Elizabeth:
The Golden Age

Rated: PG-13
Runtime: 1 hour, 54 minutes
Directed by: Shekhar Kapur

Starring:
Cate Blanchett - Queen Elizabeth I
Geoffrey Rush - Sir Francis Walsingham
Clive Owen - Sir Walter Raleigh
Abbie Cornish - Elizabeth "Bess" Throckmorton
Samantha Morton - Mary, Queen of Scots
Rhys Ifans - Robert Reston

I only saw Shekhar Kapur’s 1998 film Elizabeth for the first time this past year and I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it. The film painted a fascinated portrait of a ruler who must not only be as domineering as a male ruler but as charming and disarming as a female one, all the while having to cut away at her humanity and desires to do what is necessary. The ending of the film is a beautiful tragedy where Elizabeth has stepped firmly into power but lost her youthful innocence and any possibility of any deep, personal relationship.

The best thing I can say about the film's sequel, Elizabeth: The Golden Age is that I can make the following analogy: Die Hard is to Die Hard 2: Die Harder as Elizabeth is to Elizabeth: The Golden Age. It is a sequel that retreads. While with Die Hard 2, such a repeat is a bearable letdown, no one goes to a Die Hard film to see the evolution of John McClane as a character. But when following such a fascinating character portrait and transformation as presented in Elizabeth, to take a step backwards makes no sense, especially when the story allows for new challenges.

Elizabeth (Cate Blanchett reprising her break-through role), under the constant danger of assassination and a double-threat from Catholic Spain and her imprisoned and Catholic cousin Mary, Queen of Scots (Samantha Morton), is the queen we saw at the end of the last movie. She has learned to accept her place of power, wield it effectively, and even managed to form a bond with one of her ladies-in-waiting, Bess (Abbie Cornish). But the arrival of the ruggedly handsome explorer and pirate Walter Raleigh (Clive Owen) regresses Elizabeth into a disappointing love triangle where we see the once-strong ruler back as a teenager who must once again wrestle with her overwhelming desire for personal love. It's not exactly the same story as before as now there's a vicarious element with Bess representing her younger self, but then again, Die Hard 2 was set in Washington, D.C. and not L.A. It's essentially the same movie and not quite as good the second time around.

Kapur has once again crafted a beautiful world where the film is a lock for Best Costume and Art Direction Oscar nominations and the leading actors, especially Blanchett and Owen, play their roles brilliantly. But with more interesting elements pushed to the side, such as Elizabeth's conflict with Mary and Spain's desire to start a holy war, it's a shame to watch the film simply retrace its predecessor's steps. Watching Elizabeth deal with the morality of her position rather than regress to play in a soap opera love triangle is not the sequel the Oscar-nominated original deserves and it's certainly not the film this fascinating historical figure deserves.

Words by
Matt Goldberg
9.13.07

Rating: 6.5 out of 10