BEFORE: From the kings of France to a king of England, from Louis XIII to Henry VIII. I know some of the details here, but I admit I've got a big gap in my knowledge when it comes to British kings. I never remember who succeeded who, and I never learned the difference betwen Thomas More and Thomas Becket. So let's take a step toward changing that tonight.
THE PLOT: The story of Thomas More, who stood up to King Henry VIII when the King rejected the Roman Catholic Church to obtain a divorce and remarriage.
FOLLOW-UP TO: "The Lion in Winter" (Movie #1,115) and "The Other Boleyn Girl" (#1,120)
AFTER: Well, I'm still unclear on how, exactly, the British government works. Er, worked. What's the difference between a chancellor, a prime minister, and an archbishop? They're all under the king, but who's in charge of whom? And then where does Parliament fit into the picture? (EDIT: The Lord Chancellor is an Officer of State and Cabinet member, who is appointed by the King, on the advice of the Prime Minister. Still sounds like a confusing mess.)
Of course, this is set during a very particular time period, when Henry VIII kept trying different wives in hope of producing a male heir. Or perhaps he just liked having sex with different young women, and then was forced to marry them to save face. Right, and then behead the current wife or find her guilty of some treasonous act to make room for the new one - the guy was a class act.
This did not sit well with the Catholic Church, since he kept asking for dispensation after dispensation, and finally led to a split with Rome and the founding of the Anglican Church, which he himself was the head of, so it really cut down on the paperwork, as I understand it.
Thomas More was caught in the middle of all this - succeeding Cardinal Wolsey as Chancellor (and here's where I get confused, since the previous Chancellor was also an archbishop, but More was a lawyer) he was asked to help Henry request divorce from Catherine of Aragon to marry Anne Boleyn, and he refused. (EDIT: Back in the day, the Lord Chancellor served as presiding officer of the House of Lords, and was on the Judicial Committee - so he was involved in all three branches of government, and was often also a church official. Ample opportunities for conflicts of interest!)
It takes a lot of guts to stand up to the king, but it's obviously a losing battle. This is a guy who has people beheaded, and those are the ones he LIKES! But More's concern is for his soul, if he compromises his principles, and has to answer to God. Gee, that sounds a lot like the quandaries in "Les Miserables" - speak up and be condemned, or remain silent and be damned. (silly people, what if there is no God? No, they don't even think that way.)
Unfortunately the subject matter here is much more dry and boring - this takes place at the intersection of history (yawn) and the finer points of the law (double yawn). But it's man's law vs. God's law, and you can see how this conflict sort of led to the (alleged) separation of church and state in the U.S. I say "alleged" because there are still Congressmen who vote according to their religious beliefs, because they're unable to make the separation in their own minds. Voting against abortion, for example, may help a Senator sleep at night, or may make him popular at Sunday mass, but it's not what his constituents want or need. But jeez, if you can't bring yourself to vote for abortion, at least support birth control and sex education so there won't be as much need for abortion - nope, they're against those too. Madness.
What comes around goes around, even if people can't see it at the time - at the start of the film, More wouldn't let his daughter marry a Lutheran, which to him was the equivalent of a heretic. Later on, he's on trial for his own religious beliefs, when they're in conflict with what the king wants. (definition of "heresy": what the other guy believes) A spoken rundown before the closing credits reminds us that his prosecutor, Oliver Cromwell, was later beheaded for treason, and the King also met his end a few years later, as a result of syphilis. Makes all the fighting seem rather pointless, doesn't it?
But hey, another Best Picture Oscar winner crossed off, bringing my total to 60, with two more to follow in the next week.
Starring Paul Scofield (last seen in "The Crucible"), Robert Shaw (last seen in "Black Sunday"), Leo McKern (last seen in "The French Lieutenant's Woman"), Orson Welles (last seen in "The Lady From Shanghai"), John Hurt (last seen in "The Proposition"), Wendy Hiller, Susannah York, with a cameo from Vanessa Redgrave (last seen in "Venus").
RATING: 4 out of 10 rowboats
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