HENRY V (1989 FILM)

'''Henry V''' is a 1989 film directed by Kenneth Branagh, and based upon the Shakespeare play about the famous English King.
Branagh stars in the title role. Derek Jacobi takes the role of the Chorus, a type of narrator used by Shakespeare to fulfil the role of the chorus in classical drama.
Brian Blessed, Ian Holm, Christian Bale, Paul Scofield, Jimmy Yuill and Emma Thompson are among the other stars, whilst Robbie Coltrane and Judi Dench have the cameo roles of Falstaff and Mistress Quickly, both of them major characters in other Shakespearean plays. Another minor character, "Michael Williams", is played by the actor Michael Williams, Judi Dench's husband in real life.
The film was produced by Bruce Sharman with the British Broadcasting Corporation and Renaissance Films. Whereas the 1940s film used the Elizabethan Globe theatre as a setting in which to introduce the action, the 1989 version used a film set as the background to Chorus's opening speech.
The visual and verbal styles of the film are much grittier than the Laurence Olivier film (''see'': Henry V), particularly with respect to the Battle of Agincourt scenes, which are strongly reminiscent of the battle scenes in the films of Akira Kurosawa, or the Battle of Shrewsbury in Orson Welles's ''Chimes At Midnight''. The film's budget was $9 million.
''Henry V'' received near-universal critical acclaim for Branagh's Oscar-nominated performance and direction, for the accessibility of its Shakespearean language and particularly for its music by first-time composer Patrick Doyle, which was performed by the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and conducted by Simon Rattle.
Branagh, however, received criticism from Shakespearian experts for removing large amounts of the original text to fit better with Branagh's image of Henry. He was at one stage called the ''pretty boy'' of English theater and this was mainly because he edited any scenes from the text which depicted Henry as brutal or inhumane. This has led to the belief that the film is biased and one sided, and that the text can only be truly studied when the original is looked at as well as the film interpretation.

The film grossed $10 million in the U.S. and at the time of its widest release played on 134 U.S. screens.Phyllis Dalton won the Academy Award for Best Costume Design and the film was nominated for Best Actor in a Leading Role (Branagh) and Best Director (Branagh).

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