After bearing insult from King Charles of France, King Henry
V galvanizes his outnumbered troops and leads them into glorious victory in the
Battle of Agincourt. For his directorial debut and only 29 years old at the
time, Kenneth Branagh also wrote and starred in this gritty and captivating
Shakespearean adaptation and does stellar work both in front of and behind the
camera, with all culminating is the moving and absolutely riveting St. Crispin’s
Day Speech. The film is somewhat marred by Derek Jacobi’s anachronistic
narration, which plays like a Monty Python sketch, and as for the climactic battle,
it serves more as a digression, leaving us longing for the resplendent,
powerfully conveyed dialogue.
*** 1/2 out of ****
