I walked into The Queen expecting a biography of Queen Elizabeth II with a wonderful performance by Helen Mirren. I kinda got that. Mirren's performance is outstanding but The Queen only covers the one week period following Princess Diana's death. If you remember, the Royal family was at their summer home at the time and stayed there with no public statement while it seemed all of England was flocking to London to drop off flowers at Buckingham Palace and mourn as a group.
The Guardian's review spends most of it's time explaining how The Queen is "the first ever critical depiction of the monarch in mainstream British drama". That's certainly significant and obviously the royal family didn't participate in the creation of the film. The films official site says the sceeenplay is "drawn from extensive interviews, devoted research, discreet sources and informed imagination".
It came across to me as exactly what you think you know about the family. Elizabeth is cold and aloof, Charles is inept, Philip is an ass, and the Queen Mother drinks. Charles is redeemed a little as he sheds a tear for Diana, comforts the children, and seems frightened of his mother. The Queen points out that Diana was no longer a part of the royal family and deserved no special notice from them. The flag wasn't at half mast because it's not a flag but a standard which is only flown when the Queen is in residence. Yeah whatever.
When the Queen wonders if she's supposed to drop everything and go to London or points out that she's thinking of the grandchildren that's all well and good until you notice she doesn't do anything but drink tea and is never shown with the grandchildren. We're shown Charles telling them the bad news and then Philip takes them hunting every day as a distraction. Elizabeth shows more sympathy for the killed stag than she does for Diana. I guess this is supposed to mean something but of course it's all complete conjecture.
One surprise was that I think the person with the most screen time was Michael Sheen as Tony Blair. He became Prime Minister shortly before Diana's death and had a better understanding of the mood of the people than their queen did. He talks with Elizabeth about the need for modernization. The movie shows her progression via telephones. At first we see her using rotary phones, while Blair uses modern cordless ones. But by the end, Elizabeth even uses a cell phone, wow.
The production values are all good. Good sets, costumes, makeup (all but Charles looked very much like their real live counterparts), etc. The cinematography was good with mostly eye level static shots giving a you-are-there effect. There's one helecopter shot over the countryside that just feels very out of place. Also some the Diana story is told with interspersed news clips and reenactments. Also towards the end there are a several cutaways to shots of Diana which seemed odd to me.
There's a point where Blair makes an abrupt turn-around and defends the queen's actions to his staff. It's fine for seeing the other side, but I don't buy it. At the end the Queen and Blair have a conversation about how quickly the public mood can change. While that's relevant to Blair now, it's nothing new.
The Queen is an exercise in restraint. There isn't much that happens with the main characters but that's used as effect. The characterizations while notable in sense of the film history also are not anything new. The acting is superb, Mirren is guaranteed a nomination, but the film (obviously) didn't do much for me. I have some sympathy for the Queen's point of view that people made too much of Diana's tragic death but I don't have any sympathy for the Queen.
No comments:
Post a Comment