I think I just spent a good 5 minutes staring at that slowed set of gifs from the Henry V kiss....*sigh* I LOVE that kiss. One of the best on screen kisses ever imho. So romantic, so sexy. Also I have to say as a short person I really like that they didn't have her standing on a giant box to get rid of the massive height difference between them. Instead they worked with the height difference which gave us that lovely finger under the chin moment.
Let’s start at the very beginning, shall we?
First of all, he goes from giving the daggers look in the Dauphin’s direction
to the fidgety OH GOSH NOW I AM ALONE WITH THE PRINCESS AND WHAT IF SHE DOESN’T LIKE ME mode…
He goes from Conquering King to Nervous Boy in a flash. In spite of the terrible textual butchering and editing (with obvious continuity errors), Hiddleston played that scene with the perfect blend of nervousness, earnestness, gentleness, affection, and humor. He portrays an adorable air of being tentative in the sense that he realizes his power as King is completely useless because he can’t command her to love him even if her father can command her to marry him. That’s why I love that he took off the crown. And I say again, the farm line was delivered perfectly.
He’s so careful. He’s so careful not just in the manner of his speech, but in how he is moving. He isn’t being pushy or impatient, he isn’t belittling her feelings. He appears to be genuinely concerned about her consent in the marriage, which is important considering that such marriages were all about power and politics and women were basically spoils of war. There’s a whole theory about how Shakespeare used the treatment of women throughout his plays as a sort of indicator of the general tone and final result, that the women are usually ill treated in the tragedies or use whatever power they have for the wrong reasons, whereas it is much different in the comedies. I think this scene in Henry V is even more interesting when placed in the greater context of Shakespeare’s work. I don’t recall anything specific that Hiddleston said about it, but he has talked in the past about how unique Much Ado is in that respect because we see Beatrice fighting for the falsely accused Hero and her conviction of Hero’s innocence causes Benedick to support that cause and he goes against the Prince in that matter. So. I can’t help but wonder what he was thinking about when he decided how to approach the scene in Henry V.
It’s lovely. Perfectly lovely.
The fingers under the chin.
How he can’t quite look at her right after.
How he sort of swoops down.
It’s sweetly ardent and youthful.
And did I mention the curls on his neck?
Notice that he doesn’t grip her chin or hold her to his body or do anything to inhibit her freedom of movement. She can pull away whenever she wants.
Plus, he glances up to her eyes.
And then the way he looks at her when her father returns, like he wants to gobble her up. *swoon*
AND THOSE BLASTED EYEBROWS
snowghoul
germansingergirl
tangentwithtanner
titsay
