Divorced, beheaded, died; divorced, beheaded, survived. Thus, mirthfully, Horrible Histories on the six wives of Henry VIII. All you need to know? Not quite. The survivor, Catherine Parr, has never had her due despite all the Tudor dramas we’ve lapped up: the 38 episodes of The Tudors between 2007 and 2010 and the final part of the TV adaptation of Hilary Mantel’s great trilogy, taking us up to Thomas Cromwell’s execution in 1540, is scheduled for broadcast later this year, possibly at Christmas.
But Catherine Parr, married to Henry from 1543 until his death in January 1547, has never been the focus of a film. Firebrand puts that right and then some. It’s based on Elizabeth Fremantle’s 2013 debut novel, Queen’s Gambit, but whereas that covers Catherine’s life from before her marriage to Henry to her fourth marriage to Thomas Seymour, and her death after childbirth in 1548, Firebrand is focused on the last months of Henry’s life.
As the film opens, Catherine (Alicia Vikander) is acting as regent while Henry is on his final campaign in France. She is looking after his children, Elizabeth, Mary and Edward, while developing her Protestant sympathies. Catherine Parr composed three books of prayers and translations, one of the first women to publish such works in Britain. She is shown here, not quite factually, supporting her childhood friend, possibly even lover, the radical preacher Anne Askew (punky Erin Doherty), who was burned at the stake aged 25 in 1546.
Vikander gives her best performance since Ex Machina. She looks naturally so reserved and gentle, but this flawless, serene countenance masks great strength and resolve, as we soon realise when Henry (Jude Law) returns from the wars. Catherine is married to a monster and she knows it. She is also being plotted against by the reactionary Bishop of Winchester, Stephen Gardiner (Simon Russell Beale, masterly), and endangered too by her suitor Thomas Seymour (Sam Riley) and his creepy brother Edward (Eddie Marsan).
Previous portrayals of Henry have found the king royally fascinating, from the intensity Damian Lewis lent him in Wolf Hall to the weird channelling of Anthony Hopkins adopted by Jonathan Rhys Meyers in The Tudors. Jude Law gives us nothing less than a horror-film Henry, seizing the screen every moment he appears. He plays the monarch like the man to be feared in a gangster film or the heavy in a Pinter play.
Henry is in constant pain from the ulcerated, suppurating wound in his leg, sustained while jousting ten years before and never healed. We see this horrific, stinking injury in detail, Henry groaning and bellowing wildly as it is unsuccessfully dressed, refusing to accept that, in his early fifties, this is what the physical prowess of his youth has become. His whole being is infected. He grunts and belches as much as he speaks, stumping about, roaring “shut up!” to all around (the dialogue is blatantly modern). He is wildly abusive, grossly suspecting Catherine. “Are you a f***ing liar? Are you just like all the others?” Smashing up the room around him, he screams, “We cut them down!” – the royal “we” turning suddenly psychotic. And he is sexually brutal, grabbing Catherine’s face in his hand, pushing his fingers in her mouth, or thrusting at her relentlessly.
Firebrand is the English-language debut of Algerian-Brazilian director Karim Aïnouz, and he admits he knew nothing at all of Henry VIII before taking it on, a liberation both from period-drama conventions and their ostentatious subversion. The film is superbly costumed in period (by Michael O’Connor) and beautifully photographed in dark, saturated colours that appear to be illuminated only by fire or candlelight by the French cinematographer Hélène Louvart. But the way people speak and act is contemporary.
This was filmed entirely in one location, Haddon Hall in Derbyshire (the court is supposedly escaping the plague in London). It helps make the drama seem a dark fairy tale rather than a historical chronicle.
The script, by Henrietta and Jessica Ashworth (Tell It to the Bees) is sententiously framed, with a feminist message lumberingly emphasised in voiceovers from the future Queen Elizabeth I (Junia Rees), claiming that Catherine “forged something in the flames and made way for tender shoots of hope to burst forth”. At over two hours, Firebrand, overstuffed with scenes of Henry bullying his court into jollity, is half an hour too long.
Yet it lives. The unhistorical scene in which the until-now ever demure Catherine finally gives Henry what he deserves, growling like a beast, is pretty unforgettable. After all, history is what we remember.
“Firebrand” is in cinemas now
[See also: Sing Sing is a tender portrait of creativity behind bars]
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This article appears in the 04 Sep 2024 issue of the New Statesman, Starmer under fire