1000 years ago life was brutal. Yet from the darkest of ages, the art of romance came into being. When all yours neighbors are barbarians, what caused some men to herocially create the model of grace, nobility, compassion, and love? To give high regard to womanhood was key. This new school of training was established in the courts by Eleanor of Aquitaine. Within her palaces, a revival of ancient Roman architecture she endowed all of the forms ofromance - writing love letters, giving flowers, singing love songs, declaring engagement with rings, the valentines ceremony, and courtly manners. This was a great transition for humanity, and for this, the primary creator Eleanor suffered mightily, largely forgotten.
Eleanor of Aquitaine was a forceful and voluputous Queen who cultivated a romantic Renaissance that changed human nature. Eleanor believed in love as a prime good and the primary drive of humanity. Shetapped into the power of desire. But as queen of two countries she was emprisoned by her Kings for the excess of her nature. King Louis of France seized her as a teenager and went to the Crusades with her where he emprisoned her for her passionate influence over men. King Henry who was to take the thrown of England compelled her to leave the French thrown, but he too jailed her for fifteen years. Eleanor hearoically imposed her will and her failures were heroically romantic, yet the outcome of her tragic struggles changed all of humanity. Through her passion in the West and her compassion in the Mideast, our world of romance and chivalry was born. For those who cherish romance and chivalry and those who want to discover its birth - her story serves a legend, myth and warning.
It is hard to imagine that studios of romantic adventure have overlooked its very origin. Eleanor precedes Joan of Arc, for Eleanor was a warrior in the Crusader in the Holy lands. Compared to Joan, Eleanor left the world with so much more. And yet, Eleanor today is an erased face of history.Her story is epic and personal. For she seduces, gives birth, and generates a rule over four great kings. Opposed by the church and despised by powerful men, she becomes Queen of France and then the Queen of England. In a different age with strange customs, she builds a complex family of ten daughters and sons. Restrained by her husbands and church she manages to develop the courts of love, the Book of Love, the rewriting of the King Arthur tales and the great romantic songs and poems of the time. She defines the rituals of romance, chivalry, and produced fantastic courts of love as pageants, then endured the worst. Through patience she triumphantly becomes the grandmother of Europe. She redefines the role of an essential woman - temptress, mother, professional, grandmother - and in so doing redefines the role of man. Eleanor compels a code of love that stretches from her passion in Europe to her compassion in the Middle East. It is the story of woman who becomes transfigured in the rituals of love against a backdrop of terror, brutality, oppression, hate and fear. Eleanor's story is how she evolves to become erotic, artful, and powerful in spite of mighty forces, enriching a masculine world with her femininity.
The powerful and controversial legend is an original screenplay, ELEANOR OF AQUITAINE which begins in 1137 when Eleanor is 15 about to become the Queen of France.