Most Brits could tell you that Edward 2nd came to an unfortunate and painful end but that would be the extent of their knowledge of the country's first acknowledged homosexual monarch.Their disinterest not being rooted in deep-seated homophobia,merely the lack of relevance to life in 21st century England of the sexual orientation of some obscure long-dead king.
Wearing his gay-right crusading heart on his sleeve, Derek Jarman's antepenultimate work EDWARD II is a post-modern interpretation of Christopher Marlowe's play about the eponymous Plantagenet sovereign (Waddington, a celluloid debutant), whose partiality towards his male lover Piers Gaveston (newcomer Tiernan), raises Cain in the court and prompts his wife Queen Isabella (Swinton), in league with Lord Mortimer (Terry), to usurp his throne.Shot in Jarman's characteristic sparse, claustrophobic setting which avails itself of minimal indoor lighting and cherry-picked iconography to great effect (striking use of refraction, a quasi-black-box theater intimacy, etc.
This gay adaptation of Christopher Marlowe play about the passion of the British King Edward II for a plebeian made by Derek Jarman, who died of AIDS in 1994, is very boring and confused. The film was shot on a stage, but the screenplay is very unpleasant and I could not wait for the end of the movie.
Shakespeare's Richard II and Marlowe's Edward II were successful stage productions recorded in the studio for BBC Television in the early days of colour transmissions. At that time only the recently inaugurated BBC 2 channel was broadcasting in colour and the new TV sets were very expensive.
"Edward II" (1991) by Derek Jarman is a variation on Christopher Marlowe's 16th-century play "The Troublesome Reign of Edward II" which tells the story of England openly gay King Edward, and his relationship with Piers Gaveston that bitterly angers his queen, Isabella of France, "The French She-Wolf", and eventually leads to his fall - he will lose his Kingdom and his life. If I had not known that Jarman was a painter and a Caravaggio admirer, I would've guessed immediately after first 5 minutes or so.
This is a wonderful, fiery production with the most gruesome murder scene I've ever seen on public TV....I don't know how they handle it on stage but they pulled out all the stops here....
Ya know that scene in Being John Malkovich, where he goes into his own mind and everyone inside says nothing but "Malkovich Malkovich, Malkovich?" I felt that way watching this movie.
This movie is a photographed stage play.Richard Marquand and Toby Robertson directed Christopher Marlowe's tragedy of King Edward 11 of England.
This movie is based upon a play written by Christopher Marlowe. Marlowe lived in the 16th century (1500's) while the events in the play took place in the 14th Century (1300's), thus there is approximately a 200 year difference between the events the play depicts and its writing.
