Random Least Accurate Movies About Historical Royals (14 items)

• 

  (#1) The Private Life of Henry VIII

  • Charles Laughton, Merle Oberon, Elsa Lanchester, Robert Donat, Miles Mander, John Loder, Claud Allister, William Austin, Gibb McLaughlin, Franklin Dyall, Laurence Hanray, Sam Livesey, Helen Maud Holt

  What It Gets Wrong: This film emphasizes the titillating bits of Henry VIII's chaotic personal life while ignoring some of the most significant developments in English history, like the English Reformation. It also incorrectly depicts Henry as an uncouth glutton. By contrast, Henry VIII's court was celebrated for what an ambassador from Venice described as "elegant manners."

  Its depiction of Anne of Cleves, Henry's fourth wife, is especially misguided. The film portrays her as actively trying to get out of the marriage, a representation that basically absolves the real Henry of his role in divorcing Anne. In actuality, he rejected her in part because he didn't find her attractive.

  Where It's Surprisingly Accurate: By centering on the king's private life, the film acknowledges that Tudor power was often negotiated through personal interactions. In other words, the personal was political.
• 

  (#2) The Other Boleyn Girl

  • Scarlett Johansson, Natalie Portman, Benedict Cumberbatch, Eric Bana, Andrew Garfield, Eddie Redmayne, Kristin Scott Thomas, Juno Temple, David Morrissey, Jim Sturgess, Alfie Allen, Mark Rylance, Joanna Scanlan, Michael Smiley, Ana Torrent, Mark Lewis Jones, Bill Wallis, Iain Mitchell, Maisie Smith, Tiffany Freisberg, Joseph Moore, Oliver Coleman, Montserrat Roig De Puig, Daisy Doidge-Hill, Corinne Galloway, Tom Cox, Brodie Judge, Poppy Hurst, Oscar Negus, Emma Noakes, Constance Stride, Kizzy Fassett, Finton Reilly

  What It Gets Wrong: The star-studded film is based on a novel by Philippa Gregory. Both the novel and the adaptation wrongly take politically motivated allegations and rumors from the Tudor court as historical fact.

  Riffing off a probably false allegation that Anne had relations with her brother George, for example, the film depicts her trying to convince him to impregnate her. 

  Where It's Surprisingly Accurate: Mary Boleyn really was one of Henry VIII's mistresses before he took her younger and more famous sister Anne as his second wife.
• 

  (#3) The Young Victoria

  • Emily Blunt, Mark Strong, Paul Bettany, Jim Broadbent, Miranda Richardson, Rupert Friend, Julian Glover, Thomas Kretschmann, Princess Beatrice of York, Michiel Huisman, Harriet Walter, Michael Maloney, Jesper Christensen, Rachael Stirling, Genevieve O'Reilly, Jeanette Hain

  What It Gets Wrong: This period film - which features a royal cameo - is a sympathetic look at Queen Victoria as a young woman and her budding romance with Prince Albert. But one of the most dramatic scenes in the movie never happened in real life.

  In the film, Albert proves his devotion to Victoria by selflessly throwing himself in front of a bullet meant for her. While there were several attempts on Queen Victoria's life throughout her reign, Albert never acted as a human shield for her.

  Where It's Surprisingly Accurate: As shown in the film, the so-called "Kensington System" - rules and regulations about what Victoria could do - limited the young princess's freedoms in Kensington Palace, her childhood home. The film also depicts the tensions that defined the first years of her reign, including the political fallout surrounding her close relationship with Prime Minister Lord Melbourne and his Whig party.

  As in the movie, Queen Victoria really was deeply in love with Prince Albert, even if they had marital problems just like any other couple.
• 

  (#4) Mary Queen of Scots

  • Saoirse Ronan, Margot Robbie, David Tennant, Jack Lowden, Martin Compston, Joe Alwyn, Brendan Coyle, Guy Pearce

  What It Gets Wrong: At the film's climax, Queen Mary of Scotland secretly meets her cousin and political rival Queen Elizabeth of England. Though it's a richly conceived scene, there's one problem: It never happened. Mary and Elizabeth exchanged letters, but they never actually met. 

  The film has also received criticism for giving Mary a Scottish accent. She grew up in France and probably had a French accent. 

  Where It's Surprisingly Accurate: Though the Catholic Queen Mary largely accepted Scotland's Protestantism in the wake of the Scottish Reformation, firebrand theologian John Knox nonetheless butted heads with her. Lord Darnley was a terrible husband and had a hand in the slaying of David Rizzio, Mary's secretary and friend.

  Director Josie Rourke's decision to cast ethnically diverse actors in the film also highlights the indisputable fact that Stuart Scotland and Tudor England weren't exclusively white.
• 

  (#5) Grace of Monaco

  • Nicole Kidman, Tim Roth, Paz Vega, Parker Posey, Milo Ventimiglia, Frank Langella, Derek Jacobi, Robert Lindsay, Geraldine Somerville, Jeanne Balibar, Roger Ashton-Griffiths, Nicholas Farrell, Olivier Rabourdin, André Penvern, Pascaline Crêvecoeur

  What It Gets Wrong: Despite the film's claim, Princess Grace of Monaco never single-handedly saved Monaco - a tax-free haven for the moneyed elite - by preventing it from paying taxes to France. Director Olivier Dahan did not dispute the film's numerous inaccuracies and instead declared, "I am not a journalist or historian. I am an artist."

  Where It's Surprisingly Accurate: Though the details of the film are suspect, the overall truth of Grace's celebrity and her feelings of disconnection in Monaco are probably true. One detail it seems to have gotten right: Grace didn't prioritize learning French, the language of her people.
• 

  (#6) Elizabeth

  • Cate Blanchett, Daniel Craig, Lily Allen, Christopher Eccleston, Richard Attenborough, Eric Cantona, Emily Mortimer, Geoffrey Rush, John Gielgud, Joseph Fiennes, Kelly Macdonald, Vincent Cassel, Matthew Rhys, Kathy Burke, James Frain, Alfie Allen, Fanny Ardant, Jean Piere Leaud, Angus Deayton, Amanda Ryan, Edward Hardwicke, Tim Bevan, Wayne Sleep, Terence Rigby, Jamie Foreman, Kenny Doughty, Joseph O'Conor, Daniel Moynihan, George Yiasoumi, Edward Highmore, Jocelyn Quivrin, Daniel O'Meara, Paul Fox, Martin L. Evans, Jeremy Hawk, Vladimir Vega, Peter Stockbridge, Kate Loustau, Daisy Bevan, Jennifer Lewicki, Hayley Burroughs, Ben Mars, Brendan O'Hea, Rod Culbertson, Michael Beint, Christian Simpson, Sally Grey, Sarah Owen, Liam Foley, Lewis Jones, Nick Smallman, Viviane Horne, Valerie Gale, Elika Gibbs, Matt Andrews, Charles Cartmell, Liz Giles, Joe White, James Rowe, Donald Pelmear, Edward Purver

  What It Gets Wrong: For a stylized biopic about one of history's strongest-willed monarchs, Elizabeth curiously presents its titular queen as weak and insecure. The physical romance as depicted in the film between Elizabeth I and her favorite courtier Robert Dudley is historically uncertain.

  Though their love affair has been rumored for centuries, there is no historical evidence that they ever consummated their relationship.

  Where It's Surprisingly Accurate: The film hits on a number of issues that defined Elizabeth's reign, from the politics of marriage to religious strife and the fine line she walked as a female ruler in a patriarchal world.
• 

  (#7) The King's Speech

  • Helena Bonham Carter, Colin Firth, Guy Pearce, Michael Gambon, Geoffrey Rush, Timothy Spall, Derek Jacobi, Claire Bloom, Jennifer Ehle, Anthony Andrews, Roger Hammond, David Bamber, Adrian Scarborough, Eve Best, Simon Chandler, Robert Portal, Calum Gittins, Andrew Havill, Ramona Marquez, Patrick Ryecart, Paul Trussell, Graham Curry, Teresa Gallagher, Orlando Wells, Max Callum, Harry Sims, Freya Wilson, Jensen Freeman, John Warnaby, Michael Archer, Richard Dixon, James Currie, Tim Downie, Ben Wimsett, Dominic Applewhite, Filippo Delaunay, Pete Noakes, John Albasiny, Stuart Pollock, Mary Robinson, Charles Armstrong, Sean Talo, Dick Ward, Sarah Molkenthin, Jake Hathaway, Tony Earnshaw, Mihai Arsene, Martyn Moore, Alex Sabga, Danny Emes, Abbie Murison, Dean Ambridge, Adam Eveson, George Rodd, Roger Parrott, Tony Sweeney

  What It Gets Wrong: The film downplays King Edward VIII's sympathies for the Third Reich. It also skips over King George VI's initial preference for appeasement as a strategy for dealing with Hitler. 

  The King's Speech also incorrectly depicts Winston Churchill as supporting King George VI, when in fact he stood by Edward.

  Where It's Surprisingly Accurate: The film's central relationship - the friendship between King George VI and his speech therapist Lionel Logue - is fairly represented, as is the king's speech impediment. 
• 

  (#8) Marie Antoinette

  • Kirsten Dunst, Tom Hardy, Rose Byrne, Molly Shannon, Jason Schwartzman, Marianne Faithfull, Jamie Dornan, Asia Argento, Steve Coogan, Rip Torn, David Walliams, Judy Davis, Danny Huston, Shirley Henderson, Mathieu Amalric, Jean-Christophe Bouvet, Mary Nighy, Aurore Clément, Guillaume Gallienne, Sebastian Armesto, Clementine Poidatz

  What It Gets Wrong: Though Marie Antoinette focuses on a crucial era of French history, it lacks any meaningful political context. It also reduces Marie Antoinette's famously extravagant clothing tastes to frothy window dressing. In reality, her fashion choices were politically charged statements.

  Where It's Surprisingly Accurate: Director Sofia Coppola depicts a number of historical details correctly, from the cumbersome rituals that defined life at Versailles to the intimacy problems in the early years of Marie Antoinette's marriage to King Louis XVI.

  Though Marie Antoinette was in love with the Swedish officer Axel von Fersen, historians still aren't sure if their relationship was physical. The movie argues it was.
• 

  (#9) It's All Romance - And No Political Complications - In Madonna's 'W.E.'

  What It Gets Wrong: Like The King's Speech, the Madonna-directed W.E. downplays the extent to which King Edward VIII and his mistress-turned-wife Wallis Simpson sympathized with Third Reich politics. Their sympathies were so worrying that the British government actually surveilled the couple and considered them a liability. 

  Where It's Surprisingly Accurate: King Edward VIII and the American divorcée Wallis Simpson launched into a tumultuous love affair when he was still the Prince of Wales. Their relationship really did bring down his reign: Edward abdicated the throne when it was clear that the British public would not accept her as their queen. 
• 

  (#10) Elizabeth: The Golden Age

  • Cate Blanchett, Clive Owen, Eddie Redmayne, Abbie Cornish, Geoffrey Rush, Samantha Morton, Rhys Ifans, Tom Hollander, Susan Lynch, Jordi Mollà, Laurence Fox, John Shrapnel, Adrian Scarborough, Sam Spruell, Rosalind Halstead, Stuart McLoughlin, Coral Beed, John Atterbury, Hayley Burroughs, Penelope McGhie, Aimee King

  What It Gets Wrong: This sequel to Elizabeth sees Cate Blanchett again take on the role of Queen Elizabeth I. Though released a few years after the first film, Elizabeth: The Golden Age takes place several decades after Elizabeth ends, and Blanchett's Elizabeth should have aged more. In the 1580s, Elizabeth was in her fifties. 

  Sir Walter Raleigh really was a dashing figure in Elizabeth's court. Though Elizabeth was a notorious flirt, she wasn't in love with him, as the film suggests. His role in repelling the Spanish Armada was a bit different than what the movie shows; he remained on land during the attempted incursion in 1588.

  Where It's Surprisingly Accurate: The film depicts the queen getting advice from her royal astrologer John Dee. Dee was a real figure at her court. 
• 

  (#11) A Royal Night Out

  • Sarah Gadon, Bel Powley, Emily Watson, Rupert Everett

  What It Gets Wrong: When Princess Elizabeth - the future Queen Elizabeth II - and her sister Princess Margaret secretly join the crowds of people celebrating VE Day on the streets of London, the two royals get split up and have their own adventures across the city. In actuality, both sisters were never on their own that night.

  Though the film hints at a romance between Elizabeth and a young soldier (they share a kiss), this is purely fiction. Jack Hodges never existed and isn't based on a real person. After all, Elizabeth was already involved with Prince Philip at the time of her VE revelry. There is no evidence that she had any other romantic relationships before she married Philip in 1947.

  Where It's Surprisingly Accurate: The two princesses really did go incognito in London on VE Day.
• 

  (#12) Lady Jane

  • Helena Bonham Carter, Patrick Stewart, Cary Elwes, Joss Ackland, Richard Johnson, Michael Hordern, John Wood, Richard Vernon, Sara Kestelman, Jane Lapotaire, Jill Bennett, Lee Montague, Ian Hogg, Warren Saire

  What It Gets Wrong: The emotional heart of the film centers around Lady Jane Grey and her husband Guildford Dudley. Over the course of the film, they go from a pair of resentful teenagers who are forced into marriage to resolute allies who fall in love with one another.

  The reality was quite different, however: Jane couldn't stand her husband. She later admitted, "I was compelled to act as a woman who is obliged to live on good terms with her husband," despite her claim that she was "maltreated" by both Dudley and his mother. Indeed, Jane feared for her life when she was around the Dudleys.

  Where It's Surprisingly Accurate: Teenage Lady Jane Grey was Queen of England for only nine days in 1553. As the film makes clear, she did not want to be queen, a fact that made her swift downfall and eventual execution truly tragic.
• 

  (#13) 'Queen Margot' Adds A Dash Of Drama - And Arsenic - To A Harsh Chapter Of French History

  What It Gets Wrong: Based on Alexandre Dumas's historical novel of the same name, the film centers on the political intrigue surrounding Margaret "Margot" of Valois's marriage to Henry of Navarre, a Protestant royal.

  The film explains the demise of her brother King Charles IX of France in a peculiar - and wildly inaccurate - way. Catherine de' Medici - Charles and Margot's mother - attempts to slyly take out Henry of Navarre with arsenic. Her plan backfires when Charles accidentally consumes the concoction and perishes. In reality, tuberculosis - not a botched attempt by his mother - ended the French king in 1574.

  Catherine de' Medici has long been vilified as a scheming poisoner, and this film perpetuates that unfair myth.

  Where It's Surprisingly Accurate: The bloody event known to history as the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre in 1572 happened in the wake of Margot's marriage to Henry of Navarre. Though Catherine wasn't responsible for her son's demise, she was responsible for starting the event.

New Random Displays    Display All By Ranking