Henry V (1944)

TCM ran Laurence Olivier's version of Henry V during 31 Days of Oscar last month and I, never having blogged about it before, recorded it so that I could watch it again and do a post on it.

There's a title card announcing the fuller title of the play, The Chronicle History of King Henry the Fift with His Battell Fought at Agincourt in France [sic] being performed at the Globe Theater on May 1, 1600. After an overhead shot of a model of 1600 London, we pan into the Globe, somewhat reminiscent of the opening to The Crowd. Leslie Banks plays a "chorus" (one person) who announces upcoming action at the beginning of each act, and then we see a couple of the King's advisors discussing the big issue, which is France.

The English monarchy had of course come from France 350 years earlier and the English had had any number of claims on French territory so, after being insulted by the French king, Henry decides that he's going to go on a little expedition to show the French who was boss. We leave the Globe as the action moves outside, either to soundstages or for the big battle scenes later outside.

Henry goes to Southampton to go across the English Channel, and has to deal with a murder plot, and then goes to France itself, laying siege to the town of Harfleur before continuing on. Plans were apparently to head for Paris but weather intervened, so Henry continued east, winding up getting intercepted by the French near the village of Agincourt, which was the location for the famous battle in October 1415. Henry rallies the troops in disguise so that they don't know who he is, and then wins the battle.

Of course, that wasn't the end of the war, and there was much diplomacy that ensued which ultimately concluded with the marriage of Henry to French princess Catherine (Renee Asherson) despite each of them having a rather poor command of the other's language. I'd say that they all lived happily ever after, but in real life Henry died two years after marrying, with just an infant son which caused all sorts of political turmoil.

Shakesperean language can be tough, so you really have to pay a lot of attention. I also think that the histories are a bit more difficult than the comedies or tragedies, so Olivier had two strikes against him going into this one. Olivier, who not only starred but directed and adapted Shakespeare's play, does well even though I have to say that the movie may not be everybody's cup of tea.

Even though Britain was in the midst of World War II -- and the movie was made in part to rally British morale for the invasion of Normandy which actually preceded the film's release -- no expense was spared. The British government wanted this one to be made. Technicolor was used (interestingly, this is one of the few Technicolor movies not to have Natalie Kalmus' name on it), and supposedly an extremely low amount of footage was left on the cutting-room floor: I'd guess that the supply of Technicolor film stock was severely limited thanks to the war. The sets are well executed, with an obvious stylistic decision made to have backdrops that would have looked like what was used in the Globe in 1600 even once the action leaves the Globe. One thing that I noticed was that the bright Technicolor of the day made the battle scenes look almost unreal, reminding me of the shots that Sergei Eisenstein used some years earlier in Aleksandr Nevsky or Dreyer used in The Passion of Joan of Arc.

If I were going to recommend Shakespeare to people, I'd probably start with Zeffirelli's 1968 version of Romeo and Juliet and then the 1935 Midsummer Night's Dream. But Henry V is an extremely worthy watch.