Adapted from Elizabeth Fremantle’s 2013 novel Queen’s Gambit, this compelling historical drama takes liberties with the truth to paint an engaging and sympathetic portrait of its subject.
★★★★☆
There are some periods of history we just can’t let go of. Writers keep writing about them, filmmakers keep making films about them, and audiences keep flocking to see them. This usually means lots of stories about the royals: Elizabeth I, Queen Victoria, or Princess Diana. But one man still outdoes the rest, in fiction as in school textbooks: Henry VIII, with his notorious six wives.
Yet Firebrand—Brazilian director Karim Aïnouz’s first English–language film—is uninterested in retelling the “divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived” story we’ve seen before. Instead, it focuses just on the “survived” section: Henry’s final wife, Katherine Parr. The film opens with Katherine (Alicia Vikander) acting as regent whilst Henry (Jude Law) is at war. She seems the ideal queen, wife and stepmother—but trouble is brewing. In Henry’s absence, Katherine reunites with old friend Anne Askew (Erin Doherty), a radical preacher whose beliefs render her a heretic. In a post-Reformation England, where being the wrong type of Christian gets you an excruciating execution, Katherine is literally playing with fire.
With Henry’s return imminent, Katherine secretly funds Anne’s escape from inevitable persecution. But despite continuing to play the role of devoted spouse to her older, abusive husband almost to perfection, the walls are closing in. As Katherine’s religious views cross the line from endearing piety to treasonous zeal, her enemies at court start circling. After all, when your husband has already disposed of five wives, you’re never far from going the same way.
Anyone who knows much about Tudor history may be gradually realising that Firebrand is not always wedded to the truth. Indeed, its opening titles declare: “History tells us a few things, largely about men and war. For the rest of humanity, we must draw our own—often wild—conclusions”. There might be just a few historians who would disagree with that assessment. Nonetheless, it acknowledges that the film mostly relies on imagining the personalities of long-dead figures whose true thoughts we simply cannot know. Some viewers will be alienated by its rewriting of history, others will be unbothered; but you can hardly accuse it of not making its intentions clear.
Firebrand’s greatest success is undoubtedly how well it conjures up the unbearable claustrophobia of Katherine’s life. Its 120–minute runtime never drags, despite most of it being shots of Katherine looking tense and Henry looking increasingly suspicious, interspersed with the king’s temper tantrums. His court is a chaotic pit of vipers, home to extravagant feasts, strange singalongs, and some of the worst fake beards ever committed to screen. A few of the methods used to put us on edge don’t quite work; the intermittent blurring and jump cuts aren’t cohesive enough and end up feeling accidental, whilst the foreboding opening narration is clunky rather than threatening. Nevertheless, the film cleverly manages to make us feel wary without overreliance on actual violence. Instead, it is the constant feeling that it is never far away that makes Katherine’s situation so unsettling.
However strong its setup, the film could not function without the strength of its two lead performances. Parr is often conceived as a boring footnote to more excitingly doomed queens, but Firebrand illustrates that she was genuinely interesting in her own right. Alicia Vikander is (naturally) rarely offscreen, and never fails to bring Katherine vividly to life. She combines vulnerability and resilience to powerfully evoke just how terrifying being married to Henry VIII must have been—especially as his sixth wife. The script occasionally tries to make her slightly too perfect—even Henry’s dog adores her—and risks rendering her insipid, but Vikander pulls it back, imbuing Katherine with enough steel to make her convincing.
Yet even in a film which tries to do things differently, Henry VIII threatens to steal the show. Jude Law skilfully balances childish paranoia with boundless cruelty and overwhelming egotism to produce a Henry who is certainly unsympathetic, but layered enough to remain interesting. His casting is also a slightly meta stroke of genius: as you half-recognise repugnant Henry as Hollywood star Jude Law, you struggle to reconcile it with his more typical roles as heartthrob lead in films like The Holiday. This fits perfectly with the real Henry VIII—who apparently aged from charismatic, handsome prince to repellent tyrant—and the resulting omnipresent sense of charm gone sour hooks us even further into Law’s chilling performance.
Since the film’s greatest strengths come from its subtleties, it is therefore disappointing when they fall apart at the conclusion. Perhaps the real problem with history—whether concerning men, war, or anything else—is that it never has a tidy ending. Firebrand must consequently manufacture a satisfying end for Katherine which never really came. Unfortunately, the conclusion it chooses requires such extreme suspension of disbelief that it undermines its value as a pleasing finale. Moreover, although it seems designed to give Katherine more agency than sticking the facts would, its implausibility more diminishes the rest of the film’s compelling depiction of misogyny than it provides an empowering feminist denouement.
Firebrand works best when it avoids clever tricks and shocking twists and instead drills down into the sinister workings of court life. Its lead actors are strong enough to carry off its focus on character, and it skilfully builds tension through suggestion as much as actual plot. The film’s ability to create a decidedly uncomfortable atmosphere and to humanise characters long dead in a way which feels real is truly impressive, and ensures that it packs a punch despite its flaws.
The Verdict
Firebrand is a satisfyingly original take on a well-worn topic of historical dramas which builds a compelling portrait of both Katherine Parr and Henry VIII. Whilst some stylistic choices miss the mark and the ending will certainly divide audiences, it is a chilling, tense, and atmospheric biopic defined by two remarkably strong performances.
Words by Eleanor Harvey
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