why are they portraying the english badly.

Another interesting and informative comment, I'm not so familiar with the history of the Normans so it's fascinating what you say here, and to be fair you make a good argument. It was never clear to me in school exactly why the Normans invaded England to begin with, didn't it have something to do with a dynasty dispute after Edward Confessor? Since he had no kids of his own, Harold claimed the throne but William did too, something about Edward growing up in Normandy and promising it to William? But still unclear why a whole-sale invasion came out of it it, though I guess in the medieval period the people as a whole were pawns in those dynasty struggles.

"cared that it was the Bastard Duke of Normandy and his mercenaries who invaded not the French King's men...they came speaking French, with French customs and ideas from France. "
Such an irony in alot of ways, the Normans were descended from Vikings and married the Franks who were a Germanic tribe, but in 1066 where were speaking.. French, a Romance language. Weird, like Vikings forcing French onto their English cousins. I guess the Viking Normans liked the Frankish women so much they just "went native" themselves or something.

"We can probably argue that it was the Normans who invaded France then centuries later, not the English since it was Normans who took over England and created the culture of continental rivalries and French/Latin elitist snobbery that still dominates the English language.

That said the genetic impact on Britain of the Norman invasion is almost zero - aside from a few ruling families (who still rule over the English) they didn't change the actual ethnic make up at all. Even the Vikings had more impact than the Normans. "

That's really interesting too, I'd heard that. That something like only a couple hundred Normans ever really settled in England, the rest of the soldiers in William's army were mainly just Dutch mercenaries who got their money and went back home, or fellow Normans who went back home for their own reasons. And the Normans themselves were mainly Vikings anyway. I'm not even so sure about the language impact, sure the nobility in England spoke French for two centuries, but that was common throughout a lot of places in Europe, French was so "genteel". I don't really know Russian, German or Dutch that well, but the bits I've picked up or read in lit classes, seems like for some reason they snagged a lot of French words for some reason too. Still do today to try to appear snobbish and high class I guess.

But that's true, without the Normans and their confused claims in England on the continent, there's probably no reason England would have gone to war in the 100 years war. Weird in a way, it's like a mirror image of the Viking Normans "going native" in France earlier with Rollo. By the 100 years war a couple centuries later, the Norman invaders in England began "going native" too and adopted English identity and customs, plus they were so outnumbered by the English, yet they only got involved in France because of those old dumb dynastic battles that William the Conqueror cared about it. In fact, didn't William of Normandy himself get killed in a battle against a French opponent, like a hint of the later 100 years war fighting?

Because this film is from the french / Joan of Arc's point of view

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Movies like Braveheart and the Patriot, well it portrayed the english as the were.

How ever, thats not to say no one else was anybetter.

The french throne was entitled by heredity to an english king, the french were just too *beep* arrogant to let someone else rule. so, they decided they'd let two thirds of the population be slaughtered. the french were the bad guys. sure, the english invaded, but a hundred years before the war they took english lands in mainland europe by force. just because the english wanted what was theirs they are evil? lol. okay.

All of humanity is built on bloodshed. The fact is, Britain is a deeply liberal country and put up with a lot of accusations of villainy and brutality - even in their own films, they are always willing to show the negatives in their own society, contrary to the French who very rarely do (La Haine springs to mind as an obvious example of honest self-examination). A lot of other nations like to gloss over the bloodshed, especially the nations that are spiteful toward the British. Former colonies, France, etc - all of them have much to be ashamed of, but it's easier to scapegoat a declining force in the world.