*** (out of ****)
Starring Helen Mirren, Michael Sheen, Alex Jennings, Roger Allam, Sylvia Syms, Helen McCrory, Mark Bazeley, and James Cromwell
Directed by Stephen Frears & written by Peter Morgan
2006
97 min PG13
Oh, of course a little part of me hates this movie for receiving 5 or 6 Oscar noms, 4 Golden Globe nominations, and a 98% on Rotten Tomatoes while the similarly-themed but more inventive “Marie Antoinette” is chastised by critics, overlooked by awards, and ignored by audiences. Everything “Marie Antoinette” describes through oblique imagery is here spelled out in dialogue – sometimes with reporters and interviewed people on the streets directly addressing the camera. Instead of giving us something to think about with an incongruous ‘80s soundtrack, The Queen is always accompanied by a stately classical score. The framing, editing, and pacing is all conventional – everything that challenges us with “Marie Antoinette” is stripped away.
The opening scene sets the tone as being smart-but-not-deeply smart: The Queen tells her painter “I sometimes wish I could vote.” The painter replies “I sometimes forget that The Queen can’t vote!”, a piece of needless exposition for viewers who didn’t glean that from The Queen’s previous statement.
“The Queen” is the kind of engrossing yet artistically stunted film that loses Oscars for Best Picture but will certainly give Best Actress a run for its money. Apparently the US still lives in awe of jolly old England: when Brits speak imperiously it must be important. There’s a lot of standing around wood-paneled rooms reading newspapers aloud, watching TV, and talking on phones; “The Insider” probably makes those moments more cinematic than any other movie I’ve ever seen, and it does that by adding throwaway details like rain on windows, Styrofoam coffee cups being put down, and glances across the city. Except for one helicopter shot there’s no reason why “The Queen” couldn’t have been on “Masterpiece Theatre” (Mirren, after all, has done very well for herself with “Masterpiece Theatre’s” “Prime Suspect” series). If “Masterpiece Theatre’s” period pieces look a bit on the cheap side, keep in mind that their present day stuff does not.
Still, as I said, “The Queen” is inherently engrossing, and we feel the most for the newly elected Prime Minister Tony Blair (Michael Sheen of “Wilde” and “Underworld”). Constitutional monarchy is probably the most idiotic form of government – either be a monarchy or a republic, but make up your mind. A true monarch who claws and kills his way to the top is more worthy of respect than figureheads kept cooped up in a castle until they’re trotted out to look pretty. We feel for Blair as he has to deal with them.
Yet we also feel the downside of democracy as well, as Blair has to deal with a public, as publics tend to be, unable to grasp nuances or complexity. Mirren is getting most of the attention, but Sheen’s performance is the real stand-out. He comes to feel for her plight, even if he doesn’t agree with her, and there’s something so diplomatic about the head-patting white lies he tells her in their final scene. That everyone else in the movie is kept at about two dimensions isn’t really to the film’s discredit; this is a two-person drama.
The film’s central conflict is The Queen and the royal family’s refusal to bend to public pressure after the death of Princess Diana. Being someone who followed Diana about as much as a cat follows a car, I probably missed much of the resonance of this section. I’ve heard tell that she was a looker, but perhaps that’s only relative to English royalty, which isn’t much competition. Mostly I just couldn’t get over how someone so rich could have a 1984 haircut so far into the ‘90s.
Finished Thursday, December 28th, 2006 (except the Oscar noms - added Feb 25 2007)
Copyright © Friday & Saturday Night