NekoHomey
Purely Joyful Movie!
Exoticalot
People are voting emotionally.
Merolliv
I really wanted to like this movie. I feel terribly cynical trashing it, and that's why I'm giving it a middling 5. Actually, I'm giving it a 5 because there were some superb performances.
petrelet
Roger Ebert said that this movie's history was as good as one could expect, but otherwise it was pretty bad. I revere Ebert, but he was way off about the history part.The movie is very much concerned that you properly appreciate Cromwell. To this end, it fills the sound track with orchestral flourishes and fanfares and strident Protestant chorales from the first moment Cromwell appears to the last. Not content with this, it shamelessly reworks history in order to put Cromwell in places and roles which the historical Cromwell did not occupy, and to show him performing wonders that he did not perform, in the hope that the viewer will not know enough history to notice, or will just figure that such lies are the necessary means of sanctifying Cromwell. For example, it makes Cromwell one of the five members of parliament accused of treason by Strafford, although he was not. It makes Cromwell a participant in the battle of Edgehill, although he wasn't there. Movie-Cromwell commanded the revolutionaries at the critical battle of Naseby, starkly outnumbered by Charles but routing his forces through brilliant strategy and just plain awesomeness. The historical Cromwell was at least present at Naseby, but Fairfax was in command, and his forces had the edge in numbers. At every point Movie-Cromwell is shown to be the sole unaided leader and savior of the Revolution, whereas the real Cromwell was often a subordinate or part of a larger committee. In short, the movie perjures itself from beginning to end.Now, you could say that there are plenty of history films that get the history way wrong, but are at least fun to watch or produce memorable moments and so on. You might even point out that Shakespeare's histories are bad history but memorable art. Well, Hughes is not Shakespeare, and his Cromwell is not Prince Hal either. Sixty percent of what he does throughout the movie presents a variation on the following: (a) Cromwell asserts a conventional and lofty principle ("I will hear no treason against the king!") (b) He immediately runs up against a harsh reality (One of his men has his ears cut off) (c) He declares that God wants him to throw aside the original principle ("God damn this king!").There are lot of movies about people who have started off with good intentions and made themselves dictators, convincing themselves that it's necessary for the greater good because all the others in government are traitors and thieves, and because democracy (or republicanism, to be more precise than the movie ever is) is just inadequate to the needs of the day. You can argue about whether this is an adequate and fair summary of the career of the historical Cromwell (I don't think so), but it is an exact synopsis of Movie-Cromwell's career. As if to convince you that he has really gone over the edge, movie-Cromwell punctuates his seizure of total power with a long ahistorical populist rant about how he will make England a center of learning where every man can earn his bread.As I say, there are a lot of movies about ranting dictators, but there are not so many where a narrator comes along at the end and assures you that the dictator was perfectly justified by history in all his actions and ambitions! But here, after the above-mentioned rant, supposedly taking place in 1653, (SPOILER) the movie comes to an abrupt end - we never see a frame about Cromwell's service as Lord Protector - we only get the voice of an uncredited narrator telling us that during those five years Cromwell made England a great and respected nation!Now on the issue of religion. We know that the English Civil War had a strong religious element. We don't expect Cromwell and his Puritans to be presented as models of tolerance and ecumenicism. Of course they were opposed not just to the Catholics who back the monarchy but to Catholicism itself. But in fact it looks very much as if Hughes himself is opposed to Catholicism, which is exemplified in the film by Charles' French wife, Henrietta Maria, one of his many evil counselors (and who, out of perhaps 100 words spoken in the film by women, has the plurality), and by a conniving Italian archbishop who attempts to extort all sorts of treasonable favors out of Charles in return for his support. All this in a film released in 1970, during the Troubles! I have no independent knowledge of Hughes' sympathies in religion or Irish politics. We are informed that this biopic was a "dream project" for Hughes, the product of ten years of research. We do know that Cromwell was a particular hero to the Orange Order. We can see that Hughes wrote and directed a film dedicated to the particular virtues of Cromwell during the time when Catholics in Northern Island were launching a civil rights movement (1964) and loyalists were responding by creating paramilitary forces (1966). The film is full of fake history - did he compose the lies himself, or just uncritically trust some dodgy source? Hughes actually filmed scenes of Cromwell putting down Catholics in Ireland, which were ultimately cut from the final film as just too inflammatory.And even if one ignores the whole Irish context, the message that national revival can best be handled by a single man who says "I alone can fix it" - no, that was someone else, Movie-Cromwell says "I must do it all alone" - doesn't play well in 2018. To me, anyway.
firesoforion
It says something about a movie that 350 years after the events being depicted, I found myself seething with rage at the depiction of some of the characters. Fortunately, there was comic relief aplenty, as terrible dialogue combined with acting bad enough to make me laugh out loud. The depiction of Queen Henrietta Maria was infuriating. She should be held up as an incredible strong woman figure in history, and her list of accomplishments is pretty extraordinary. This movie depicts her as a manipulative shrew. There's a reason they do that. The filmmakers clearly want you to feel a sense of sadness at Charles' death, but they don't want you to feel any sympathy with for his cause. Solution? He was just being pushed around by his evil wife. Now, she's not the only character to be woefully misrepresented. Manchester's depiction is widely criticized, and Prince Rupert is laugh worthy. I don't understand the purpose of depicting Strafford as 20 years older than he was when he died, or depicting him on crutches when as far as I know he was a healthy 48 year old at the time of his death. Charles and Cromwell, themselves, are devoid of character except as representations of tyranny and democracy (something which, in itself, is simplistic). Fairfax is depicted as Cromwell's inferior, and they even attribute a religious speech by a Royalist to Cromwell (why?). They specifically say that Cromwell was outnumbered at his greatest victory, which is false, and even weirder they misidentify what his greatest victory actually was. They cannot claim that the movie is historically accurate when they do stuff like that. You never watch a historical movie expecting a completely accurate representation, but you hope for some level of honesty. This movie felt like propaganda about a war that ended 350 years ago. But not even well done propaganda. Propaganda that made me laugh every 5 minutes because of some ridiculous dialogue or music reminiscent of a Star Trek TOS episode.
JohnHowardReid
A wonderful film which ranks with El Cid as one of the best historical blockbusters ever made. I've mentioned before that imaginative "B" directors often turn out staid and uninspired "A" work. This hasn't happened here. True, some critics feel that the non-battle scenes lack power, but I found them far more interesting and forceful. The inner action of men's minds, the crackle, dart and thrust of their speech, their motives, aspirations, stubborn beliefs and hidden agenda formed for me a richer panorama, a far more fascinating vista than the mere brute clash of iron against steel.The acting is well-night perfect with both Guinness and Harris superbly cast as contrasting king and conqueror. It is these two powerful players, both giving the performances of their lives, who rightly dominate the action. The director's script — following history itself — brilliantly thrusts them center stage and cleverly keeps them there until the inexorable end. It's hard to keep audience interest alive when the outcome of the plot is so well-known, but Hughes manages to work up such sympathy and suspense, we concentrate all our attention on events as they unfold so fascinatingly before our eyes. The sets, the costumes, the rich details and panoply of court and parliamentary life are alone so gripping — and beautiful to behold — that occasionally historical events seem like an intrusion! And that is exactly the right approach for a writer- director to take, crowding our hearts with such an abundance of inspiring and abhorrent images and ideas, there is no time to reflect. In Hughes' hands history is always vigorously alive, never static or blandly familiar, — let alone moribund or dull.
Neil Welch
My English history isn't the greatest, so I take the view that this movie is probably a tolerable overview of the Cromwell era without necessarily being spot on with its facts.Richard Harris is an intense Cromwell and Alec Guiness is an aloof Charles 1 as this tale of accountability, the divine right of kings, parliament's position and, ultimately, civil war proceeds.From a film-goer's perspective, the movie needs a dramatic set piece nearer the end - Charles' execution and its aftermath is a rather low key and understated way to finish off the film. There are some large scale and relatively well staged battle scenes earlier on.Which leads me to ponder the rationale behind this movie. It is rather late in the day for an old-style massed battle action movie (viz. the Hollywood knights in armour movies, El Cid, Charge Of The Light Brigade etc.) and, in any event, despite the battles, this is quite a talkie movie. I suppose it tells an important story which hadn't, at the time, been told in any detail elsewhere.
