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Cate Blanchett as Elizabeth in Elizabeth: The Golden Age Greg Williams/Courtesy of Universal Studios

Cate Blanchett sits regally before a hungry audience at a meet-the-press moment in support of Elizabeth: The Golden Age. Her skin is a flawless, milky white as she faces a room full of journalists eager to pounce.

What can you tell us about Indiana Jones?

She disarms her captors with an easy smile.

"I can't," she says, briefly turning serious. "I'll be shot — and so will you. Don't joke, there're FBI people on the set." She beams at them again.

"Radiant" is too obvious a word to describe Cate the Great. "Luminescent" is a little closer to the mark — in person she glows and sparkles like her character Galadriel from Lord of the Rings. The crowns she wears in her films suit her. And when she speaks of her Elizabeth's desire to both possess her love interests and to become them, it's no great leap to understand her meaning — no doubt there are gads of admirers who would happily live in her shimmering skin.

This crown of Elizabeth has fit the Australian actress particularly well, garnering her an Oscar-nomination for her 1998 portrayal of the monarch, a person who was also known for her beauty and sense of the theatrical. Elizabeth's self-spun visage inspired the faith of her people, both Protestant and Catholic, though she kept those same people at a distance; Blanchett's character tells one suitor that she imagines a pane of glass separates her from others so that no one may come near.

Director Shekhar Kapur — returning to the subject that landed a Best Picture Academy Award nomination in his first turn, helming Elizabeth — plays up the Virgin Queen's isolation and iconic status with very deliberate scenes, dialogue, and camera angles, as when she faces down a snarling contingent of wild-eyed Spanish diplomats. She, shot from below, thunders with the force of the "hurricane" she threatens to unleash, while they wither in her presence — an effect punctuated in part by a distorting close-up of the petulant ambassador and his posse shot from above.

Kapur's Elizabeth is also a voyeur queen, who first encourages her lady-in-waiting Bess (Abbie Cornish) to engage dashing adventurer Walter Raleigh (Clive Owen) in conversation, then shivers while watching the handsome commoner later grope Bess in a sensual dance, and finally explosively attacks her attendant when she discovers that the two have married — but not, it's worth noting, before Elizabeth has commanded a kiss from Raleigh.

As she faces down the Spanish Armada in this dramatic take on her life, Her Majesty ages and feels her mortality, becoming a very human icon.

INTERVIEWS WITH THE STARS AND DIRECTOR:
	Cate Blanchett The Golden Icon
	Abbie Cornish The Lady-in-Waiting
	Shekhar Kapur Directing the Myth
	Geoffrey Rush As Royal Pit Bull