Excellent performance, sexist writing

David Thorpe, as ever, delivers an excellent performance. But that's where the positive elements end. I can forgive the formulaic plot. I can forgive the anachronisms. I can forgive the repetitious use of adjectives. What I can't forgive is the appalling characterisation of female characters. The positive female characters are virtually only characterised in terms of their lustfulness or lustworthiness, or otherwise are shrews or doormats. I don't recall the last time I saw women written so two-dimensionally. Apparently In Marston's version of Elizabethan England, women have access to a hitherto unsuspected form of contraception, because they seem to be up for a lot of extra-marital shagging without any reference to the consequence. It's pathetic.

I wanted to be able to persist as I really like Thorpe's performances on the whole, but If I hear one more description of her "inviting smile" and the male characters "parting the gates to enter the garden of heaven" without any real substance to them beyond that, I'm going to barf.

I'm not someone who would think of myself as a feminist, but I am beginning to see their point listening to this dross.

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