TBT: Henry VIII (2003)

I’ve continued my Anne Boleyn-focused “let’s watch things we haven’t fully reviewed for Frock Flicks” kick and so foolishly rewatched 2003’s Henry VIII, a two-part movie made by ITV starring Ray Winstone as Henry. And people, it was BAD. VERY BAD. Both in terms of plot, costume, pacing, you name it. So, let’s dust this one off and relive the horror.

Although the film’s title implies it will focus on Henry, it’s really an episodic romp through Henry’s wives plus a few extra Henry-focused scenes. Most of the entire first half is spent on Anne Boleyn, so the other wives get definite short shrift and I very much lost focus and just started fast-forwarding. I’m not going to recap the entire thing, but talk about the deeply shitty costumes and a few choice moments from a storytelling angle.

 

Henry VIII

First, Ray Winstone plays Henry VIII, complete with East London accent that sounds very gangster and is never explained, especially because the first scene features a younger-looking 17-year-old Henry at his father’s deathbed with a typical upper crust accent. In case you were wondering if this film was going for subtle, here’s what that scene looked like:

Second, I never care as much about the men’s costumes as I do the women’s, but there were a few things worth mentioning:

 

Catherine of Aragon

Catherine of Aragon is mostly a dried-up old husk, although there is one brief scene where she and Henry cry about not having had a son and try to have sex and Henry is actually nice to her. Her story is intertwined with Anne Boleyn’s, so she isn’t around much and only gets one (maybe two?) dress in dark red taffeta that doesn’t entirely suck, although her hood makes her look like a vampire:

Also, here’s Princess Mary (right) plus a courtier with an overly large, square Marian hood:

 

Anne Boleyn

Anne is honestly the focus here, and they should have just made the damn thing about her and Henry. Helena Bonham Carter did a decent job with the role. I liked that they showed her resisting Henry’s advances and that inflaming his desire; didn’t like that the timelines was so compressed that it felt like they waited about a day to get married; and I couldn’t unsee the fact that Carter was pregnant throughout and all her gowns were cut to “hide” this.

One of the first scenes in which we see Anne, she’s going before the king for permission to marry Henry Percy. Apparently in this world, couples line up and ask the king publicly for permission, and he just answers off the top of his head. Uh huh. Anne is wearing a deeply unfortunate French hood, if you can call it that:

Maybe this extra stole all of Anne’s hood’s missing real estate:

At Hever, the king comes to sexually harass her while she’s in this dressing gown.

She joins Catherine of Aragon’s household and goes to a joust, where her outfit is a lot of WTF and she just looks preggars:

The underdress is godawful:

That joust is broken up by someone yelling “PLAGUE!” and everyone running pell mell:

 

Back at Hever, resisting the king in lilac:

Let’s pause to remember what fashions of this period SHOULD look like:

Anne watches Catherine of Aragon’s speech at the divorce trial in this very sparkly Indian number, which I think is a rewear of the “permission to marry” dress above:

Cromwell is full Gríma Wormtongue from Lord of the Rings:

When Henry writes love letters to Anne, she reads them at Hever’s outer door, at night, with a giant spotlight shining on her:

When Anne writes back to Henry favorably, he goes running off at the beach yelling “ANNE! ANNE!”

When they finally get together, there’s this terrible scene of Anne and Henry swimming:

Henry runs towards Anne, naked, so excitedly and so dorkily that I had to make a gif:

Finally Anne gets to be on-screen pregnant. I have NO idea what’s up with this dress except that I think she’s wearing it backwards.

Next up, crushed red velvet:

And more Very Indian Embroidery:

And finally, for her trial she goes full whore red in crushed velvet and more Indian embroidery trim:

Anne gets put into a very “prison cell”-type room in the Tower rather than the luxurious queen’s apartments she was really in; Princess Elizabeth gets to hang:

Anne’s execution is the only other non-WTF costume. It’s in plain white satin:

 

Jane Seymour

Jane Seymour (Emilia Fox) got the least WTF outfits, and I have no idea why. Fox didn’t suck at her role. FYI when Janes tries to promote the Pilgrimage of Grace rebellion, Henry beats her, which puts her into labor, and is implied to be the reason for her death. In case you missed that in your history books.

I don’t entirely remember the order of Jane’s wardrobe, so here’s me throwing a dart:

She gets a halfway decent black dress:

This white and gold dress is probably the best from the production and it totally confuses me because it’s light years better than everything else [Editor’s Note: this dress was made for a production in 1977 and has been used a ton since!]:

Compare with the fashions of the era:

She welcomes Princess Mary back to court in this orange dress with rampart bodice (i.e., where the bodice inaccurately sticks up into the air above her boobs):

She gets a giant-paisleys (Indian motif only really worn in Europe starting in the 19th century) dress [Editor’s Note: also recycled!]:

And at some point gets the QUEEN of sticky-uppy French hoods:

FYI this is what the dissolution of the monasteries was like:

 

Anne of Cleves

Poor Anne of Cleves isn’t even shown on screen except twice, looking dumpy with bad teeth in a long shift (chemise) while Henry tries to have sex with her, and then dressed regally for Henry’s funeral. They totally go with the “she’s hideous!” take on Anne and don’t show/explain anything about her first meeting Henry.

Her funeral dress is reworn from The Prince and the Pauper (1962). I feel meh about it:

Let’s look at the real Anne around the time of Henry’s death:

 

Catherine Howard

Catherine Howard (Emily Blunt) gets the second-most screen time and is dressed in I DON’T KNOW WHAT FUCKING PRODUCTION I JUST WANDERED INTO BECAUSE IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH ANYTHING ELSE I’VE SEEN IN THE PREVIOUS TWO HOURS. She’s played as the slutty slut who’s already shagging everyone before she meets the king and then quickly takes a lover after marriage.

First, she’s in vaguely-late-15th-century princess-WTF-ness [Editor’s Note: First used in 1990’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead]:

Then she gets a Galadriel-style nightgown to swing in:

For Henry’s proposal, she’s in this vaguely mid-16th century dress that you never really see all of:

She gets married IN THE SAME GALADRIEL NIGHTGOWN:

Compare with Actual Tudor Fashions:

Her lady-in-waiting wants to be Minnie Mouse:

Thomas Culpepper gets a leather jacket with Southwestern-printed fabric on the revers:

Katherine is encouraged to shag him in a sort of Ottoman robe:

AND IS IMPRISONED AND EXECUTED BACK IN THE GALADRIEL NIGHTGOWN. WHY.

 

Catherine Parr

Catherine Parr is slightly more on screen than Anne of Cleves, but not by much. She’s courted by the king in this dowdy nightmare:

Yes they wore high-necked gowns, but usually by adding a partlet:

Catherine gets married in a halfway decent, if shiny, dress:

And then in the next scene, Henry dies and Portentous Things are narrated at his funeral while Princess Elizabeth throws rose petals:

 

 

Do you remember Henry VIII (2003)? Or did you block it out like me?