Review: Film

Anonymous dir Roland Emmerich, Vanessa Redgrave, Rafe Spall, Joely Richardson, Rhys Ifans

Teasing. The contention about the authorship of Shakespeare’s plays is well known. The front-runner, apart from our William, is the Earl of Oxford, Edward de Vere; and here he takes centre stage. De Vere offers playwright Ben Jonson money to claim authorship, as to do so himself would be to compromise his position. Yet in a moment’s hesitation, one William Shakespeare - jobbing actor, semi-illiterate and would-be-blackmailer – steps up to claim penmanship and the money. Set this teasing diversion against the political intrigues of the powerful Cecil family, the perennial fantasies about Elizabeth 1, our virgin, or not so virgin, queen, and you have a melting pot of multi-plot involving some of the best known English characters from the history and theatre annals of the seventeenth century, which is hugely entertaining. There will be no peace in the hen coop, however, for the film’s claims range from tame to outlandish, yet are teasingly plausible: from Robert Cecil as the model for Richard III to Elizabeth's incestuous relationship which produces the Earl of Southampton; now think about those sonnets……. Roland Emmerich’s seventeenth recreation is visceral, cut-throat; with the need to see Elizabeth at the beginning and end of her reign, neatly answered by the intriguing casting of mother and daughter, Vanessa Redgrave and Joely Richardson……