An unlikely monarch and an unlikely movie:
Firth is among the most inward of actors, able to communicate a puzzled discomfort with a simple shift of his eyes; and in the role of Bertie—as Logue insists on calling him—he shows us a man walled in by the starchy imperiousness in which he’s been trained (“You’re the first ordinary Englishman I’ve spoken to,” he awkwardly tells his new therapist), and straining to free himself in search of help. Firth’s ability to project a fully detailed character through the scrim of Albert’s disability—a strangling knot of glottal chaos—is a marvel of concentrated skill.
Carter is also fine as Bertie’s affectionate wife, officially a commoner herself, who can play the game of royal deportment and also set it aside when necessary. (“It’s ‘Your Majesty’ the first time,” she tells Logue’s flustered wife (Jennifer Ehle) with muted amusement, “then ‘Ma’am’ after that.”)
But Bertie made himself - with the help of his formidable Queen - a very fine King.
I think that's the only time I've ever heard Colin Firth drop an F-Bomb. Actually, it was more like an F-Bombardment. Intensely entertaining, though.
ReplyDeleteThe film almost makes me want to move north to Canada and swear fealty to Elizabeth II.
ReplyDeleteH.R.H. Queen Elizabeth Time Lapse
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tmHWYgPZBVw
Finally saw this movie, and thought it was blighted by a deeply conflicted ethos. In order to care about the hero's struggle requires that the audience take kingship seriously, but the director panders throughout to modern, egalitarian sensibilities.
ReplyDeleteIronically, if Logue had really been as republican in outlook as portrayed (and perhaps he was--I wonder how accurate the film is in this regard), then he would probably have preferred Edward VIII's style of monarchy. It's a little ridiculous, actually.
The C of E gets an especially unfavorable portrayal, and the coronation is portrayed as a bit of a joke. I actually found it, on the whole, to be rather distasteful.