Amazon.com: The Other Boleyn Girl: Natalie Portman, Scarlett Johansson, Eric Bana, Kristin Scott Thomas: Amazon Instant Video

The Other Boleyn Girl

Based on the best-selling novel, The Other Boleyn Girl is a captivating tale of intrigue, romance and betrayal about two sisters who rival for the bed and heart of King Henry VIII.

Starring: Natalie Portman, Scarlett Johansson
Directed by: Justin Chadwick
Runtime: 1 hour 56 minutes
Release year: 2008
Studio: Columbia Pictures

Play trailer

Synopsis: Based on the best-selling novel, The Other Boleyn Girl is a captivating tale of intrigue, romance and betrayal about two sisters who rival for the bed and heart of King Henry VIII.

Starring: Natalie Portman, Scarlett Johansson

Supporting actors: Eric Bana, Kristin Scott Thomas, Mark Rylance, David Morrissey, Andrew Garfield

Directed by: Justin Chadwick

Genre: Biography, Drama, History, Romance

Runtime: 1 hour 56 minutes

Captions and Subtitles: English Details

Release year: 2008

Studio: Columbia Pictures

Studio required notice: Content is protected by U.S. copyright law. Learn more

MPAA Rating: Rated PG-13 for mature thematic elements, sexual content and some violent images

ASIN: B0018STVHQ

Rights & Requirements

Purchase rights: Stream instantly and download to 2 locations. Details

Format: Amazon Instant Video (streaming online video and digital download)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

28 of 30 people found the following review helpful

1.0 out of 5 stars Made Me Sigh for Those Wonderful BBC Mini-series January 31, 2009

By J. S. Lang

Format:DVD

Those of us over-40 folks remember fondly the great BBC mini-series of yesterday, The Six Wives of Henry VIII and Elizabeth R, incredibly acted and scripted, albeit lacking in Hollywood glossiness. The Other Boleyn Girl delivers on the gloss but the acting is mediocre at best, the writing several steps below mediocre. I rather like Natalie Portman, but her variable English accent was distracting, to say the least. (Obviously there is some logic in casting English actors in such roles.) I didn't find Eric Bana particularly appealing (maybe we hetero males aren't easily swayed by an actor's looks), and the rape of Anne is unhistorical and was obviously included to spice up a rather dull movie. (Tip to movie-makers: sex can actually be very titillating when it's just suggested, and off-screen.) After seeing this movie on DVD, I found myself dragging my old Six Wives of Henry VIII tapes out of the closet and relishing the great acting and the intelligent scripts, and the great actress Dorothy Tutin as Anne is a pretty tough act to follow. I really cannot recommend The Other Boleyn Girl as entertainment, much less as history. If scriptwriters want to sex up historical dramas, fine, but at least give us some credible dialogue and some actresses who can sound consistently English.

2 Comments |

Was this review helpful to you?

Yes

47 of 54 people found the following review helpful

1.0 out of 5 stars Even worse than the book, if that is possible July 17, 2008

By Shimmy VINE™ VOICE

Format:DVD

First off, let me say I am not a fan of Philippa Gregory, mainly due to her blatant disregard for history (although she claims to do extensive research for her novels, she uses no primary sources (first rule of historical research = use primary sources) and her secondary sources (which from reading the book, she appears to have only skimmed over) are often outdated or don't stand up to the test of time). I watched the movie mainly to see the costumes (I'm a Tudor period fanatic) and to see if it would be better or worse than the book.

The Tudor period is a fascinating time, and it doesn't need to be changed or altered in order to make it more interesting. There's plenty of love, sex, betrayal, political scheming, etc. so I'm not sure why PG felt the need to completely alter the story so much.

I won't go into all of the historical inaccuracies here, if I did, I would be here all night. Besides, there are many other amazon reviewers who are better-spoken than me and have far more knowledge of the Tudor period than I do (I'm only a student), and they have written some wonderful reviews pointing out errors (head on over to the TOBG book page, or check out forums on IMDB).

My main problem with this movie was that it seemed much more like a TV Movie (Lifetime channel anybody?) than a Hollywood film with well-known, highly-paid actors and actresses. The Henry/Mary relationship was almost non-existent, they have a few sex scenes, but nothing to show that they might have actually cared for one another. Henry and Mary have TWO very short conversations before they sleep together. And this is supposed to be our heroine, who has fallen in love? This is preposterous even to romance novel readers.... There is no character development or relationship development between the beginning of Henry and Mary's affair and Mary conceiving. So when Anne comes back and "steals" Henry away from Mary while she is pregnant, do we really feel that bad for Mary? Not really, since we haven't seen anything to show us that Mary is in love (at least in the novel there was an actual emotional relationship, one-dimensional as it was).

The one main thing that *really* put me off of this film was the rape scene with Henry and Anne. Henry certainly was not a wonderful guy, history has clearly shown us this, but is this scene necessary? As far as history goes, Anne held off Henry for many years, so a rape is very unlikely (not to mention she wasn't pregnant when she and Henry married secretly (winter 1532, second ceremony in London January 1533, Elizabeth born Sept 1533)). I'm not really sure if this scene is here to show us that "you'll get what's coming to you" if you act like a shrew, or if it's supposed to make us feel a hint of sympathy for Anne. Yes Henry and Anne's relationship (obviously) fell apart, but it fell apart over a period of years, not months. *SPOILER ALERT* Also, the ending with Mary storming into the castle and grabbing Elizabeth from her caretakers and walking out with her seems pretty preposterous. Henry had gotten rid of Anne, but he still did show regard for his children and made sure they were properly raised. Snatching Elizabeth, especially after the king has warned you he will not tolerate you, your pleas to him, or your family anymore, seems like asking for some major punishment to me. *END SPOILER*

Strangely enough, considering that Ms. Gregory considers herself a "feminist author," the only characters remotely resembling anything feminist was the Boleyn mother, Elizabeth, who encourages her daughters to be well-educated and shows her objection to the Boleyn-Howard males pimping out their daughters for political gain (gains which usually fell to the males), and Katherine of Aragon, who acts honorably and respectably at all times. I don't think these are the characters we are meant to admire, but Anne is made out to be a self-serving, conniving shrew and Mary is too meek and mousy to be likeable.

One major (non-historical) error: Mary is married to William Carey, but midway through the film William Stafford asks her to marry him and leave court with him. Um, what happened to Mary's husband (He died of the sweating sickness, but the film never shows this)?

I was hoping for some great costumes from this film, and I was very disappointed. The fabrics were very modern (some of them looked like 1970s curtains) and seemed very out of place. Natalie Portman basically wore the same version of a dress, just in different colored fabrics, through the majority of the film (same for Scarlett). Tudor fashion is amazing; the costume designers could have shown so much more variety with the costumes. The accents of Natalie Portman and Scarlett Johansson were incredibly bad. Portman's accent seems to have gotten worse from when she did V for Vendetta. Also, at times certain scenes were so dark that I had to readjust the settings on my screen (which I've never had a problem with).

The one positive thing about the film is that they chose to leave out the incest plot-line that was very strongly suggested in the book. Read more ›

6 Comments |

Was this review helpful to you?

Yes

26 of 29 people found the following review helpful

1.0 out of 5 stars G'day, mate, I'm the king of England. March 11, 2010

By M. A. Bechaz

Format:DVD

Many times whilst watching this movie, I found myself wishing I was watching the much better 'Anne of the 1000 Days'. 'The Other Boleyn Girl' is a travesty of a movie.

Scarlett Johansen seemed to have the acting range of a cold, dead fish. Natalie Portman did better, but frankly, she was fighting a losing battle against very poor scripting. And Eric Bana...well, as an Aussie, I have of course taken the oath of allegience to always adore Eric Bana, who like Hugh Jackman is one of the nicest guys you could hope to meet. But Eric has a very strong accent, of the type that many people who hail from Melbourne's northern suburbs do, and he just can't seem to hide it, no matter what. When he tries to sound English, it just makes me cringe. I was almost expecting King Henry VIII to crack open a beer, throw another shrimp on the barbie and call Anne 'a beaut sheila'. Ugh! Sorry, Eric, you're a top bloke, but I can say with all honesty that Amy Winehouse would have made a better King of England, even with the problem of trying to get a crown on over the wig.

The film made me angry because it was so historically inaccurate. No film better deserved to have the 'This movie is a work of fiction and bears no resemblance to any persons or events ever etc.' disclaimer appear in its closing credits. Worse, I sensed a strong bias from the writer (the writer of the book this was based on, assumedly), in that she seemed to be living vicariously through the character of Mary, and wanted her to be all things good, whilst her sister Anne had to appear as all things bad, assumedly to make Mary appear even better by comparison.

And as for the scene with Anne and her brother (and anyone who's seen the movie will know exactly what scene I mean), well, that was just ICKY!... Read more ›

5 Comments |

Was this review helpful to you?

Yes

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars 4 Stars for the film, 5 for the DVD June 12, 2008

By Jem TOP 1000 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:DVD|Amazon Verified Purchase

After seeing this in the theatre, I was ready to give it 5 stars. I love period movies, especially about the Tudors, and I really enjoyed this one. However, after watching the deleted scenes on the DVD, I realized this movie should have been much better!

When I ordered the DVD, I had already resigned myself to little or no features. Elizabeth, and Elizabeth: The Golden Age were sorely lacking. Most period movies have few extras, despite having such a treasure trove of history to mine. However, I was surprised and delighted with the excellent selection of special features on this DVD! First, there are several deleted scenes, many of which should have been included in the film. For the most part, they centered around Mary and gave more insight into her life with her husband after Anne supplants her, plus some calculating scenes with Anne. One scene with Mary's husband upon seeing her "bastard" child of Henry was quite poignant. All of these would have enriched the movie to be more than just two women in rivalry for a king. It could have been 5 stars and would no doubt have pleased more people who saw the film. Also included in the extras was a feature called "To Be Lady" about court etiquette and the precarious life of a woman, even noble, in those times. It featured interviews with the author, some college history professors, and the cast/crew of the film. Women were often exploited in that time to the benefit (or detriment) of their families. And Mary and Anne were no exception. Another excellent feature was about translating history to film. They discussed the book vís á vís the movie, what they used of history, how the expanded on Mary's lesser known character.... I have not read the book this film is based on, and didn't feel any urge to do so after seeing the movie. However, these two features and the interview with the author and cast have piqued my interest in the novel. I definitely intend to read it now.

Many DVDs throw in biographies of the characters just to have another extra to list. They are usually nothing more than frozen screen shots a viewer clicks through. But, this DVD included bios of 5 principal characters which included interviews from the author, historians, the cast and crew, coupled with footage from the movie. They were like mini-bios from A&E. Very well done, and I would recommend first time viewers of the movie watch before the film as they really help to keep the characters straight (such as Mary's two husbands, William Carey and William Stafford who look enough alike with the same name that I sometimes confused them). The DVD also includes a commentary, which I didn't listen too because I find them very boring. Overall, a fantastic set of features on a single disc edition.

As to the film, I thought the costumes and sets were phenomenal, the story was very good and the casting spot on. The cinematography is expertly done, and helps set the tone and tell the story as much as the script. Some viewers have complained that Natalie Portman wasn't good as Anne Boleyn. I've read a lot of history books and historical fiction on Anne and I thought she played the part true to the person (if not the book, which I can't comment on). Anne Boleyn wasn't a raving beauty, she was striking. Her major appeal came from denying Henry and being intelligent, ambitious, manipulative - in short, a match for him in many ways. She intrigued him. Portman brought all these qualities to light in her portrayal. Scarlett Johansson actually exceeded my expectations. I have only seen her in a couple movies, and the parts didn't require much effort. However, I thought she embodied the somewhat na�ve and soft Mary, who is quickly disillusioned about the real world, and even her family. The two women played against each other beautifully. In one of the features, the director mentions how in the book it is often not clear which of them is "the other" Boleyn girl and that he uses this in the film. He does, and it works to great effect.

Eric Bana as Henry is perhaps the weakest casting choice, but he wasn't bad by any stretch. History bears out that Henry was young, handsome, charming and athletic until injured falling from a horse so Bana fit that fine. Bana is best as the temperamental king who is at once attracted and disgusted by Anne's manipulation, and drawn to Mary's docile nature. His interactions with other characters didn't really stand out, but the movie was focused on the women so this was fine. Two other stand outs were Anna Torrent as Queen Katherine of Aragon and David Morrissey as the Duke of Norfolk. Though her role was small, Torrent's Katherine made a big impact. She commanded every scene she was in. She was at once regal, and pitiable, as the victim of her husband's desperation for a male heir. Morrissey played a consummate politician - calculating, controlling and just a bit sleazy. Without him, it would be difficult to sympathize with either Anne or her family. His ruthless game of chess, in which they are pawns was vital to the film. Yes, liberties are taken with historical fact, but some license must be given to film as its own art form just as for a historical fiction. Not much is known about Mary Boleyn, but this film certainly stirs the imagination of what she may have been like.

Overall, I highly recommend this DVD! Read more ›

Comment |

Was this review helpful to you?

Yes

› See all 269 customer reviews (newest first)

Write a customer review

Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars The Other Boleyn Girl (Blu-ray)

If you enjoy pre-20th Century drama type entertainment you won't be disappointed in this movie. It has great acting and is very, very entertaining.

Published 2 days ago by Richard L. Honnick

1.0 out of 5 stars Don't waste your time

I know everyone says this, but the book was much better! Having just finished the book, I was excited to see the movie; I could not be more disappointed. Read more

Published 21 days ago by Sydney