Historical costume drama, stronger on the costumes than on the history or drama. Those two elements come down to a kind of Late Renaissance Godfather, in which a feminist-revisionist Elizabeth I is installed in the part of Michael Corleone, evolving from a frolicsome carefree girl (no virgin, she) into a steely enemy-purging autocrat. The Australian actress Cate Blanchett (Oscar and Lucinda) conceals no increment of the transmutation, and there is a great deal of operatic glaring and glowering from friend and foe alike, and Geoffrey Rush, as her appointed protector, lurks about on the sidelines in apparent consternation as to when his role will materialize. For all the nakedness of emotion, the courtly skulduggery is not terribly lucid, and the hyperactive camera of Indian director Shekhar Kapur (Bandit Queen, further feminist ferocity) generates more heat than light. With Joseph Fiennes, Richard Attenborough, Christopher Eccleston, John Gielgud. (1998) — Duncan Shepherd