Almost Bollywood.

Rating: 3/10 (4 February 2011)

Why this movie should have had nominations escapes me.
Let me tell you where I am coming from. I have just finished watching the full day-and-a-half series "The Tudors" on DVD - which ends as Bloody Mary becomes queen. So it was logical to watch "Elizabeth" on DVD as a follow-on.
Others have commented on the historical inaccuracies (which were also evident to some extent in The Tudors) so I won't labour the point. It does, however, make me just a little leery when films use history as narrative as opposed to merely a period backdrop and present scenes of historical significance as fact. I can accept liberties taken with unimportant scenes but there's enough drama in the known facts to make a gripping movie without embellishment.
Now to the film. There is some fine acting here, especially Rush. Queen Anne is in my opinion miscast. Ms Winslet, although looking the part, just doesn't cut it though: she projects as if she is on a West End stage production. Much more subtlety needed.
My biggest criticism lies with the director, Kapur. There are one or two visually stunning sequences - the water party comes to mind. The cinematography is excellent throughout, the sound better than seems to be the norm nowadays (with the exception of using Elgar in one sequence, at funereal speed) and the sets and locations believable. But unfortunately the whole is spoiled by the director's constant infusion of "Art" with a capital "A".
Fades to overexposed white. Soft focus. Incessant slow pans and zooms. Very few of these cinematic tricks are necessary in such a story, and neither are many of the dancing scenes. The overall effect, for me, is of a Bollywood extravaganza transposed into a 16th Century setting. It is almost comical, and reminiscent of those TV take-offs of blockbuster movies, with everything exaggerated to extremes.
One particular sequence, with Ms Winslet overacting her way through a staccato series of practices of her forthcoming speech, made me check that the DVD hadn't inadvertently switched to the "Out-takes" extra.
Shame: a period of English history that perhaps more than any other shaped the path to modern society could, and should, have been better presented. Not as documentary, but certainly less as a director's statement.