[tapestry]

Originally Posted by easternsunrise

I saw it and loved it! The costumes are beautiful!

I was all set to go see it since I *loved* the book, but at the last minute, I read that the critics thought it wasn't very good, so I didn't see it after all....they said if you want to see a good Henry movie, you should watch The Tudors...

It's probably not here anymore, so I guess I'll hafta wait for it to come out on DVD....

[6 Haunted Days]

Originally Posted by retrokat

Has anyone here seen the Other Boleyn Girl yet? From the trailer I'm guessing that also takes a fair bit of licence with history - although Scarlett Johansson was so lovely in Girl With A Pearl Earring that I'm very keen to see it. How are the costumes?

IMO the book was and is the worst offender in the completely retarded inaccurancy department, so the film might even be worse. Seriously the author has Mary as the younger sister....what?! What nonsense.

I'll rent it, it'll be a lovely lush Tudor fairytale!

I too suspended disbelief and throughly enjoyed The Tudors series, I bought the 1st season months ago.....way to short a season! I agree that JRM was a weird very off choice though.

[retrokat]

Originally Posted by 6 Haunted Days

I agree that JRM was a weird very off choice though.

All those gratuitous bodice-ripping scenes wouldn't have been nearly as much fun to watch if he'd been an overweight, hairy, piggy-eyed actor with recurrent leg ulcers, so I'm not really complaining

[easternsunrise]

Originally Posted by 6 Haunted Days

IMO the book was and is the worst offender in the completely retarded inaccurancy department, so the film might even be worse. Seriously the author has Mary as the younger sister....what?! What nonsense.

I'll rent it, it'll be a lovely lush Tudor fairytale!

I too suspended disbelief and throughly enjoyed The Tudors series, I bought the 1st season months ago.....way to short a season! I agree that JRM was a weird very off choice though.

I've not read the book yet, but the movie depicts Mary as the older sister. As far as books go-I'm currently reading The Lady in The Tower by Jean Plaidy-it's been a good read so far.

[retrokat]

Originally Posted by easternsunrise

the movie depicts Mary as the older sister.

I always thought Mary was the older, but according to wikipedia, the order of their birth is very much contested with evidence pointing both ways. I was very surprised!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Other_Boleyn_Girl

[easternsunrise]

Originally Posted by retrokat

I always thought Mary was the older, but according to wikipedia, the order of their birth is very much contested with evidence pointing both ways. I was very surprised!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Other_Boleyn_Girl

I did not know that...I thought Mary was older...very interesting!

[retrokat]

Goes to show how fragile the 'facts' of history are, eh? You'd think the birth of nobles would be the one thing reliably documented at the time - although I guess as they were both girls it wasn't considered as important?

[easternsunrise]

My mother is pretty educated in this time period and thought the movie was pretty accurate. Some things she thought were "off"-she thought they could have found a red-haired Henry. The end of the film shows Mary asking Henry to spare her sister and Anne is depicted as having hope that she may be spared. My mom said that she had never read anything about that-but it did add to the intensity of the execution. She thought the actresses chosen for Mary and Anne were perfect in their roles.

[HearthCricket]

I can't wait to see the newest version of The Other Boleyn Girl. The most recent scholarly studies have shown that indeed the two sisters were very close in age and that is may very well be that Mary was the younger. People assume she was older because she was Henry's first choice of the two, but he did not discriminate so much. He would have any wench in the kingdom he wanted and could not be denied, so he probably went for whichever one warmed up to him the most or grabbed his attention. It is interesting that he targeted the Seymour family twice, when there were plenty of other women he could have had. So there was certainly another sort of attraction to these two sisters that grabbed him~possibly a similarity in their looks.

The Tudors period certainly offers a fine array of characters for you to work with, Kat, from Pope to Commoner!

[6 Haunted Days]

Mary was indeed older, no quibble there imo. I'm sure she wasn't older by much though. She was sent 1st to France to serve in the Court, they would never send a younger girl "out" when there was an older sister still at home.

Also the book gives as facts all the horrid rumors about Anne and make Mary out to be some pure saint.. Hardly.

Regardless, I'll rent it. If one waits for a very accurate historical movie you'll be waiting a long time!