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100This historical epic about the "virgin queen" of England's early life moves with the crackling urgency of a contemporary political thriller.
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90What's best about the film is not the hot romance, but the coldness that lies at its heart.
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90Superior historical soap opera that shrewdly sidesteps all the cliches of British costume drama with its bold, often modern approach.
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90The fabulous Elizabeth reinvents English Tudor history as gangster movie.
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90Where Elizabeth really triumphs over its dusty source material is in transforming all this boring history into a real, rip-roaring adventure tale.
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88The texture of the film is enough to recommend it, even apart from the story.
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88A fascinating whirl of politics and palace intrigue.
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83This is a sensual, psychologically modern costume drama influenced by both "The Godfather" and gals' guides to empowerment.
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80A handsome, diverting coming-of-intrigue story studded with meaty performances.
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80Bollywood meets The Godfather.
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80Elizabeth's most triumphant aspect is Blanchett's transformation from saucy, spirited toe-tapper to iconic Virgin Queen.
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Period movies inevitably reflect more about the period in which they're made than the period of their subject, and rarely has that been more evident -- or more distracting -- than it is with Elizabeth.
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80This Elizabeth is presented as a glamorously stressed-out modern woman who must cope with a super-intense case of having it all.
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80The movie's approach makes for juicy melodrama.
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80This darkly sumptuous, hypnotically complex movie ought to have many constituencies.
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78Despite the florid trailers' emphasis on bodice-ripping romantic imagery, Elizabeth is above all a political thriller.
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75Acted and directed with great energy and imagination.
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75Elizabeth works in a number of ways. It's a feminist film. It's also a kind of spy thriller and a superior historical drama.
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75History rendered with enough brains and imagination to more than make up for its few stumbles.
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75It's a rousing adventure that keeps the audience involved for the entirety of the two hour running time while opening a window into the culture that gave birth to Christopher Marlowe, Edmund Spenser, Francis Bacon, and William Shakespeare.
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75Bad history it may be, but Elizabeth is a movie that makes you want more, as it plays to the myth of history's great actress-monarch, a character who puts today's tinselly political heros and heroines (royal and not), to shame.
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70The film belongs to Blanchett -- this hellcat Virgin Queen is something to see.
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70Kapur can't decide if he's making an art movie or a melodrama, an opera or a soap opera.
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70Although frustratingly confusing -- often the viewer can't be sure who is on which side or why -- the film brims with physical grandeur, exquisite costumes, and a captivating performance by Blanchett.
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63The movie -- directed in such a frenziedly self-conscious style you often wonder whether the camera will topple over on his actors.
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60The conspicuous lack of emotional resonance makes this film "Queen Margot's" poor cold English cousin.
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60But much of it, like its subject, is so cryptic, distractingly stylish, and impenetrably posed that it's rough going most of the way.
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60Whether the story's bald ironies are historical cliches or just dramatic ones, they convey only platitudes about gender, sexuality, and power.
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50A notably undynamic treatment of Protestant Elizabeth I's ascension to the British throne.
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30All of the nutty editing and the loud score just grated on my nerves and failed the story.
User score distribution:
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Positive: 8 out of 11
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Mixed: 0 out of 11
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Negative: 3 out of 11
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EricC3
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AuskaP.10I just love Cate. She is just a perfect Elizabeth!!
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KenB10This is a great period piece, period.