Edward II

Wearing his gay-right crusading heart on his sleeve, Derek Jarman's antepenultimate work EDWARD II is a post-modern interpretation of Christopher Marlowe's play about the eponymous Plantagenet sovereign (Waddington, a celluloid debutant), whose partiality towards his male lover Piers Gaveston (newcomer Tiernan), raises Cain in the court and prompts his wife Queen Isabella (Swinton), in league with Lord Mortimer (Terry), to usurp his throne.

Shot in Jarman's characteristic sparse, claustrophobic setting which avails itself of minimal indoor lighting and cherry-picked iconography to great effect (striking use of refraction, a quasi-black-box theater intimacy, etc.), EDWARD II radically strews anachronistic items into its theatrical foreground: a slick modern dance, characters sporting contemporary costumes and its trimmings (business suits for the members of the court and for Queen Isabella, a Hermes bag accompanies her entrance), brandishing modern weapons, notably a band of rioting gay right activists constitutes the king's army, Jarman has economically, but also impressively warps its source play's temporality and gives its story an exigency and immediacy that elicits strong topicality, when cruelty is wantonly lashed out at the beleaguered gay lovers.

Among the cast, every single one of the main cast robustly sinks his or her teeth into Marlowe's florid wording, a savage-looking Tiernan flouts the traditional aesthetics of a rakish lotus eater and brings about a fierce ugliness that contests for a basic human right which goes beyond its often beautified physicality and narcissism (a self-seeking whippersnapper still has his inviolable right to love someone of his own sex); both Swinton and Terry grandly chew the scenery of lofty operatics, but in a commendable way which resoundingly adds the dramatic tension and heft of their sinister collusion, and by comparison Waddington, looks unfavorably bland and wishy-washy in a role who pluckily hazards his monarchial reign in favor of one single mortal that he holds dearest.

As Annie Lennox's belts out "EV'RY TIME WE SAY GOODBYE" in her cameo appearance, Jarman's EDWARD II is a soulful transposition to exclaim his cri de coeur, and steeped in his sui generis idiom that sublimes a tenacious beauty out of its rough-hewn components, but with a proviso that an acquired taste is requisite.

This beautifully filmed, strangely erotic minor masterwork is Derek Jarman at his best. Dark and brooding, Jarman draws the viewer into the world of medieval England while still being his unusual, original self. Homoerotic without being blatant about its pro-gay leanings, Jarman tells a story of doomed love in a time where certain loves were life threatening.

Ya know that scene in Being John Malkovich, where he goes into his own mind and everyone inside says nothing but "Malkovich Malkovich, Malkovich?" I felt that way watching this movie. Through the whole movie, I heard pretty much nothing but "Gaveston? Gaveston, Gaveston? Gaveston!" It's not that the movie's difficult to understand because of the Elizabethean language. I'm a huge fan of Shakespeare's plays, having read a number of them and seen plenty of film adaptations of them, so I can follow Elizabethean dialogue. But this... well, it ain't Shakespeare. Christopher Marlowe's style doesn't have the poetry or fluidity of Shakespeare. He didn't have Shakespeare's genius. Which makes this movie tough on the ear: boring, in fact.

I'm occasionally tempted to watch this movie again, just to see if maybe it DOES have something to redeem itself, perhaps something I missed... and maybe I will, someday. But for now, I'll stick with Branagh's Much Ado About Nothing.

Definitely Derek Jarman's most refined film. That said, refined for Jarman is bizarre for most.

Based VERY loosely on Christopher Marlowe's play from 1592, however, should be view in its own light / right. Whereas it does tend to capture the wonderful Marlow language, this is no "Shakespeare" here! It's a brilliantly acted ensemble piece, set in Jarman's abstract vision of the world, with a core message that is as valid today as it must have been shocking then.

Jarman "paints" his film - as he always did - not in any logical manner or order, but like a mosaic of images, creating a whole and a statement - a strong statement about intolerance in this case.

This one might even be palatable for non-Jarman fans.

Being one of only two movies (as opposed to stage productions) based on the works of Christopher Marlowe (the other is the Richard Burton 1967 DOCTOR FAUSTUS), Derek Jarman's 1991 film of EDWARD II would be important for that reason alone. However there is more to the film than that. It's not only what meets the eye but what meets the ear that really counts. Like most of his films, Jarman shot EDWARD II on a shoestring and like many a theatre director turned filmmaker, he follows the time honored tradition of re-interpreting a classic play for the screen.

The minimal settings and modern costumes, which were partially budgetary concerns, take some getting used to as does the overtly gay overtone that Jarman brings out which is not for the easily offended even though it can clearly be found in Marlowe's text. However, if you can get past that, then this EDWARD II can be a surprisingly rich and rewarding experience especially on repeated viewings.

After I have watched a film version of a Shakespeare play or in this case Marlowe, I like to run it through my sound system without the picture and just listen to the words and how the actors speak them. The cast for EDWARD II is very strong and their theatrical background comes through with most of Marlowe's lines. Shakespeare was regarded as a playwright when he died in 1616 while Marlowe was considered a poet when he was murdered in 1593. There is poetry in Marlowe's blank verse that even Shakespeare couldn't aspire to although he was the better writer overall. But I digress.

With a trio of strong performances from Stephen Waddington, Tilda Swinton, and Nigel Terry, this version of EDWARD II has a raw power that is accentuated by Jarman's visuals and Simon Fisher-Turner's music. Forget the anachronisms like Annie Lennox or the appearance of Queer Nation and focus on the story of a flawed individual who like Othello, "loved not wisely, but too well"...For more reviews visit The Capsule Critic.