Blooper

As Elizabeth is being arrested, Robert Dudley's gold chain disappears from around his neck.

Elizabeth has flashbacks to the Bishop shouting, "You'll be damned for this!" But the Bishop shouted this at Walsingham, not Elizabeth.

After the unsuccessful assassination attempt, when Elizabeth is being tended by her ladies, she is shown standing, yet the next shot has her sitting.

As Walsingham is speaking with Mary of Guise, she is holding a table knife up to her lips and is playing with it by rotating the handle. The camera then switches to a shot from behind her head, and the knife is oriented the other direction. Then, as they continue speaking, the camera shot returns to the original angle, and the knife handle is reoriented back to the original hand.

When Robert Dudley goes to Elizabeth's bedroom, he interacts with six 'ladies in waiting' who are giggling outside the room's entrance. He flirts with Isabel Knollys and then goes inside the room. In the next shot, a Lady in Waiting (Lily Allen) appears, and there are now seven 'ladies in waiting', positioned differently in the entrance when Sir William Cecil interacts with them immediately after Dudley enters the room.

At the beginning, when Elizabeth is being arrested, she is addressed as "Princess Elizabeth". She was stripped of the title 'Princess' when Anne Boleyn was executed and called 'lady'. Mary Tudor made certain that distinction was maintained during her reign as she followed Catholic Law and considered Elizabeth a bastard.

The beginning shows Robert Dudley with Elizabeth while she was arrested. Historically, Robert Dudley, his four surviving brothers (including Guildford), and his sister-in-law (Lady Jane Grey) were all in the Tower of London indefinitely. In fact, Wyatt's rebellion threatened all of their lives and brought about the executions of Jane and Guilford, while Robert and his remaining three brothers would stay in the tower until being released later that year.

Walsingham never went to Scotland during the period the film covers and never killed Mary de Guise. She died of dropsy. In fact, Walsingham later went to Scotland to ensure James VI's succession of Elizabeth to the English throne. Walsingham also is portrayed as older than Elizabeth, but they were about the same age.

While it's true that Henri, Duke of Anjou (later King Henri III), was generally obsessed with clothing and did, on occasion, dress as a woman, he never actually traveled to England to court the Queen. That honor fell instead to his younger brother François, who became Duke of Anjou in 1576, and was the only one of Elizabeth's many suitors to court her in person.

Two of Elizabeth's ladies in waiting are called Lettice Howard and Isabel Knollys. In fact, Lettice Knollys, Elizabeth's first cousin once removed was one of her ladies in waiting. Knollys went on to marry Robert Dudley.

Details of some historical characters and events have been changed to fit the dramatic narrative.

If historical events are intentionally changed due to artistic license to make a more dramatic narrative, it is not a Goof; i.e., it was intentional.

In the featurette included on the DVD, the on-screen titling refers to the Duke of Norfolk, played by Christopher Eccleston, as her "Advisary". The correct spelling is "Adversary."

This is not a Goof per IMDb Guidelines, as DVD "extras" are not part of the filmmaker's story.

In the beginning, on the right side of the shot, a halberd used to block the crowd from the prisoners bends and wobbles, showing itself to be made of rubber.

When Elizabeth, dressed in red, is galloping to find Sir Robert, who is afield hunting, one long shot taken straight on shows the face of the stunt double.

(at around 1h 23 mins) Midway up the Scottish castle in the background, the flash of a passing car is visible.

The first shot of Walsingham (from behind the head) is used twice. Just before the next shot of his face, a sharp slit of silver can be seen heading toward Walsingham's head from the right side of the screen. However, Walsingham's servant then crosses the room, and gets a knife out of its case. When the next shot of the back of Walsingham's head is seen, this slit is the knife now being held to his throat by the servant.

Mary of Guise is seen wearing modern eyeliner and eye shadow throughout the film. It's especially conspicuous when she is having dinner with Walsingham during his visit to Scotland.

Robert Dudley recites Sir Philip Sidney's sonnet "My true love hath my heart" to Elizabeth in a boat. This sonnet was not written until at least 1580, about 20 years after the time the movie is set, and wasn't published until 1593.

Elizabeth is shown washing her face with water. In 16th-century England, water was considered dangerously unhealthy and almost never used for washing the body. Elizabeth would have "bathed" by rubbing her face with a dry cloth.

Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk was not arrested and executed for treason until 1572 when Elizabeth was 39, and well outside the time period of the movie.

Bishop Stephen Gardiner stands as a key figure in the pro-Catholic faction during Elizabeth's reign. In fact, he died in 1555 before Elizabeth ever ascended to the throne. The role Gardiner plays in religious politics here is likely a stand-in for the historical Bishop Edmund Bonner, the Catholic clergyman most at odds with Elizabeth's Protestant reforms, who died as her prisoner in the Tower of London in 1569.

John Gardner refutes Elizabeth's description of religion as a "small" issue by saying that it led to her mother's death. Elizabeth's mother, Anne Boleyn, was executed for adultery, not for her religion.