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Teaser Trailer here. (http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1ra4a_golden-age-trailer)
Release Date: October 12th, 2007 (wide)
Starring: Geoffrey Rush, Clive Owen, Cate Blanchett, Samantha Morton, Abbie Cornish, Jordi Molla
Directed by: Shekhar Kapur
Premise: During her 16th Century reign, England's Queen Elizabeth I strikes up a relationship with Sir Walter Raleigh.
Elizabeth: The Academy Award for Cate
Elizabeth: This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by Universal Pictures
Quote from: Pubrick on April 20, 2007, 12:27:55 AM
Elizabeth: This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by Universal Pictures
"How dare those pirates promote our film like this?!"
That's a really thrilling trailer.
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1070422/asp/7days/story_7669196.asp
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After the Oscar-winning Elizabeth, Shekhar Kapur has finished work on the second film of his trilogy. Kapur talks to Smita Sarkar on The Golden Age
Shekhar Kapur would rather blog than speak. But we've caught him at the right time — he has just finished shooting and has a moment to breathe. And, of course, when the topic is his favourite Elizabeth I, once queen of England, it doesn't take much to galvanise the otherwise soft-spoken director.
The Golden Age — the much-awaited second phase of the Oscar-winning Elizabeth — is nearing completion. Shooting has just got over, and the sound and background scores are now being worked on. A.R. Rahman has done the music for the film, along with Oscar-nomine Craig Armstrong. And Kapur is full of excitement.
"There are two aspects to the story — there is the individual, micro aspect of Elizabeth's personal tribulations and there is the larger macro aspect of the political turmoil that England goes through," he says.
Kapur, clearly, is passionate about the subject of queens, for let's not forget he shot to international fame with a film called Bandit Queen. The new film, on Elizabeth I, is set against a period that saw a violent rift between the Catholics and the Protestants in England.
"At that time, the Spanish threat was looming large on England. Spanish King Philip II commanded the fabled Spanish Armada and was out to dominate England in the high seas. Elizabeth, a Protestant, attracted the ire of the devout Catholic Philip II — a situation further complicated by the fact that nearly 60 per cent of the English Parliament and the majority of her subjects was Catholic," the filmmaker says.
Add to that a series of treacherous plots to dethrone her by members of the Royal family and you have a historical thriller. "If not for a freakish storm that damaged the Spanish Armada, Spain, and not England, would've been the colonial power ruling the world for the next 500 years," Kapur says.
"Shekhar likes doing films that are biographical in nature," explains executive producer and close associate Mohan Chopra. "Elizabeth is not the only character he has worked on. He has also made Bandit Queen, which was biographical. He is a very keen observer of human nature. Biographies may not be all that he'll do, but at this point of his career this is what he wants to do," Chopra says.
The Golden Age is slated to be released on October 12 in the UK and the United States. Produced by Universal Studios, the $57 million film was shot in places such as the Westminster Abbey in London and parts of Scotland.
There is some excitement in film circles about the music in The Golden Age. "Knowing Rahman, there will be more than a hint of Indian music in this film," says Chopra, who is also the producer of Rahman's recent solo album Pray for Me Brother. "The producers love his skills and his diversity. His coming together with Oscar nominee Craig Armstrong will be very much like fusion food," he says.
Sound production for the last leg of the film is underway in the prestigious Soho Studios in London and Kapur is busy supervising that. Now that a major portion of the work is done, the crew is visibly relaxed. "It took Shekhar a very long time to prepare and start work on this film," says Rajesh Rajilal, his assistant in London for the last five years. "After completing the screenplay, he had tapped producers in Canada and Australia. He wanted this to be a big budget film. It's his dream project," Rajilal says.
Understandably, for the period is rife with drama. If England was at a political crossroad, so too was Queen Elizabeth — and this turmoil serves as the common thread between Kapur's two films on the subject. In The Golden Age, Elizabeth feels an unexpected vulnerability in her love for Walter Raleigh — a love denied to a Queen who had sworn everything to England. To keep Raleigh near her, she encourages Bess Throckmorten, her lady in court, to cultivate a relationship with him. This is the second phase of Elizabeth's life that Shekhar captures in The Golden Age.
Keeping the thread of continuity alive are Cate Blanchett and Geoffrey Rush, who play the same roles as in the first film — those of Queen Elizabeth and Sir Francis Walsingham, respectively. Joining them are Clive Owen, (Walter Raleigh), Samantha Morton (Mary Stuart), Abbie Cornish (Bess Throckmorten) and Jordi Molla (King Philip II of Spain).
"Golden Age is about immortality. It is what happens to people when they are in positions of absolute power. They then aspire to divinity and feel they are set apart from other mortals," Kapur writes in his website.
Meanwhile, what's clear is that his saga of Elizabeth does not end with The Golden Age. Kapur is planning out the third in what is going to be his Elizabeth trilogy. The theme will be mortality. "For that, I will wait a while — for Cate Blanchett to start looking 10 years older," says Kapur.
New Trailer here. (http://video.msn.com/v/us/v.htm?g=9e6b1359-ed2c-4478-a1ba-30819176e35d&f=01/64&fg)
beautiful.
catecornishclivemortonarmadaspeechtastic.
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I actually quite like that. Elegant and simple where it easily could have been a very messy poster.
A rare successful big giant face poster.
Everything about this movie is classy and awesome so far. The only thing that can go wrong now is the movie itself. Which will probably be the case.
Well, the trailer convinced me to re-rent Elizabeth which I haven't seen since it first came out because I hated it... maybe I'll like it almost ten years later.
Elizabeth: The Golden Age
Source: Entertainment Weekly
History often repeats itself. Especially in the movie business, where sequels, remakes, prequels, and threequels have lately defined the zeitgeist. But that incessant parade of things revisited doesn't hold much allure for Cate Blanchett. Or at least it didn't one fateful night in January 2005, when director Shekhar Kapur and actor Geoffrey Rush, two of Blanchett's chief collaborators on the 1998 art-house crossover hit Elizabeth, met her for dinner at the swanky Hotel Bel-Air in L.A. Their mission: persuading the actress to don the royal raiment again for a follow-up, Elizabeth: The Golden Age. ''They came very, very fueled with excitement,'' Blanchett remembers. ''And alcohol, probably.... I pooh-poohed the idea,'' she says. ''I thought, 'I've done that. Why would I want to come back and retell the same story?'''
The original Elizabeth turned Blanchett from a promising talent only dimly known outside her native Australia into a shiny new global star. She pulled off an unforgettable transformation from randy young palace terror into stuffy head of state, her face powdered a ghastly white as she forged a newly virginal image. Blanchett copped a Golden Globe for Best Actress, and an Oscar nomination, too. Six years after that red-carpet odyssey, Kapur wanted to tell the story of Elizabeth's middle years, when she was firmly ensconced in power. For months, Blanchett remained skeptical. Would audiences truly be able to judge Golden Age independently? And why should she risk tarnishing the first film's perfectly good legacy? In the end, some blunt talk from Rush finally swayed her. His pitch? You're getting older — don't be so picky. (She was 35 at the time; she's now 38.) ''I remember saying, 'You're moving into that traditionally difficult phase where mainstream Hollywood is going to possibly pass you by,''' says Rush. '''Roles like these, that require someone of your capability and daring, don't come along that often.'''
And so, in April 2006, Blanchett found herself back in regal harness, her brows and lashes once again bleached to match the queen's ultra-plucked aesthetic. Amazingly, considering the gap between films, virtually the same key team from the first movie signed on. There were a few new faces as well, notably Clive Owen, Kapur's first choice to play adventurer Sir Walter Raleigh. As Golden Age portrays things, Elizabeth falls hard for the rugged explorer — but loses him to her favorite female companion from the royal court, Bess Throckmorton (Abbie Cornish).
One of Blanchett and Kapur's most frequent points of discussion was how much to fictionalize Elizabethan details. ''I'm very engaged in adhering to the actual events,'' says Blanchett, ''whereas he's kind of playing loose and fast with history.'' Indeed, Kapur used the facts of Elizabeth's life merely for inspiration. The first Elizabeth took considerable flak from reviewers for its factual liberties — one of the boldest being the idea that the queen in fact romped in bed with any number of men before officially reinventing herself as a virgin. This time, Kapur could get slammed for portraying King Philip II of Spain as a far more megalomaniacal religious crusader than records suggest — which plays into the movie's pointed contemporary overtones about the dangers of intolerance in an age of jihad.
Blanchett worries less about fine points of history in the film than whether the general public wants to see more Tudor happenings at all, following Helen Mirren's award-winning turns in 2006's The Queen and HBO's miniseries Elizabeth I. ''You hope that people don't tire of it,'' she says. ''Or think, 'Oh, here it comes again.''' But Kapur feels emboldened by early positive feedback, and he's anxious to plan yet a third Elizabeth movie. ''At first you just hope people won't laugh at your film, or boo it out of the theater,'' he says. ''Then you hear people are liking it, and you get greedy.''
Indian filmmaker Kapur hoping for Elizabeth III
As the widely-acclaimed "Elizabeth: The Golden Age" premiered at the Toronto film festival Sunday, India-born director Shekhar Kapur mused about making a third installment of the British monarch's life.
Shekhar said he'd been sitting on the script for this sequel for almost a decade, since his Academy Award-winning epic "Elizabeth" was released in 1998.
But Cate Blanchett, star of both pictures, was hesitant, he told reporters.
Blanchett, who won the award for best actress at the Venice film festival on Saturday for her role in Todd Haynes's Bob Dylan biopic "I'm Not There," said: "I didn't feel like enough time had passed" since the first film -- until now.
"Having to be that responsible to drive a film, it was the first time I'd ever done it and I was exercising muscles I'd never exercised before," she explained.
The Australian actress conceded: "There are endless possibilities with Elizabeth ... And I think there will be a lot more Elizabeth (films) because she's endlessly fascinating."
But she remained coy about joining the cast for a possible third film.
"Elizabeth: The Golden Age" picks up several years after the first ended, with Elizabeth I more confident in her rule and facing her greatest challenge: the attempted overthrow of Protestant England in 1585 by the Catholic figurehead of Europe, King Philip II of Spain.
Actor Geoffrey Rush reprises his role as loyal Sir Francis Walsingham in the film, and Clive Owen is introduced as Sir Walter Raleigh, who spearheaded English colonization of North America, beguiling the queen who is preoccupied by her failure to produce an heir.
The film also stars Abbie Cornish, Rhys Ifans, Jordi Molla and Samantha Morton.
"The first one was about power and love, betrayal, survival, separation and disengaging all in the context of power. This one is much more about absolute power ... and being divine ... and what that means," Kapur said.
"The third one (would be) about if you become a model in your life, how would you face mortality ... If you go to the top, and you suddenly are going to die, you become average, ordinary by dying because everybody dies," he said.
On a more intimate level, Blanchett added: "The first film was about denial, a woman denying herself in terms of her role ... this one is about acceptance, a woman having to confront that she is aging."
During the reign of Elizabeth I, known as the Elizabethan era, playwrights such as William Shakespeare and Christopher Marlowe flourished, Francis Drake became the first Englishman to circumnavigate the globe, and Francis Bacon established scientific method to deduce by elimination and inductive reasoning the cause of underlying phenomena.
Blanchett compared the English monarch to Princess Diana, saying both "captured the public's imagination and people felt they could connect to her."
Despite very different personalities, "that she walked often with very little guard, and walked down and shook the hands (of her subjects), I thought a lot about Diana, strangely enough," she said.
Diana, the mother Prince William, of the future king of England, died in a Paris car crash in 1997.
Also relevant in Elizabeth I's story today, said Kapur: "Fundamentalism and tolerance are issues that face us so clearly right now" in a post-9/11 world.
Quote from: MacGuffin on September 10, 2007, 12:03:40 AM
Diana, the mother Prince William, of the future king of England, died in a Paris car crash in 1997.
oh, it was an american article.
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/awards_festivals/fest_reviews/article_display.jsp?rid=9779
Bottom Line: Once more Shekhar Kapur and Co. find fun and romance in 16th century English history.
by Kirk Honeycutt
Sep 9, 2007
Toronto International Film Festival
TORONTO -- Queen Bess is back in fine form in "Elizabeth: The Golden Age," the second of a potential three-part historical romance about England's Virgin Queen. Cate Blanchett has lost none of the brio that earned her an Oscar nom for 1998's "Elizabeth." Nor has returning director Shekhar Kapur toned down any of the energetic camera moves, pageantry or vivid colors he deployed to reformulate historical drama in the original movie. This is history writ large, presented in terms of larger-than-life personalities rather than changing political, social and religious climates. It's robust historical fiction, designed as movie spectacle, which calls out to toss aside dusty history books and join the fun.
Remnants remain from Hollywood's own golden age of historical drama. A musical score by Craig Armstrong and AR Rahman is virtually a character itself, huffing and puffing through nearly every scene, provoking tension and calling characters to action. Resplendent costumes, grand sets build in England's Shepperton Studios and architecturally magnificent locations all give a feeling of majesty. So the second "Elizabeth" movie should appeal to a broad age range, as did its predecessor. This unabashedly romantic epic from Working Title and Universal looks set to deliver boxoffice gold.
The good queen is now in her third decade of rule. No longer a young girl struggling to learn the ruthless ways of court life, Elizabeth is thoroughly at home with flattering wooers, fawning sycophants and courtly spectacle. (Indeed, with Kapur at the helm, her court looks like a circus with exotic humans, wild animals and nimble dancers vying for her pleasure.)
Storm clouds gather across the English Channel in Spain where King Philip II (Jordi Molla) assembles his Catholic forces to free England from its Protestant queen. This marks the filmmakers' attempt to contemporize 16th century European conflicts in a model resembling our modern struggle with religious fundamentalism. Elizabeth is seen here as the leader of the forces of enlightenment and liberality -- which is not entirely inaccurate -- against the religious intolerance and barbarism of the Spanish Inquisition.
In Michael Hirst (who wrote the first movie) and William Nicholson's screenplay, Elizabeth is a woman of action and sharp words rather than the historical Elizabeth, a notorious ditherer -- who nevertheless was a shrewd politician and social engineer -- and a ruler whose motto was "I see and keep silent."
Her circle of advisors has been reduced to one, the great spymaster Sir Francis Walsingham (a returning Geoffrey Rush). Her romantic interest falls on a person who was indeed a favorite courtier yet one historical gossip usually omits from her list of alleged lovers, the dashing explorer and author Sir Walter Raleigh (Clive Owen).
The writers have moved up Raleigh's clandestine affair and marriage to lady-in-waiting Bess Throkmorton (Abbie Cornish) by several years so it can coincide with the legendary English defeat of the Spanish Armada. Raleigh plays a huge (and historically unlikely) role in this version of that battle but one that fits in well with the escalating drama of the Queen's personal and public crises.
That naval battle, recreated through all manner of movie trickery from digital effects to underwater action, is wonderfully staged and not too elaborate. (End credits even mention the use of footage from David Lean's "Ryan's Daughter," possibly those mighty waves crashing on a dark, rocky shore.) Blanchett in her glistening body armor astride a fine stallion overlooking the sea, delivering a great rally speech to the troops, gives the movie its most resplendent moment of sheer majesty.
Yet whether in her bath or glaring at underlings, Blanchett has made this Queen her own, a woman of fierce independence and thought, who only in her most private moments yearns for the male touch that she must deny herself. For virginity is part of her statecraft.
Rush is wily and self-contained as the spymaster while Owen as Sir Walter channels a toned down yet still quite debonair Errol Flynn. Cornish comes off a little too sweet and reserved for the rebellious Bess. The film never finds a way to fully utilize Samantha Morton as the ill-fated Mary, Queen of Scots, and fudges Walsingham's own possible role in Mary's "treason."
All in all, it's a grand package of hearty acting, design and action with the only caveat being that unlike the first film this "Elizabeth" can no longer surprise us with its modern twists.
two oscar nominations for blanchett this year.
(predicting is fun)
5 Minute Preview Trailer here. (http://www1.film1.nl/trailers/popup.php?id=2774&speed=2)
*WATCH AT OWN RISK*
*admin-edited for easier link
Official website (http://www.elizabeththegoldenage.net/site.html)
INTERVIEW: CATE BLANCHETT (ELIZABETH: THE GOLDEN AGE)
Source: CHUD
Ten years ago, I walked out of Gillian Armstrong's Oscar & Lucinda convinced of two things: 1) a massive glass cathedral floating down a river is as oppressive a visual metaphor as a crucified Jesuit tumbling over a waterfall, and 2) the lead actress cast opposite Ralph Fiennes would be one of her generation's best. One year later, there was Elizabeth, an Oscar nomination, and dominion for Cate Blanchett.
Of course, it took the AMPAS another six years to atone for passing Blanchett over in favor of Gwyneth Paltrow (who was just really good in Shakespeare in Love), but even with a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her spot-on Katharine Hepburn embodiment in Martin Scorsese's The Aviator, many feel the grievous error of 1998 won't be completely rectified until Blanchett claims her very own Actress trophy. Thus far, this has proven problematic. Though the Academy will gladly cough up the hardware for a showy performance in a ho-hum movie if they decide it's your time (think Jessica Lange in Tony Richardson's Blue Sky), you've still got to do a little better than Charlotte Gray, Veronica Guerin and The Missing.
Given Blanchett's willingness to take what the Academy would consider "supporting" turns in ensemble works and two-handers, it's quite clear that the Best Actress chase means less to her than it does to the rest of the entertainment community. Working with the best in her business seems to be what turns her on. That said, if you want to get Oscar voters worked up, you can't beat returning to the role that made you an international movie star and a lamented Best Actress bridesmaid.
So here comes Blanchett in "Part Two" of what director Shekhar Kapur would like to be a trilogy of films about The Virgin Queen. Elizabeth: The Golden Age covers some of juiciest imbroglios of the monarch's reign, including the Anglo-Spanish War, the execution of Mary Stuart (played by a psychotic Samantha Morton) and a speculative, unrequited romance with Sir Walter Raleigh (Clive Owen). Kapur and his screenwriters, William Nicholson and Michael Hirst, cram as much history as possible into the two-hour run time, but wars and conspiracies and assassinations feel like needless distractions when you've got Blanchett facing off with the likes of Owen, Geoffrey Rush and an impressive Abbie Cornish.
The below press conference was conducted at the Regent Beverly Wilshire, and while I wouldn't say Blanchett was at all "uneasy" during the session, she did seem eager for it all to be over. This isn't to suggest she was rude; on the contrary, Ms. Blanchett was thoughtful in her answers and somewhat playful - particularly at the outset. But when she confessed that she'd like to switch off the recorders and microphones arrayed in front of her, I 100% believed her.
Cate Blanchett: (Settling in at the table) I'm just going to move this back a little bit. Otherwise, I'm going to have nowhere to put my elbows. (Jostles with a microphone the size of Sweet Sweetback's manhood.) I promise I'm not going to turn any of them off. Although, I'd like to. (Laughter)
Q: What's the point of interviews anyway?
Blanchett: Exactly! We can all go home! You've seen the movie!
Q: You very reluctant to take this on.
Blanchett: Today? Yes, that's true. (Laughter)
Q: You were very reluctant to take this movie on. Why did you change your mind? And how are you able to juggle your commitments to the Sydney Theatre Company, your family and your various film roles?
Blanchett: First part of the question: what convinced me was time. The minute we finished the first one, Shekhar was talking about me not only playing Elizabeth again, but hundreds of other ideas. We've remained friends, and we've talked about various projects. And Tim Bevan from Working Title just said, "Look, just let us work a script up, and if it doesn't work, it doesn't work." I found that the notion of the love triangle, the very structure of the narrative was quite different - because I'd always said that if they did another one, Elizabeth shouldn't be the central character. But the structure of the romance - and it is an unabashedly romantic film - was quite different, so it didn't feel like treading the same ground.
And also, then, knowing Geoffrey and Clive were on board, and that Remi [Adefarasin] was going to shoot it. And working with [costume designer] Alexandra Byrne again; she's a genius, I think.
In answer to your second question... the commitment to the Sydney Theatre Company, we officially take over as co-Artistic Directors, my husband Andrew Upton and I, on the first of January. Things have begun; Andrew's been there all year as an Artistic Associate, and I've been coming and going. Obviously, it takes a long time; these are some deep time projects that we've begun to set up already. But officially we don't start until January 1st.
Q: Cate, congratulations on the Best Actress win for I'm Not There at the Venice Film Festival.
Blanchett: (Beaming) It was cool, wasn't it? I was very surprised and pleased.
Q: People are automatically putting you in the mix for the Oscars again. You've already won for playing Katharine Hepburn, and now you're playing another famous person who's...
Blanchett: A man.
Q: Can you talk about what is irresistible for you as an actress? Are you drawn to playing someone real? There have been so many interpretations of Eizabeth.
Blanchett: There's a long and glorious legacy of actresses who've played Elizabeth I: Flora Robson, Bette Davis, Glenda Jackson, Helen Mirren, Anne-Marie Duff. She's constantly reinvented. One of my favorite plays is [Friedrich] Schiller's Mary Stuart, which is about a fictitious meeting between Mary Queen of Scots and Elizabeth I. She's ripe for reinvention because she's such an enigma. Also, if you think about the Elizabethan Age, when English culture as we know it was crystallized, it's a fascinating period of history. I think there will be many more Elizabeths after this film. She's a fantastic - particularly for a director like Shekhar - leaping-off point for a story.
Q: Contrast playing Elizabeth I with playing someone as iconic as Bob Dylan.
Blanchett: Well, Elizabeth I is iconic as well. Look, I think I run 100 miles-an-hour away from projects every single time. In the end, the one's that stick are the ones that pursue you, that you can't say "no" to. And the idea of playing Bob Dylan was just so utterly ludicrous that, of course, I had to take it. It was daunting.
But I was a bit nervous about returning to a character that, I suppose, had allowed me to walk into a door to an international film career. You don't ever want to feel like you're going backwards. So once I could see that I could progress forward through playing it, then it became exciting to me.
Q: Can you talk about the first day of shooting, when you got back into Elizabeth's skin?
Blanchett: It was quite organic. Obviously, I started with Morag Ross, who did the hair and makeup, and Alex Byrne. We'd had long, long discussions about where to start. In the end, no matter how much research you do, you're telling the particular story that the script and the director prescribe. The great thing about Shekhar and I working together is that I'm fascinated by history, and he's utterly disinterested. So I think we temper one another really well. We did a lot of research, but in the end you have to say she's starting off at a point where we kind of left her in the last film - except she was at a point of utter rigidity in the end of Elizabeth. How does one exist in that rigid place? We had to open that up a little bit.
But it felt strange. It was like there was an echo in the room, but yet it felt very fresh. Shekhar and I and Abbie, because I don't think she'd seen [Elizabeth]... we watched it just before we started to film. I was incredibly uncomfortable with the notion of "Oh, god, it's ten years later; have I aged that much?" Being an actress in film is like aging in dog years. (Laughter) But I was surprised by how well it stood up. I thought, "Well, that's that. It is its own thing." And I was excited that [The Golden Age] was at once an echo, in that you've got the same creative team and a few of the same characters, but it was its own creature. It's a much more interior film despite the epic backdrop. It was a bit like a homecoming, but I think I was uncomfortable in a healthy, useful way.
Q: I have a two-part question: first, if you'd just talk about your role in Indiana Jones 4, and-
Blanchett: I can't. I'll be shot. (Pause) And so will you. (Laughter)
Q: Well, you've talked about playing iconic characters; could you talk a little bit about joining an iconic franchise?
Blanchett: It's such a well-oiled, iconic franchise - one which I grew up with. On the first day of shooting, it was extremely surreal. I was watching the monitor as Steven set up the frame, and I knew the iconography of the frame: I knew the layout and I knew the way these things are lit. So when I had to enter the frame, it was a real Zelig moment.
So it's been fantastic and so much fun, and my boys have had an absolute ball.
Q: Are they sworn to secrecy, too?
Blanchett: Yes.
Q: One of the things that's so interesting about your performances as Elizabeth in these movies are the subtle changes in your face that convey all these different moods.
Blanchett: You can say it. Age. (Laughter)
Q: I don't think that at all. What do you do to distinguish each little look to convey these feelings?
Blanchett: I think it's tricky, but vital as an actor working in film that you have a sense of the third eye, in that you're aware of what you're projecting, but not in a self-conscious way. I think if you're internally engaged with the set of feelings and emotions, and also the actions that you're trying to play on the other actor, then that will, externally, take care of itself. I didn't think about that on the day that much. You think about it, obviously, when you get into hair and makeup; it is a form of masking up. But even when you're in your Elizabethan war paint, you don't want that mask to be opaque. It has to be transparent. So, hopefully, there was a transparency to it.
Q: Is this a fictionalized history, historical fantasy or is it the exploration of legend?
Blanchett: I think it's all three. In the end, when you only have a couple of hours to tell an incredibly dense period of history, by the process of selection you're already telescoping the events, and you're automatically saying, "This event has more significance than the one that's been omitted." It's never going to be like reading the letters and the court documents, or reading Alison Weir's biography of Elizabeth. It's not the same experience. But going to see a film shouldn't be. You are being told a fable through the eyes of that director. It's very temporal, too, filming. Hopefully, the film has a contemporary quality. I think, like with all good stories, if they're able to connect to the current collective consciousness, what we're all thinking about - and what it means to be female now, as opposed to being female then.
Q: Could you talk about Elizabeth and Sir Walter Raleigh's romantic chemistry? It seems like their timing is off.
Blanchett: Timing is everything, isn't it? What interested me about the relationship between Raleigh and Elizabeth in this particular incarnation of this set of events was that there was a vicariousness to it. I think that happens in a lot of so-called love relationships; you almost want to be the person as much as you want to possess the person. I think there were a lot of male courtiers over the years that Elizabeth had strong connections with, and I think she was probably fascinated by the freedom that was afforded - not only to an adventurer like Raleigh, but also the men in the court that could travel a lot more freely than she could. She never left the shores of England.
Q: You have incredible romantic chemistry with Clive.
Blanchett: I think every woman who works with Clive has incredible romantic chemistry. (Laughs)
Q: Is he a charmer in real life?
Blanchett: No, he's very frank and open and not at all self-conscious. I think that's incredibly attractive when somebody is as incredibly attractive as he is.
Q: When Elizabeth says "I have a hurricane in me," we believe her. What do you hold inside that makes you so believable as an actress?
Blanchett: Oh, god, I am utterly the wrong person to answer that question. I have no idea. Hopefully, I have a rich set of life experiences that I'm able to draw on, but, at the same time, I'm not at all interested in playing myself or imposing my own value system onto a character. It's like having conversations continually with like-minded people: you get a very skewed perception of the way the world works. So I like having conversations with characters who think in very different ways and have very different sets of experiences.
Q: Is being an international movie star like you are kind of like being a queen in the sixteenth century?
Blanchett: (Almost choking on her water) No. And anyone who says that is insane.
Q: Well, Elizabeth had a very hard time finding a mate due to her position. She was the Queen. Today, women who have successful careers, like yourself, can find happiness. Do you think there's a significant difference?
Blanchett: I was reading Joan Didion's The Year of Magical Thinking again the other day, and she referred to various psychologists who were analyzing the notion of grief and the grieving process, and saying that, somewhere along the way in the last century, there became this notion that we all need to be happy. So no one fully grieves anymore because we can't be seen to be unhappy. The notion of happiness to someone in Elizabeth's position is a strange one; I think it's a very modern concept, that happiness is something that we must not only strive for, but can achieve in this lifetime. I think Elizabeth's situation was entirely different. And in relation to what you're saying about finding a companion, the reason for getting married was deeply unromantic. It was to do with securing a nation. It was a political tool: women were used as part of the political negotiation process between countries. And the fact that Elizabeth claimed that political machination for herself meant that the prospect of finding love was very elusive. The history books say - and, or course, they were written by courtiers at the time - the closest she came was the Duke of Anjou. But in Shekhar's first film, the Duke of Anjou was a raving transvestite. (Laughter) So everything's up for grabs in these films.
Q: In the movie, it seems like Elizabeth teeters on the verge of madness. I'm wondering how much you played with that idea.
Blanchett: It's interesting. I don't think I thought about it a lot. I did it in about three or four scenes, one of which was cut because they were talking about Mary Stuart, and I think they decided there was a bit too much discussion about Mary Stuart. But I tried to see through it... her self-medicating with herbs and being physically unstable, because I thought at the time that I'm playing her she would've been quite menopausal. She was going through "the change". (Laughing) I think at the time I kept telling Reni to take off the twelve denier stockings he was shooting me through to show a few more wrinkles. But Shekhar likes women to look beautiful.
But in terms of that madness, it was not only what was going on with her psychologically, but what was going on with physically. I think it's great that you got a little texture of that, but I think the whole complexity of what I was trying to do maybe wasn't in the film.
Q: (From a Spanish journalist) Do you think, if it weren't for Elizabeth, England would be speaking Spanish today?
Blanchett: (Laughing) Quite possibly. But it's a really interesting thing to look at the history of failure. If we analyze history by the failures that took place rather than the victories... they've influenced us incredibly. Absolutely, the world would've been a very place.
Q: Was there any talk of having Elizabeth and Mary Stuart sharing a scene in this film?
Blanchett: I would've loved it. I think Samantha Morton is incredible. She's such a dangerous, exciting and unusual presence on screen. I so admire her work. If anyone is ever going to do the Schiller [play], I'd be there with her, absolutely.
Elizabeth: The Golden Age opens nationwide this Friday, October 12th.
This is getting a critical pummeling at Rotten Tomatoes. 25% positive so far.
Wow. I was really looking forward to this one. It's kind of heartbreaking, actually.
26% now.
even across the universe got TWICE that. the main complaints i can see are that it's a melodramatic soap opera without any insight into her character. which is kinda the vibe i got from the clip they showed on Leno. i can forgive some historical liberties but if they amount to a ridiculous movie what's the point? kapur had the perfect title, star, poster and everything needed to make something special.
my girl cate's been saying a lot in interviews that she was hesitant to do a sequel, looks like she was right.
http://in.rediff.com/movies/2007/nov/01kapur.htm
Of Elizabeth, Gandhi and Kapur
November 01, 2007 15:20 IST
As Shekhar Kapur's Elizabeth: The Golden Age rolls out in theatres worldwide Friday, here's a bit of news for those who have been following the director from his Mr India days. He drew parallels for Elizabeth, his first film on the British monarch, with former prime minister Indira Gandhi, and for Golden Age with Princess Diana.
The director revealed this in an interview to Stephen Moss of the British daily The Guardian.
In the freewheeling and insightful interview -- in which he credited his Bandit Queen to be the reason the Elizabeth producers chose him -- Kapur also drew parallels between him making films on the venerated British queen and Richard Attenborough deconstructing the Father of the Nation.
'I couldn't have made a film about Gandhi,' Kapur told The Guardian. 'I couldn't have carried the burden of that story. It's too much part of my psyche. Maybe it would have been the same for some British directors making a film about Elizabeth.'
Kapur's new movie has garnered lukewarm reviews, with Time Out London, for example, declaring that it makes 'soap out of statecraft.'
The director did not rule out a third picture in his portrayal of Queen Elizabeth, but he told The Guardian that his next project would be called Water. 'The story is set in 2025 in a city of about 20 million people that has practically run out of water,' he said. 'Whatever water that exists belongs to the 10 to 15 per cent of very rich people, and they discover that if there is a shortage of water it's a very powerful position to be in, so water is used as a weapon of economic, social and political power.'
The movie will be shot in India, but will be in English.
I'm skeptical about the news of "Water," given that Kapur frequently drops projects.