolds. I’m sure many young teenagers can relate to this story in a way. It’s quite universal except for the dreamworld or the in-between as I call it.

“Scarlet” was a beautiful film with interesting characters and a very good story based on Shakespeare’s Hamlet. It’s not the only Hamlet based story that came out in 2025, but it’s a fascinating way to tell a coming of age story. The director did a terrific job with the animation and the story. The cast is all doing good work here as well. Fans of anime are going to love this gender swapped version of this classic tale. Even an old guy like me can get behind this interesting tale of revenge and friendship. This was gorgeous from the beginning, and that to me is worth the price of admission. 

3 ½ stars