Didn't expect to like this movie about the ultimate Pirate Queen

Rating: 9/10 (30 September 2008)

I'm mostly Spanish. To me Queen Elizabeth was not some well-meaning, noble monarch, but a desperate, royal cut-throat willing to send her countrymen out on numerous provocative raids. Every time I hear of a new treatment of the period, I'm always interested to see what the spin is. (In case you don't know, public relations got its real start back in Elizabethan times with the English trashing Spain's Inquisition.) There's no attempt to escape the pirate angle in this movie. What is toyed with is the idea that Elizabeth authorized the raids. And it may be the case that she couldn't control people like Sir Walter Raleigh, but nevertheless she did little to discourage their activity, or to turn away their profits. In this movie the question is made to appear one of the poor English holding off the much more powerful Spanish. Raleigh believes that when he takes from the Spanish, he weakens them and, therefore, protects Protestant England. That's probably an acceptable interpretation of events. You can't go praising theft otherwise.
All that aside, I'm a fan of both Cate Blanchett and Clive Owen. And Geoffrey Rush is near perfect here. And now I can add the director to my list, Shekhar Kapur. I found the pacing, style and script wonderful and unusually entertaining and you'd have to ascribe a great deal of that to Kapur. Among the actors, Cate is especially excellent as she makes Elizabeth someone even I can admire. She really deserved some high praise for her portrayal, easily the best I've ever seen, and there have been quite a few over the years. About the only thing I'd quibble about would be the sets which seemed a little too opulent, having visited the Tower of London. I imagine the real Elizabeth wasn't quite so surrounded in splendor. Still, the art direction is quite effective. This is definitely a fine movie and well worth renting.