How does Hiddleston's Henry V differ from Branagh's?
Branagh’s Henry V flawlessly executes Branagh’s vision of the hard consequences of war.
Every element of the film reinforces this theme. Branagh’s screenplay presents many of the play’s darker elements: the English traitors, the hanging of Bardolph, the deaths in battle. The mood and production design are somber throughout. Branagh assembles a remarkable cast of famous actors for all the major roles, who all bring their characters to specific human life. Branagh fully exploits the dramatic possibilities of each scene and he delivers the highlight of the production with a four-minute tracking shot of King Harry carrying the body of a young boy killed by the French across the battlefield and through a tableau of almost every character in the play, living, …show more content…
Overall, however, director Thea Sharrock has made some key errors with her version of the play.
Sharrock doesn’t seem to have quite decided what she wants her Henry V to say or who she wants her King Henry to be. The film starts on promising notes. Sharrock opens with Henry V’s funeral (which The Chorus describes in the closing lines of the play) suggesting he is the perfect king. She reinforces this idea by giving us a King Henry who goes to war out of a sense of obligation to his own and his country’s honor.
But then she doesn’t follow through. Instead, much of this Henry V has the look and feel of Branagh’s. Sharrock underplays many of the scenes, most notably the St. Crispin’s Day speech, losing the drama without gaining new insight. And Sharrock muffs the Harfleur scene, where she has Hiddleston threatened the French citizens with genocide from within the walls of their own town if they don’t surrender. Even though the English army had already captured
Branagh’s Henry V flawlessly executes Branagh’s vision of the hard consequences of war.
Every element of the film reinforces this theme. Branagh’s screenplay presents many of the play’s darker elements: the English traitors, the hanging of Bardolph, the deaths in battle. The mood and production design are somber throughout. Branagh assembles a remarkable cast of famous actors for all the major roles, who all bring their characters to specific human life. Branagh fully exploits the dramatic possibilities of each scene and he delivers the highlight of the production with a four-minute tracking shot of King Harry carrying the body of a young boy killed by the French across the battlefield and through a tableau of almost every character in the play, living, …show more content…
Overall, however, director Thea Sharrock has made some key errors with her version of the play.
Sharrock doesn’t seem to have quite decided what she wants her Henry V to say or who she wants her King Henry to be. The film starts on promising notes. Sharrock opens with Henry V’s funeral (which The Chorus describes in the closing lines of the play) suggesting he is the perfect king. She reinforces this idea by giving us a King Henry who goes to war out of a sense of obligation to his own and his country’s honor.
But then she doesn’t follow through. Instead, much of this Henry V has the look and feel of Branagh’s. Sharrock underplays many of the scenes, most notably the St. Crispin’s Day speech, losing the drama without gaining new insight. And Sharrock muffs the Harfleur scene, where she has Hiddleston threatened the French citizens with genocide from within the walls of their own town if they don’t surrender. Even though the English army had already captured