Asta Nielsen, grande dame of early Danish cinema, was by no means the first woman to play the role of Danish prince Hamlet who is confronted with the impossible challenges of a world gone topsy-turvy.  But Nielsen was the first to play the role of Shakespeare‘s most famous character not simply as woman but to turn the character himself into a woman and princess - albeit, for reasons of state, dressed up as a man and prince. The 1921 film adaptation by Svend Gade and Heinz Schall is also the first to cinematographically tackle this longest of Shakespeare’s plays in its entirety.