At the risk of seeming woo-woo, Hamnet does hold you in a metaphorical embrace, one which gives you permission to feel connected to emotions the rest of the world tells you to push down.

Mescal, rightly, takes a back seat while Buckley lets rip with the most astounding ferocity. It is ruthlessly manipulative and maybe you will be able to resist. But I’d take a hanky all the same.

The film’s storyline is more straightforward than the book’s and its main points are spelt out more emphatically but if the plot loses some of its delicacy on screen, the impact of its ending makes up for it.

There are few directors living today who seem as interested in the expression on an actor’s face as with the rain gently falling on a stream or stormclouds rolling over a field.