Henry VIII

I knew that the picture was going to be full of imperfections they minute I saw that they had made Katherine of Aragon a dark-haired, dark-eyed stereotype of what a Spaniard is suppose to look like. Katherine of Aragon, contrary to her previous portrayals, was a pretty, highly intelligent and well-educated young woman with reddish gold hair and blue eyes.

Moreover, she was infinitely more popular with the British people than Henry himself, and the Briitish people loathed Anne Boleyn for being the cause of hurting their beloved " Good Queen Catherine!"

It was believed that only Catherine's abhorence of Civil War prevented a good portion of the people rising up against Henry when he first started divorce proceedings. Assumpta Serna did an excellent job as Catherine, but her character(in my opinion) was given short shrift in comparison with Helena Bonham Carter's Anne Boleyn. Miss Bonham Carter was also too pretty to play Anne Boleyn, who, according to her contemporaries, was sallow-faced, black haired and eyed, and not that attractive in looks. What Anne did possess was a great deal of wit, charm, and ambition. Both she and Catherine were women who demonstrated strength and courage in adversity. What they lacked was the ruthless selfishness of Henry V111 and his monumental self-absorbsation in getting his own way. None of this was adequately portrayed in this series by the actors.

Like the film 'Elizabeth' the factual content of this film was very slim. Unlike Elizabeth it had no compensating qualities. It gave virtually no insight to the character of Henry or any of his wives, from the opening scenes where the Duke of Buckingham apparently survived his execution in 1513 to appear as a crusader for Catherine of Aragon 15 years later, to the death bed scene where Henry's family (who were actually celebrating New Year miles away) are clustered round his bed to hear his dying words. Jane gets knocked about and Henry hides round the corner during Anne Boleyn's trial-Complete nonsense! historically, once Henry had decided to lose a wife, he avoided all contact and blamed everyone else for their treatment. What is odd is that the directors chose to invent completely spurious scenes to illustrate Henry's crimes when there were plenty of real incidents which would have provided more than enough spectacle. I appreciate that Henry's court of more than 1000 people, glittering with excessive layers of sumptuous cloth and huge jewels could not be managed on a TV budget- but this Henry spent half his time in empty buildings talking to his echo, something impossible in the Tudor Court where even the King going to the toilet was surrounded by hereditary attendants. So, setting aside accuracy, we are left with the casting of Ray Winstone. Not impossible that Henry might have cracked coarse jokes, had a cockney accent and been free with his hands. Before he became a human boulder, he was also athletic, obsessed with doing all of those sports his father, fearful for the life of the only surviving son, had forbidden. But what happened to the literate defender of the faith? The king who owned dozens of pairs of reading glasses, who played a range of musical instruments and sang every day, who enjoyed disguising and dancing, who spent hours in disputes with intellectuals about faith? This film's Henry was like a soap opera character- a renaissance Dirty Den. Two dimensional and unbelievable. It was the choice to rely on spectacle rather than knowledge, assuming the audience to be dummies, incapable of following a plot, that sank this film. Another film which would not manage a release in cinema and will, I guess, be forgotten!

Good lord - the instant I saw Helena Bonham Carter appear as Anne in the first episode, I thought two things: one, she is definitely looking her "nearly forty" age, and two, she's at least four months pregnant! No one could miss her dress sticking out to *there* even if they tried, despite the voluminous material.

I knew it wasn't my imagination when I found this in her biography:

"Delivered her first child, a boy, Billy Ray, with boyfriend Tim Burton on October 6, 2003"

That would have been just after shooting Henry VIII. I've enjoyed Carter's work over the years, but still - there are a zillion terrific English actresses who could have done (and looked!) the part equally as well.

I second most of the comments already made about the historical inaccuracy of this program, but want to add yet another quibble: the scenes that purport to show the dissolution of the monasteries. What a bunch of hooey! I thought I was watching a scene from some movie of the Vikings raiding and pillaging the English coast. What actually happened was that inspectors were sent around and anything of value was methodically stripped and either taken for the royal treasury or sold; the monasteries were then pulled down, bells were melted, etc.; the monks and nuns were given pensions. It's true that servants were turned off without work, causing hardship; it's also true that those who were especially obdurate were tried and executed, but the slashing swords and burning monks fleeing from buildings were complete inventions of the filmmakers.

I just don't see the point--fiction is the name for this (not even historical fiction--just fiction).

Well this is just another telling of the story of England's most famous monarch, and to be very honest, it was OK, but it's been done better before.

It did have numerous strong points. Firstly, some of the wives came across particularly well. Helena Bonham Carter gave perhaps the best Anne Boleyn to date (it would be a battle with Dame Dorothy Tutin for the title), sticking to what is known about the real woman, whilst still giving a very moving performance. Katherine Parr, however brief her appearance may have been, was another winner in this production, as this is the first time her character has been accurately and well portrayed.

The acting was very good overall, but Ray Winstone stuck out a little as the King. The rest of the cast were in Tudor mode, poshing it up and giving it their all, whilst he stuck to his usual cockney gangster style. However, this aside, he did portray the King well and was the first Henry VIII to date to show any form of remorse or concern following the execution of Anne Boleyn.

However there were short falls. The single biggest problem was that it was all too glamourised - did we really need to see the executioner hold up Anne Boleyn's severed head? Did they really need to alter history and have the Queens beheaded before baying crowds, just for that dramatic effect?

There were also some questionable interpretations of history. The Duke of Norfolk's role in Catherine Howard's downfall has been altered completely here (again, all done for thrills). Some scenes were very badly juxta-posed - to any viewer unfamiliar with the history behind this story, the film would give them the impression Jane Seymour had died after been punched in the face and thrown on the floor by her violent husband.

Just as some wives came across well, the rest came across very badly. Katherine of Aragon, rather than the respected and virtuous woman history paints a picture of, is an incessant whinge here - there's nothing likeable at all in her. Anne of Cleves appears twice, but doesn't utter a word in either scene, so she doesn't come across at all. Jane Seymour was wooden - the portrayal of her arouses no feelings whatsoever.

To summarise, it's all very glitsy and modern. The story is mistold in many key places. The only thing that really makes this worth watching is the star performance from Helena Bonham Carter. If you really want to see this story well told, invest some time and patience in watching the complete 1970 TV series 'The Six Wives of Henry VIII'.