Simon Stone’s Elsinore begins with material that could easily have produced another sombre biographical drama about the AIDS crisis. Its subject is the Scottish actor Ian Charleson, best remembered internationally for his performance as Eric Liddell in Chariots of Fire, who died of AIDS-related causes in 1990 at the age of 40. Shortly before his death, already gravely ill, Charleson undertook one of the most demanding roles in the theatrical repertoire: Hamlet at London’s National Theatre. Rather than allowing illness and death to define its protagonist, however, Elsinore makes an inspired decision. It becomes a film about living, acting, friendship, humour, and the stubborn need to create when time is running out.