Picspam: Mark Strong as the Duke of Norfolk in Henry VIII

[linndechir]

I can't believe it's been so long since the last picspam, bad me. Picspams are such a wonderful way of spreading the Mark love without actually having much work to do. ;) Since I'm having the worst writer's depression in a long time, have a ridiculous amount of screencaps instead of mediocre fic. Maybe Mark makes you as happy as me. ;)

These are from the 2003 TV movie Henry VIII, with Ray Winstone as Henry. Yeah, another movie about Henry VIII, as if there weren't enough already. Is it worth watching, apart from the fact that Mark is in it? Well, I don't know. You might say that it's less "pretty" and therefore probably more historically accurate than The Tudors, for example, but I honestly prefer The Tudors, and not just because they have more eye candy, but simply because it's absurd to stuff all of Henry's lifestory in one movie, even if it's three hours long. Ray Winstone may look more like the real Henry VIII, but Jonathan Rhys Meyers' performance is a lot better; Winstone was overdoing it at times, and no matter how ridiculous the real Henry might have been, in a movie it just looks, well, ridiculous and overdone, I found JRM more convincing. I don't know what drugs they were on to cast Helena Bonham Carter as Anne Boleyn. Their Cromwell was sleezy and disgusting and portrayed as an inefficient, grovelling idiot (just like the whole thing was at times disgustingly pro-Catholic), and their Cranmer was a manipulative, but otherwise boring bastard. Erm, I'm making this movie sound worse than it was, because it was still okay. It's not a pain to watch it, if you want to see Mark. It just makes my inner Cromwell fangirl cringe. ;)

I should stop rambling and get to the important part ... Mark as Norfolk. Really, it takes Mark Strong to make me like the Duke of Norfolk. ;) What a BAMF, such authority and charisma, he just walks around like he owns the place, and all of this with Mark's perfect, understated acting that makes you forget that there's an actor behind the character. I want to put him into The Tudors, where they conveniently ignored Norfolk's existence. -.- Anyway, enough rambling, here's a bunch of screencaps. Enjoy. :)








Gotta love that little smile. ^^


Leather gloves! And that neckline ... guh. That guy next to him is the king, btw.


Sorry for the bad quality, this movie was really a pain to cap. But I just had to include that laugh.


I love the combination of his half-bald head and the relatively full beard. I think it fits this very distinguished, but also cold and ruthless aura of his character. Does that even make any sense? ;)


No, he's not singing. ;)


I don't know why he wears pretty much the same clothes throughout the entire movie, but at least they look good on him.




"That's how we do it."


"Got it, bitch?" (not a direct quote, obviously, but his tone was pretty much like that)


I have no idea why Anne Boleyn insists on standing between him and the camera all the time. -.-






After telling Anne Boleyn what to do, he tells Queen Catherine what to do. Charming fellow, really. ^^


Gratuitous handshot. Don't worry, there will be more.


Unimpressed by Catherine of Aragon bitching back at him.




That guy next to him is supposed to be Cromwell. Something's wrong with an actor who makes me dislike Cromwell, I usually like him. Can we please have James Frain back?


Again, Anne Boleyn is standing in front of him. Maybe that's why he looks so annoyed? "I'm the Duke of Norfolk, I ought to have more screentime!"




He looks more and more pissed off ...


One of the many things I love about Mark Strong? Those wonderfully commanding gestures.


Anne Boleyn finally got out of the picture. Thank you.


I can't even remember why he looks so incredibly bored here. ;)


Probably wishing he were in a different movie about Henry VIII. ;)




Hand. Nothing more needs to be said.


I think the director was very well aware of having such an attractive Norfolk, because this movie is very generous when it comes to gratuitous fan service.



And this is the moment where I should introduce surprise!Sean Bean, as Robert Aske. Really, that man should play Northerners more often, I adore his original Yorkshire accent.







Well, we all know that Robert Aske doesn't survive all that long ...


It's Mark Strong, in armour, on a horse, with a bleeding, dying Sean Bean in the background. I love it when movies feature two of my favourite actors together in one scene. Even if one of them is dying. ;)


After disposing of Aske, Norfolk goes back to be slashy with his BFF the king. I was missing JRM's Henry all the time, but never as much as when these two were together. You want to know what they were saying here?
Henry: It’s good you’re back. I need a lion like you by my side.
Norfolk: It’s where I belong. I pray you never send me away again.
... lion ... by his side ... where he belongs ... right. I'm not even saying anything.


Epic WTF-face. I think Henry VIII made people look like that very often. ;)




I don't want to start shipping Norfolk/Gardiner ... oh goddamnit!


Thank you, Gardiner, for saving my sanity by being unsexy. ;) This scene features my favourite piece of dialogue. They're trying to find a new plaything for the king. Not sure who the woman on the right is, Norfolk's mother maybe?
Norfolk: What about my late brother’s girl?
Woman: Who? Little Katherine?
Norfolk: She was always a pretty little thing.
Woman: She’s barely fifteen!
Norfolk: Why, is that too young?
And while he says that, he makes this very oblivious, confused face. It's hilarious.








Insert JRM please?




This is the point where I completely lost it.  I watched this scene way more often than I should. Can you blame me? It's Mark Strong taking off his leather gloves with his teeth. This is better than porn.






Molesting Catherine Howard. What, she's only his niece, he's allowed to. ;) And I did promise gratuitous handshots. Speaking of those ...


...and...



Cromwell just got executed, of course Gardiner and Norfolk are happily sparkling at each other. It says a lot about this Cromwell that I didn't even feel sorry for him.









LULZ. :)






I REALLY don't mind him wearing this all the time ... ;)


Mentally facepalming about Catherine Howard's stupidity.






Does Norfolk have to slap a bitch?


He does. Lucky woman.














I know you can barely see his face ...but his state of undress and hand are reason enough to post this one.


You'd react like that too if the king died the day before you were supposed to be executed. ;)



So, that's it. I apologise for the sometimes poor image quality; it's not my fault, the quality on the DVD was rather poor as well. I suppose the Mark fans among you have already been convinced to watch this. And it's worth it: he has quite a bit of screentime, and his acting is as subtle and amazing as ever. If you don't particularly like Mark (or one of the other actors), this movie is not a must, though. It's okay and not boring, but it's not mindblowing either.


Comments

[linndechir.livejournal.com]

Erm, sure, here you go.

[inamac.livejournal.com]

Thank you for that. Damn, I've said it before, but it bears repeating, the man can work black leather.

Also, I desperately need a handporn icon...

[linndechir.livejournal.com]

That man can work ANYTHING. But black leather is preferable, of course. ^^

Like this one? ^^

[creeperx.livejournal.com]

OMG! Thank you very much for these. I had heard about this role and got interested but I could only find like... one videoclip with Mark in it and few pictures. These were really welcome indeed.

[linndechir.livejournal.com]

Glad you liked it. :) I got the DVD because I had trouble finding it online, but it was definitely worth it. Mark is just wonderful here.

I love your icon, btw. ^^

[assassin-nariel.livejournal.com]

Gratuitous porn is gratuitous, we get it. But I thought you would include at least a little Cranmer-shot. Just so we'd know.
And srsly, I expected Crom to look much worse. It's just the lack of eyebrows that creates the Grima impreshun.
*pets JRM*
You know, in The Tudors, they just combined the historical figures of Suffolk and Norfolk, to reduce the cast? The Aske thing, they had Charles do it, remember? So, basically, the King's hottie bff position is taken liek totally. *waves Charles/Henry banners* ;-P

[linndechir.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it's about as gratuitous as JRM sprawling around naked whenever his leg hurts. ;)

Erm, no, didn't want to inflict that on people. I'll show you Cranmer when you're here next time. About Crum ... I'll show you some shots where you see Crum from the side - his profile is HORRIFYING!!! Like, Himmler. Worse than Himmler. I know he looks acceptable on this pic, but, believe me, he doesn't look acceptable at all in the movie.

Of course they had Suffolk do most of Norfolk's stuff. Doesn't mean that I don't want Norfolk in there. And you know I ship Henry/Charles like every sane person, and of course they're the OTP and in love and all that jazz. Doesn't mean that Norfolk didn't bend Henry over, my dear. And if you don't see that, something must be wrong with your eyes. ^^ C'mon, not even a little squee from you? ;)

[serpentsign.livejournal.com]

*dies*

I just had to get that over with ;)

Henry: It’s good you’re back. I need a lion like you by my side.
Norfolk: It’s where I belong. I pray you never send me away again.
- This, made my day and if you don't send Mark!Norfolk to Tudorsverse nao, I'm going to cry. Yep.

Sooooo much hands, soooo much black leather soooo much Mark being a BAMF: I can die a happy fan girl's death now! ;D Thank you so much, and I'm so downloading this now *runs off*

*comes back* Do I remember correctly when I say that I promised Norfolk!icons? :)

[linndechir.livejournal.com]

I believe dying is the only normal reaction to this. In my head-canon, Mark!Norfolk is already in Tudorverse screwing JRM!Henry. Om nom nom nom nom. Norfolk needs a Hans-clone too, btw. ^^

I bloody well hope you're going to download and watch this asap. ;) Because you'd regret not doing it. He's such a BAMF in this, he amazes me in every scene.

Yeeees, you did promise Norfolk icons. I'll want them. Pretty pictures. And captions and stuff. ^^

Utterly Shameless Handkink.

[deborahkla.livejournal.com]

You know your friend has serious handkink issues when she inserts a photo that literally shows nothing but hands. I can forgive this shamelessness, however, for the very worthy hands featured. You're right, he does seem to wear exactly the same outfit throughout, with just the cloak and chain of office to hide it periodically. But damn if that wasn't one of THE BEST eras in history for men's fashions. I don't care what anyone thinks of me, that clothing was pretty damn fucking sexy. I tend to like your picspams since I don't get glutted with obssesive shot by shot screencaps that I could print, cut out and turn into a flipbook version of the movie. Although you ALMOST went there with the communion shots, thank goodness you restrained yourself. I think you just like seeing things go into Mark's mouth. ;-D

Re: Utterly Shameless Handkink.

[linndechir.livejournal.com]

Bwahahaha, true! But his hands were just so beautiful on those pics, how could I leave them out just because they didn't show his face? O:-)

These clothes include, a) over-knee-high leather boots, b) leather gloves, c) those white, almost see-through, half-open shirts. How could anyone NOT find that sexy?

Haha, to be honest, when I make screencaps I do obsessive shot by shot caps. I usually have five to ten times the number of screencaps that I end up posting. But, I am aware that not everyone is as obsessive as me, AND I am way too lazy to upload 500 caps. ;)
With the communion shots, I just couldn't resist. They were gorgeous, and religion is just so incredibly kinky ...

[te-amo-marco.livejournal.com]

Does anyone know where I can find this online? I wanna see it.

[crafty40.livejournal.com]

I think it was made for british TV but there are DVDs around (european region). It gets repeated on UK tv quite often but I dont know how to find it in downloadable version. I hope you find it.

[linndechir.livejournal.com]

It's rather difficult to find Mark's older movies online, so I usually buy the DVDs. Most of them are fairly cheap on amazon.co.uk or similar sites. There might be a download available somewhere, but I have no idea where.

[unsettledink.livejournal.com]

You make my life so difficult. You go and post these glorious picspams, and then I have to wait FOREVER AND A DAY for them to load on dial up. Because I know the omgmfhotdies is going to be massive.

And why is it so hard to find Mark's films? I am trying to watch more of them and none of the stores/rental places have anything older than last year. Driving me crazy!

[linndechir.livejournal.com]

Aw, I'm sorry. Slow connections are a pain, especially with massive picspams. I always try to keep them short, but "short" usually means no more than 100 pics. ;)

I know how you feel. Most of his old stuff is hard to find, especially the TV movies. Even downloads are rarely available. As I said in a comment above, the easiest is probably to get the DVDs, they're usually very cheap. Then again, most of those older British TV productions are only available on DVD for region 2 (Europe), not the US. :/

[anneka-neko.livejournal.com]

Hnnnnn I'M TRYING TO GO TO BED IT'S 4 IN THE MORNING STOP THROWING HANDPORN AT ME! Kidding. Throw it at me for forever. Bed's for losers.

Also. Saw the next to last one? And my brain instantly adds "DUDE, JESUS-- WTF, MAN?"

And leather glove porn is guh. <3 I just basically love you and your picspams so much AND NEVER STOP DOING THEM EVER! *hug*

[linndechir.livejournal.com]

I think looking at Mark at 4am beats sleep. :D

Haha, yes, he does look very much like some sort of martyr/saint. Then again, I understand his relieved reaction. He was supposed to be executed for treason, his ... erm, nephew, I believe, had been executed a few days before, and then the King conveniently died the day before Norfolk was supposed to be executed, if I remember correctly. Something like that.

His hands and those leather gloves, yeah. Really, some of these shots make me wonder if they WANTED to give the audience some gratuitous fan service. The open shirt, the taking-off-his-glove-with-his-teeth-thing, the endless gratuitous hand shots ... Someone wanted to make us happy. :)

Thank you! :) Glad you liked the picspam. There will certainly be more, one day. ;)

Picspam: Mark Strong as Norfolk

[weetiger3.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much for those! As always, you rock!

Re: Picspam: Mark Strong as Norfolk

[linndechir.livejournal.com]

Thank you for commenting. :) Glad you enjoyed the picspam.

[yelena-tetrol.livejournal.com]

Thank You very much! Great work!
In many of his films Mark is truly brilliant as an aristocrat. I love his cunning and calculating Duke of Norfolk <3
Mark is amazingly subtle, slender and handsome man and very talented, great actor. And he is very aristocratic in this film.

[linndechir.livejournal.com]

Ah, have you actually seen the movie? I was starting to feel like I was the only one around who had seen it. ;)
He is a great actor, he can play anything. It's true that he makes for an amazing aristocrat, but what I love so much about him that he's just as good when he plays gangsters or just normal people. He's convincing no matter what he does. But it's true that he has something very imposing and aristocratic about himself.

Thanks for your comment. :)

[ladynyks.livejournal.com]

I seem to recall it was a miniseries, right? 4-6 parts on the DVD, or something?

Anyway. Thank you for capping this, since I never got around to it back in the day and wouldn't have done half as good a job, anyway. I kept thinking I need to watch this again sometime after seeing Robin Hood last week, but you've reminded me of more reasons why I really should have and ages ago already. I'd forgotten the glove porn, for one. My main recollections remained the niece thing on a general level, pimping her off.

I like his lips in the screentime pic, and thank you for reminding me about Bean as well. I really need to dig out all my old Strong DVDs again and try to screencap something at least, since I don't think Births, Marriages and Deaths (or whichever way it went, I never remember) has been capped either, or some others I got from the UK back in 2004 or so.

[linndechir.livejournal.com]

On the DVD I have it's only divided into two parts, each one lasting a bit over an hour and a half.

How did you like Robin Hood? I thought it was a pity that Mark's character had so little screentime, I would have loved to find out more about his motivations for betraying John.

Pimping off his niece, fitting description. ;) I loved that scene. The movie is definitely worth watching again, if you haven't seen it in a while. I didn't like most of the actors in their respective roles, but Mark's Norfolk makes up for everything.
I don't think I've ever seen caps from Births, Marriages and Deaths, so I suppose it hasn't been capped yet. I've got the DVD here, but I didn't get around yet to watching it. Same goes for Low Winter Sun.

Anyway, thank you for your comment. :) If the picspam makes you want to dig your old Mark DVDs out again, all the better.

[olginha.livejournal.com]

Amazing role, amazing screencaps. Thanks a lot:-)

[linndechir.livejournal.com]

You're welcome, glad you liked the caps. :)

[sizerly.livejournal.com]

AH UHM.

AGAIN, MY FRIEND, YOU EXCEED YOURSELF IN ANOTHER BRILLIANT MARK STRONG PIC SPAM

I REALLY LIKE THIS ONE *v* BESIDE YOUR HILARIOUS COMMENTS, THE PULLING GLOVE OF BY TEETH AND THE FANSERVICE SHOTS ARE GUHHHH...I CAN'T EVEN COMMENT RIGHT NOW.

djfhsdjhsk
keep this up please.
and normally i'd like Helena Bonham Carter, but in this?? She just doesn't suit the role much.

and uhm mouth receiving biscuit shot.
i died.

[linndechir.livejournal.com]

So glad you liked it! :D This movie is so full of fan service ... the gloves, the naked chest, the everything. It was as if the director went like, "Mark, you're hot, and every woman and gay man in the audience will drool at you, so give them something to look at."

It's not that I dislike Helena Bonham Carter, although I'm not a big fan of her either, but I just thought she was a horrible Anne Boleyn. Although not half as bad as the guy who played Cromwell. *whine*

IKNOWRIGHT!!!! Christian porn, all this communion stuff, and the kneeling ... And people wonder why I find prist robes kinky. ;)

[viceindustrious.livejournal.com]

*grabby hands* Oh I need this now. Right now. Stat. It looks so gooooood. You rock for capping it! Gosh it must have been such a chore to sit and look at Mark for that long. :P

[linndechir.livejournal.com]

Yes, it was absolutely unbearable to look at him for so long. ;) Therefore I decided to share my pain, and force you all to look at him as well.

Glad you enjoyed the picspam. I have a few other Mark (and Hans) picspams on my journal, I don't know if you have seen them. ^^

[silk-noir.livejournal.com]

Oh lordy, thank you for this after a particularly rotten day.

[linndechir.livejournal.com]

You're very welcome, glad it cheered you up. :) I have a few more Mark picspams on my LJ, if you need more.