Truly abysmal...

Rating: 1/10 (20 November 2007)

Terrible, terrible "film". Spending the weekend in Tromsø in Norway, I sheltered from the rain in the cinema, and went to see this (being the only film starting at the time). I hadn't heard of it at all, so I'm genuinely shocked at the high ratings here, and the generous praise. I saw it in English, with Norwegian subtitles... so when the Spaniards (or the Austrian) were speaking, I was in the dark, no English subs. But...
...it was awful! Completely disjointed, all over the place. Plot lines appeared and disappeared for fun, and it felt like it was going nowhere and taking the most convoluted route to get there. It didn't feel like there was any coherent plan here, it felt like they took the characters of Elizabeth, Raleigh and Walsingham and then shoehorned them into a two hour film.
It felt like a photo montage, a series of set pieces, always preparing the next big "Monumental Image". It would have been better as a collection of paintings.
The Mary Stuart character was just a hollow "evil" stereotype. The "baddie" English were... faintly pointless and forgettable. The Spaniards were all lisps and stereotyped Catholicism (the negative type). The Sea Battle was *terribly* done... what the hell was up with the horse jumping in the sea; was i supposed to care? They could have done with watching Hornblower.
Some unresolved issues:
Why, oh why, did they drape a cloth of 21st century morals over the story? It felt so entirely false and ridiculous!! Was it just me, or was there a big, big lesbian suggestion between Elizabeth and Bess??? Why did I feel that a film about Raleigh's adventures in America would have been far more interesting whenever he was on screen? I'm pretty sure I'm not a genius politician, so why was it so tremendously obvious that killing Mary Stuart would start the war? Why did they keep emphasising the "Elizabeth/Virgin Mary" thing (like at the end). Wasn't she meant to be Protestant?! And what on earth was the midget about???
A tedious, unfulfilling, disjointed, directionless mess.
Still... nice costumes.