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New Reviews of Nia DaCosta’s Hedda Praise Craft, Question Emotional Depth

Following its Prime Video launch, critics scrutinize a queer 1950s reimagining for turning subtext into text, thinning the play’s psychological ambiguity.

Overview

  • Tessa Thompson’s lead turn draws plaudits alongside Sean Bobbitt’s cinematography and Hildur Guðnadóttir’s score, though reviewers say the drama’s stakes feel muted.
  • Nia DaCosta exerts full creative control as writer, producer, and director, presenting a distinctly auteur take on Ibsen’s play.
  • The adaptation relocates the story to 1950s England with Hedda reimagined as a queer, mixed-race woman, and Eilert Lövborg recast as Eileen.
  • Recent reviews argue the film externalizes Hedda’s motives and shifts the focus to societal confinement, weakening the original’s psychological tension.
  • After a limited theatrical release on Oct. 22, the film began streaming on Prime Video on Oct. 29, prompting a fresh round of campus and local critiques.