Anne of the 145 minutes

[muckefuck]

Last month, when I was casting about for movies to NetFlix, I tossed on couple of the better-looking dramas concerning Henry VIII and his wives. Then, a few days back, when I was feeling in need of some inspiration for the final push on Wolf Hall, I pushed Anne of the Thousand Days to the top of the queue. A sumptuous Technicolor costume drama starring Geneviève Bujold and Richard Burton? How could I go wrong!

I couldn't. Burton may have hated the film, but I loved him in it. Even when he was being hateful. Yeah, the acting can be a bit declamatory at times, but some of the dialogue is bracingly lewd and entertaining and the scenes with Bujold are touching. Her Anne is more sympathetic than Mantel's version without being as insufferably virtuous as Donizetti's heroine.

In fact, I was taken aback by how wanton she's portrayed in the opening sequence, where she admits to not being a virgin while propositioning Percy. And even moreso that, despite that, she's allowed to be the model of fidelity in her marriage to Henry afterwards. The film is an interesting collision of both the end of the Hayes Code and the twilight of the traditional costume drama, so everyone's wearing amazing embroidery while talking freely about adultery and incest.

Among the supporting cast, Torontonian John Colicos (a familiar face from the bad tv of my childhood) stands out as the oily lawyer Cromwell, as do Anthony Quayle as Wolsey and Irene Papas as Katherine. I'm sure errors of fact are legion (even with my rough understanding of the timeline, I caught some hiccoughs in the chronology) but there are worse ways to spend a couple hours on a cold winter's evening.

Comments

[lhn.livejournal.com]

Wait, Baltar is in this? Talk about burying the lede!

[muckefuck.livejournal.com]

I didn't want to mention that in case anyone planned to watch this. Because once you see that, you can't unsee it.

[nitouche.livejournal.com]

I met John Colicos once, not long before his death -- he came by the bookstore I was working at. Yes, there was fangirl squee-ing.

[my-tallest.livejournal.com]

The charm of it overwhelms, allowing for suspension of minor disagreements on accuracy, and how is that bad thing? (as long as plenty of other movies of the time period exist to correct.) Just being entertaining can be a lot to ask in historical pieces these days.

My memories of this are so fond, I noted on my calendar when Jeff and I would have been together a thousand days. and lo, no cannon to the head at the end of the first thousand. If all goes well, we'll get to mark it again, this time for actual days married, on March 16, 2018. So, if in early February 2018, you hear of me shopping for a headsman, you'll know when to be at the Tower.

[muckefuck.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't've picked you for the Henry, but then I don't know Jeff.

Thought of you last night. Most of the action of the novel I'm reading is set around Union Park, which summoned some fuzzy wisp of recollection. So I streetviewed it and, voilà, the very street corner you and I strode past roughly a thousand days ago now.