Elizabeth: The Golden Age

"I like her not!" - Henry VIII

Elizabeth: the Golden Age (2007) was my first theatrical viewing in college. It was quite a hectic day: class on the butt-end of campus, losing my watch and getting a haircut from some weird Italian guy. Riding the bus to the theater, I got off at the wrong stop, was stranded in Squirrel Hill and had to wait for a very kind woman to guide me into town. Finally staggering into the theater, the projector broke down three times in the film's first ten minutes. Oh, and the movie sucked.

Sadly, the intervening years haven't improved my opinion. Elizabeth (1998) is historically murky but very entertaining, Shekhar Kapur showing a flare for period pageantry and classy melodrama. This belated sequel is a misbegotten farrago, recycling well-known history in a manner boring, offensive and ostentatious.

In 1585, Elizabeth I's (Cate Blanchett) throne is still threatened from within and without: Spain's Philip II (Jordi Molla) is preparing an invasion of England, while English Catholics under Anthony Babington (Eddie Redmayne) conspire to kill Elizabeth and place Mary Stuart (Samantha Morton) on the throne. But Elizabeth is too concerned with dashing explorer Sir Walter Raleigh (Clive Owen), who simultaneously charms the Queen and lady-in-waiting Bess Throckmorton (Abbie Cornish). Spymaster Francis Walsingham (Geoffrey Rush) slowly unravels Phillip's scheme, forcing Elizabeth's understrength navy to square off against the Spanish Armada.

The Golden Age gets off on the wrong foot by covering well-trodden ground. Its subjects certainly could make interesting films, and individually they have: The Sea Hawk, The Virgin Queen, Mary, Queen of Scots. Just two years prior, in fact, Tom Hooper's Elizabeth I miniseries covered the same events. It's a bad sign when you immediately invite comparisons to other, better movies.

Nor is the execution better. Michael Hirst and William Nicholson's script is a mess, introducing multiple subplots without giving any of them breathing room. Kapur focuses on a silly love triangle that mines every imaginable cliche. Setpieces (an assassination attempt, Mary's execution) seem self-contained, the build-up so cursory they don't register at all. When the Armada finally arrives, we get a shockingly generic Henry V speech from Elizabeth and an effects-laden montage of exploding warships. Yawn.


A low point is some shockingly blunt anti-Catholic bigotry. Scenes of Philip scheming, conspirators plotting and Mary pouting are crammed with priests, rosaries, crucifixes and Latin chanting. Characters constantly call Elizabeth a whore and bastard. At one point, Philip chortles "Elizabeth is darkness, *I* am the light!", somehow stifling maniacal laughter. If read for contemporary parallels, the film's message is just depressing: Catholics (Muslims?) are unreasoning monsters, so why not kill them all? Good luck with that.

Golden Age is certainly a spectacle, all sumptuous costumes, ornate set design and crazy lighting. This culminates in a jawdropping scene where Elizabeth, branded a whore by a would-be assassin, stands bathed in radiant, heavenly light. Ordinarily I'd praise Kapur's efforts, but the imagery is baldly ostentatious, as if enough pretty pictures compensate for other deficiencies. Who cares about plot? Here's a shot of a horse swimming through a shipwreck, and a camera spinning around Elizabeth! Spinning!

Cate Blanchett is captivating as always. She's good as a monarch forced to reap the consequences of a loveless life and difficult reign. On the other hand, she doesn't go the extra mile like the best Elizabeths. Where Bette Davis smeared herself with fright makeup and Glenda Jackson shaved her head, Blanchett remains strikingly glamorous for a 50-something woman. Not that I'm complaining.

Geoffrey Rush is strangely watered-down, lacking his delicious deviousness from the first outing. An attempt to flesh out Walsingham with a treacherous brother (Adam Godley) amounts to little. Clive Owen mixes smug posturing with silly ramblings and Abbie Cornish is bland. Samantha Morton gets so little screen time she doesn't register. Tom Hollander (Land of the Blind) has an inconsequential bit.

All signs indicate Elizabeth: The Golden Age should be a good film. Unfortunately, it's a near-complete failure, buoyed only by pretty pictures and Cate Blanchett.