8.1:  How about including a list of well-costumed, atmospheric
    movies that people could rent to see what a particular
    period might be like?  If a picture is worth a thousand words,
    a moving picture is worth ten thousand!

Done.  Following is a list of movies, separated into the following 
time periods:  Early Medieval (500 to @1050 AD), Middle Ages (1050 to
@1450 AD), and Renaissance (1450 to 1600 AD).  An exclamation point 
(!) indicates that the movie contains a wedding scene.

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BORDERLINE ANCIENT/MEDIEVAL (mid- to late-400's)
  Sign of the Pagan (about Atilla, ruler of the Huns @433-453)

SET DURING THE EARLY MEDIEVAL PERIOD (500 to @1050)
  The Knights of the Round Table
  Sword of Lancelot
 !First Knight
 !Excalibur
 !Camelot
  Prince Valiant
  Sword of the Valiant
 !The Sword in the Stone (Disney animation)
  Monty Python and the Holy Grail (932 AD)
  The Green Knight
  Prince of Jutland
  Merlin and the Sword
  Merlin of the Crystal Cave
  Flight of the Dragons (animated)
  The Sword and the Sorcerer 
  Dragonslayer
  Tristan et Iseuldt
  The Vikings
  The Littlest Viking
  The Longships
  Eric the Viking
  The Norseman
  The Black Arrow
  Charlemagne (late 700s France)
  Alfred the Great (late 800s England)
  King Lear
  Dragonheart (late 900's Britain)


SET DURING THE MIDDLE AGES (1050 to 1450 AD)
  MacBeth (set mid-1000s Scotland; 2 versions: 1) w/Orson Wells,
      2) w/Jon Fitch)
  Hearts and Armor (mid-1000s Spain)
 !El Cid (late-1000s Spain)
  Hildegard (11th C Germany)
  The Crusades (about Richard the Lion-hearted)
  The Seventh Seal (set during the Crusades)
  Ivanhoe (late 1100s; 2 versions: 1) w/Robert Taylor,
      2) w/Anthony Andrews & Olivia Hussey)
  Robin Hood (many versions: !1) w/Errol Flynn, 2) w/Patrick
    Bergin), 3) w/Michael Praed/Jason Connery [aka Robin of 
    Sherwood], 4) Disney animated)
 !Robin Hood, Prince of Thieves
  Robin and Marion
  Robin Hood-Men in Tights
  Men of Sherwood Forest
  The Zany Adventures of Robin Hood
  The Court Jester (12th C England)
  Lionhart
  The Flame and the Arrow (set in Italy)
  Ladyhawke (based on 12th C French legend)
  The Lion in Winter (about Eleanor of Aquitane and Henry II,
    ruler of England 1154-1189)
  Beckett (archbishop of Canterbury during reign of Henry II)
  Brother Sun, Sister Moon (St Francis of Assisi, 1182-1226)
  The Navigator: A Medieval Odyssey (moves from 14th C Cumbria
	to 20th C New Zealand)
  The Conqueror (about Genghis Khan, early 1200s Asia)
  Alexander Nevesky (mid-1200s Russia)
  The Dragon and the Sword (Russian)
  The Magic Sword (13thC)
 !Braveheart (late 1200's Scotland)
  The Black Rose (time of Edward I & Kublai Khan, late 1200s)
  Edward II (early 14th C)
  The Name of the Rose (set in 1312 monastery)
  The Sorceress (13-14th C France)
  Anchoress (1320 England)
  The Falcon of Serbia (1320s Serbia)
  Andrei Rublev (14th C Russia)
  The Virgin Spring (based on 14th C legend)
  Decameron Nights (about Italian poet Boccaccio, mid-1300s)
  Hamlet (set 1300/1400? 2 versions 1) w/Mel Gibson,
    2) w/Laurence Olivier)
  Rosenkrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (Hamlet comedy)
  Richard II (late 1300s England)
  Richard III (late 1400s England)
  The Black Shield of Falworth (in the reign of Henry IV, early 1400s)
  The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1400's France)
  A Walk with Love and Death (1400s Italy)
  Joan of Arc: A Portrait of a Legend (1428 France)
  The Passion of Joan of Arc (1431 France)
  Henry V (early 1400s England; 2 versions 1) w/Kenneth Branagh,
    2) w/Laurence Olivier)
  Tower of London (late 1400's England)
  The Advocate
  Brother Cadfael
 !The Warlord
 !The Princess Bride
  Jabberwocky (Monty Python)
  Stealing Heaven (about Abelard & Heloise, early 1100s France)
  Black Adder I (British comedy)
  Snow White (Disney)
  Sleeping Beauty (Disney)
  Willow


SET DURING THE RENAISSANCE PERIOD (1450 to 1600)
  Captain from Castille
 !Much Ado about Nothing
 !The Taming of the Shrew
  Romeo and Juliet (2 versions: 1) w/Norma Shearer 1936 and
     2) w/Olivia Hussey
  The Borgias (early 1500s Italy)
  If I Were King (life of Francois Villon, mid-15C French poet)
  Christopher Columbus (late 1400s)
  1492: Conquest of Paradise (about Christopher Columbus)
  Flesh & Blood/renamed The Rose and the Sword (1501)
  The Agony and the Ecstasy (about Michaelangelo in 1500s Italy)
  Martin Luther (early 1500s Germany)
  Nostradamus (lived 1503-1566)
 !Prince of Foxes (Italy 1500s)
  Diane (de Poitiers, mid-1500s France)
 !The Return of Martin Guerre (1540s France)
  The Six Wives of Henry VIII (ruler of England 1509-1547)
  The Private Life of Henry VIII
 !Anne of the Thousand Days (Boleyn, 2nd wife of Henry VIII)
 !Lady Jane (Grey, grandniece of Henry VIII)
  Nine Days a Queen (about Lady Jane Grey, mid-1550s England)
  The Blood on Satan's Claw (16C horror)
  Cry of the Banshee (16C horror)
  The Sword and the Rose (Disney; about Princess Margaret,
    sister to Henry VIII)
  A Man for All Seasons (set during the reign of Henry VIII;
     2 versions, 1) w/Charlton Heston & Vanessa Redgrave,
     2) w/Orson Wells)
  Mary, Queen of Scots (mid-1500s)
  Mary of Scotland
  Othello (mid-1500s; 3 versions, 1) w/Orson Wells, 
     2) w/Sir Laurence Olivier, 3) dir/Branagh)
  Aguirre, Wrath of God (1560s South America)
  Ivan the Terrible (mid to late 1500's Russia)
  Young Bess (the early years of Elizabeth I)
  Elizabeth R
  The Virgin Queen (Elizabeth I, late 1500s England)
  The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex
  Seven Seas to Calais (Sir Francis Drake, late 1500s)
  Orlando (begins during the reign of Elizabeth I)
  Black Adder II (British comedy, Elizabethan)
  Queen Margot (late 1500s France)
  Doctor Faustus (late 1500s Germany)
  The Mission (late 1500s South America)

BORDERLINE RENAISSANCE/MODERN (early 1600s)
  The Three Musketeers (1604 France) 7 versions: 1) 1911-silent,
      2) 1921-silent, 3) 1935 w/Lucille Ball, 4) 1939-comedy,
      5) 1948 w/Gene Kelly as D'Artagnan, 6) 1974 w/Michael
      York as D'Artagna, and 7) 1993 Disney)
  The Four Musketeers (1604 France)
  At Sword's Point (about the four Musketeers)
  The Three Musketeers 20 Years Later
  Cyrano de Bergerac (lived 1619-1655) 2 versions: 1) 1950 w/
     Jose Ferrer, and 2) 199? w/Gerard Depardieu
  The Last Valley (set in 1641)
  Taras Bulba (17th C)
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