Movie: The Other Boleyn Girl

First of all, wow, evening movie tickets are $9 here! Yikes!

Okay, exclamation of disbelief out of the way, I went to see The Other Boleyn Girl with friends sdkelley and DragonGoddess, yay!

My first impressions of the ads for this was "Eric Bana as Henry?! Are they nuts?" Nothing against Eric Bana, but really, every picture I've ever seen of Henry is of a very robust (to be kind :P), reddish haired gentleman. Eric is so the opposite of this!

After seeing the movie, I liked it a lot. The costumes and settings were beautiful, the acting was good. I wouldn't consider myself a history buff, so I can't speak for how accurate it was historically. My readings of this time period have so far consisted only of the book for this movie The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory and Murder Most Royal by Jean Plaidy who is also well known writer Victoria Holt. I enjoyed them both immensely and would highly recommend them.

I do have to say that if you go into the movie expecting the book, you may be disappointed, as it's a very watered down version. As with any movie that comes after a novel, much is left out or changed due to time constraints and story flow. To me the book focused much more on Mary, and was Mary's telling of the story, that feeling was not present in the movie at all. While Mary was certainly an important character, you did not get the feeling she was telling the story, which was an integral part of the novel. In the movie, Mary's romance with Stafford is completely glossed over, all the sudden he's asking her to leave with him, with very little lead up as to why she might even consider it.

I enjoyed Eric Bana's performance, even if I would not have cast him as Henry initially. Though you never really see the physical decline that I think is usually portrayed in other tellings of this period. But that's Hollywood for ya! ;)

All in all, I would say if you enjoy historical movies, definitely give it a try, I recommend it. And take my comments on comparison to the book with a grain of salt as it's been a good four years at least since I've read it, and I don't have my own copy to refer to! ;)

If you are interested in the Anne Boleyn story, check out this version from Wikipedia to see how it compares to the books and the movie.