It seems odd, but IMDB’s got nothing. Has there really never been a film version of the Henry IV plays?
There was a wonderful British television series in the early '60s that included the historical plays from Richard II through Henrys IV-VI, and Richard III. The series was called An Age of Kings. I’ll never forget the young Sean Connery as Hotspur in Henry V. Hubba hubba.
Eep, my memory is all futzed up. Hotspur was in Henry IV, Part 1. Sorry.
Arrrrrgh. I’ll start looking. I was in Henry IV pt. 1 once (as Falstaff), and I know I saw a black-and-white film version of it shortly after. More info as I uncover it.
http://www.imdb.com/find?q=henry+iv;tt=1
Strange. It appears as if Pirandello’s opera about the Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV has been filmed more often than Shakespeare’s play about the English king.
Orson Welles made a film called Chimes at Midnight. It told the story of Falstaff using material from Henry IV, Henry V, and The Merry Wives of Windsor.
Chimes at Midnight, made by Orson Welles in 1965 (Welles plays Falstaff) (IMDB link – http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0059012/) – is exactly what you’re looking for, but it’s hard to find. I saw it once, on a cassette rented from an indie video store specializing in cult films and such; the sound was really crappy. I wish somebody would re-release it in DVD.
On the subject of Chimes at Midnight, you’re not the only one to have had problems finding it. When the NFT in London ran their exhaustive Welles season a few years ago - which included obscurities like minor TV programmes and the surviving fragments of The Deep - they found they couldn’t obtain a print available for screening, even with the backing of his estate and the full resources of the British Film Institute.
My understanding is that most of the problems with the sound were present from the start, but there’s the possibility that they could now be digitally cleaned up. Quite who’s controlling the rights, I have no idea.
The Best Video Store Ever, Poor Yorick, carries Chimes on VHS. It’s very expensive though. (That said, I shelled out for a copy a while back and didn’t regret it: it’s a splendid film. The three lead actors – Welles as Falstaff, Sir John Gielgud as Henry IV, and Keith Baxter as Prince Hal – are all just brilliant.)
There are also, of course, a few TV versions floating about – most easily available is the one from the BBC TV series in the 1970s, with Anthony Quayle as Falstaff, Jon Finch as Henry, and David Gwillim as Hal. It’s a rather uneven production, and Gwillim’s Hal tends toward the bland far too often, but it has its moments. Part two, interestingly, is stronger than part one, possibly because the 1970s BBC production values better suit the decaying, washed-out world of the second half than they do the scope and energy of the first half.
A better TV version – actually a film of a stage production – is the 1989 English Shakespeare Company production, starring Michael Pennington as Hal (after having played Richard II, which leads to some interesting effects when you watch the whole set back-to-back), Barry Stanton as Falstaff, and Michael Cronin as King Henry. It’s done in modern dress, and works beautifully. I highly recommend it – it’s very hard to find, but in Ashland, you might actually have a chance of tracking down a copy.
In general, the histories beyond Henry V and Richard III haven’t fared well on film – there’s an indie production of Richard II (which I haven’t seen, perhaps surprisingly) and a few TV versions and filmed stage productions, but apart from Chimes nobody’s done feature-length versions of the multipart Henry plays. Which is a real shame, as they’d transfer to film beautifully, I think – the scope would be positively epic, particularly if (and this is one of my fondest cinematic dreams) some filmmaker were lucky enough to have the resources to do the whole cycle…