It did some things well: its depiction of Elizabeth's despair at the prospect of executing Mary was pretty much spot on, and it did a good job of demonstrating both Elizabeth's loneliness and the sense of doom which rode on the heels of the armada. There was also one highly entertaining scene involving an inept archduke.

But ... otherwise the movie was dreadful. It failed it on three major grounds:

(a) long parts of it were tediously slow, frequently attempting to use overly dramatic music, instead of characterization, to build emotion.

(b) the story was incoherent, involving at least three different plots which were ineptly woven together, with characters appearing from out of nowhere to die shortly thereafter, seemingly minor characters appearing without warning in "important scenes", and important relationships between people being revealed later than they should be.

(c) it was wildly historically inaccurate. I could forgive their unreasonable depiction of Philip as being young and hale. I cannot forgive them moving the burning of the armada from the Dutch coast to the English one; the naval tactic which scattered the armada makes no sense whatsoever if the advancing fires aren't between the armada and its only means of escape.

Dreadful, I say. Dreadful.