Soap opera in glamorous style

Rating: Null/10 (8 May 2008)

I'm not sure how purists for historical facts view this movie, but they may wish to be aware that the motivation for making it may well be to find something to put two of the hottest young actresses together. The script handles the intriguing story at high places with astonishing simplicity  king falling for the modest, innocent one (albeit a married woman) while spurning the spirited, flirting other, who later makes a comeback with a new strategy that worked  playing hard to get.
Everybody from script writer, director to actors are playing safe, coming up with a movie that is mildly entertaining but with little emotional depth. Eric Bana, trying to portray a somewhat different Henry the VIII, comes up with a half-baked humanized monarch that is neither interesting nor convincing. The two Boleyn girls obediently deliver what they are supposed to deliver in their respective characters, and not much more. I'm much more impressed instead with the two strong women. Always dependable Kristin Scott Thomas is awesome, and I particularly like the scene when she blandly answers the King who asks for her daughter with a question, "Which one?"  and she said it twice, staring at him, unblinking. Equally awesome is Ana Torrent as Queen Katherine, with icy dignity. It's also a pleasure watching Jim Sturgess playing the girls' brother while remembering him in "Across the universe" as Jude (i.e. The Beatles' "Hey Jude").
Coming out of the movie, all I'm left with is a mental exercise of visualizing how the movie would be like with the title roles switched. It could be fun and you can do it with at least a couple of dozen other movies. The one that comes to mind immediately is "3:10 to Yuma" with Russell Crowe and Christian Bale.