Watching Justin Chadwick’s “The Other Boleyn Girl” is like catching a highlight reel on ESPN’s SportsCenter instead of watching the entire game. You’ll get the gist of Anne Boleyn’s ill-fated affair with King Henry VIII, but additional research will be necessary if you hope to fully understand the historical implications of their destructive physical relationship.

Peter Morgan, Oscar-nominated screenwriter of “The Queen,” streamlines Philippa Gregory’s novel into a sordid tapestry of sibling rivalry and political positioning. At the time of the story, Catherine of Aragon (Ana Torrent) has failed to provide her husband, King Henry VIII (Eric Bana), with a proper male heir. Eager to improve his family’s status, Sir Thomas Boleyn (Mark Rylance) pimps daughter Anne (Natalie Portman) as a fertile match for Henry. But on a visit to the Boleyn estate, the king falls for Anne’s sister Mary (Scarlett Johansson), setting up one of the most awkward love triangles in England’s history.

As a period production, “Boleyn” lands somewhere between the opulence Joe Wright brings to a Jane Austen adaptation and the flippant teen dreaming of Sofia Coppola’s dreadful “Marie Antoinette.” The set design and costuming are suitable. Kieran McGuigan’s cinematography can be muddy, though Anne Pope and Youki Yamamoto’s score is noble and vibrant.

The women in the cast are exceptional. Portman stirs the pot, playing Anne as a flirtatious siren who obtains power with her sexuality. Johansson holds her own in a reactionary role, and Kristin Scott Thomas makes the most of her brief scenes as Lady Elizabeth Boleyn, mother to these mistreated daughters.

The men, on the other hand, are miscast. “Boleyn” needed a sleazier actor than David Morrissey to play the conniving Duke of Norfolk (Ralph Fiennes or Harvey Keitel would have been perfect). And Bana’s King Henry often looks perturbed instead of tortured, like he’d ordered pancakes for breakfast but was served eggs.