Remarkable...but leave the history books at home

Rating: 9/10 (9 December 1998)

I know only enough of the history of this particular period of English History to be dangerous to myself when trying to sound intelligent about it, but I am fairly certain of my conviction that the film isn't terribly accurate in a historical sense. In that way I imagine that, for lack of a better education in English History, I would have to agree with many of the previous remarks about the historical innaccuracies of this film. I bow to the superior period knowledge of others.
But I am very certain of something else: this movie isn't ABOUT history, not really, and to focus on the historical innaccuracies is to rob yourself of a marvelous experience. This film is about the remarkable transformation of a remarkable woman who was in so many ways vastly and incredibly ahead of her time.
Elizabeth is first introduced to us as a playful idealistic young girl, naive in the realities of religious persecution and the remarkable fragility of the office she ascends to after the death of her half sister Queen Mary. Her idealism and, dare I say it, feminism ("I don't see the need of a Husband at all" she says after her coronation) make her a target in a sense she only barely comprehends. Through the very act of survival, she becomes a cunning and ruthless ruler who overcomes, overtakes, and finally leads an England that is not yet the world power it is to become by the end of her Reign.
Cate Blanchette's remarkable on-screen transformation leads us from a giggly, free-spirited lover to a terrified new queen to a resigned and betrayed leader ("Must I make Stone of myself?" she asks Francis Walsingham, very aptly played by Geoffrey Rush) to a rock of regality ("to rule absolutely, yes" replies Walsingham). It is easy to understand why many do not fear her when she first ascends to the throne, and easy to understand why, in the last scene of the film, even her long time lover falls to his knees in astonishment and subjection to the Virgin Queen. She is, indeed, "Married to England".
For a time I thought I may be a bit offended by the graphic-ness of the film...it is quite surprisingly sexual and bloody. But not in an exploitative way. Much as "Saving Private Ryan" suggested (or rather, shouted) that to portray war in any less than it's ultimate and final gore and violent reality is to pay less than complete and faithful homage to the participants, the portrayal of sex and violence in "Elizabeth" is to flesh out the era's people in their full, honest and genuine reality, which is ultimately the only way to be faithful to the characters of the film and to the period itself. To omit those details is to be less than honest.
It simply cannot be said that Cate Blanchette's performance is anything less than Oscar-caliber, and I have my favorite in that particular category come early next year (assuming I stay awake long enough to root her on...and too bad she's got a boyfriend, from what I understand..oh well).