Take one iambic pentameter for your sadness, and call me in the morning. Set in the Elizabethan era, Chloe Zhao’s Hamnet (C) depicts two parents grieving the loss of a child in very different ways. Jessie Buckley offers a raw and harrowing reaction; and Paul Mescal, who plays William Shakespeare, addresses his sadness more obliquely through the presentation of a tragic stage play far away from the domestic despair. Despite Zhao’s penchant for painterly and geometric imagery, there’s not a whole lot going here: sequences of courtship, pregnancy, illness, loss and reaction play out in slow dollops. It’s a far better showcase for Buckley, doing very fine work here, than Mescal, who just doesn’t seem as ensconced in the devastation. The strained chemistry between the central pair doesn’t help; thus the final act, moving for many, rang like artificial Oscar bait. It’s a bitter quill with few breakaways or takeaways.