As every British schoolkid learns, only one of Henry VIII’s wives got a ‘happily ever after’ – the sixth and last, Katherine Parr, who managed to avoid the ill fates of the king’s previous wives simply by outliving him. Famous as it is, it’s not a story that you delve into in much detail after you learn the rhyme, and it’s not one you’ll find yourself much more interested in after watching Firebrand, Karim Ainouz’s stultifyingly boring take on Katherine’s last days with an ailing, angry, and paranoid Henry. From start to finish, this is a dull and sluggish slice of historical fiction that, despite its title, suffers from a severe lack of spark.
Central to Firebrand’s problems is Alicia Vikander in the lead as Katherine. All hushed tones and unrealised potential, we’re told frequently that Katherine is a revolutionary both in mind and soul, but a plodding script from Henrietta and Jessica Ashworth is met with an equally uninspiring performance from Vikander. Even when dealing with the hostile and inquisitorious bishop Simon Gardiner (Simon Russell Beale doing a lifeless Tudor version of his Death of Stalin Beria performance), Katherine is a character both written and acted in monotone.
It doesn’t help that the story can’t ever really conjure up much tension, given that the most/only famous thing about its lead character is that she survived, yet Ainouz and the Ashworths fail to find an interesting angle to rectify this, playing up until the last that Katherine might yet get burnt at the stake for heresy. The result is that you’re just going (very slowly) through the motions, scene after scene of boring conversations heading to an inevitable nowhere. The one time that something unpredictable *does* happen, it’s executed so unconvincingly that it’s hard to stifle a laugh.
Thank goodness, then, for Jude Law as Henry, playing the king as an abusive hooligan of a husband. The film only ever jolts to life when he’s on screen, magnetic yet repulsive. Whether he’s having his diseased, oozing legs tended to or engaging in one of many ritual humiliations of the women in his court, his sickness seeps off the screen, Law clearly having tremendous fun as the ever-fattening monarch. Good as he is, though, the fact that he’s so much better than the film around him also manages to be another weakness for Firebrand – it’s hard to see the world from Katherine’s point of view of dreading interacting with Henry when those scenes are the only ones that you in the audience look forward to.
With the dullness completed by a generic soundscape and some really murky visuals (I think I’ve seen enough overlong misty establishing shots for quite some time), it’s hard to figure out who Firebrand is really *for*, too nasty for the Sunday afternoon costume drama crowd, and too boring for anyone else.
Jack Blackwell – Film Reviews 