The King’s Speech
Death Race 31, Sarah 25; 11 (!) of 24 categories completed
What a triumph of casting The King’s Speech is. Everyone looks perfect for his or her part — especially Guy Pearce as the abdicant, Eve Best as Wallis Simpson, and Timothy Spall as Churchill — and everyone’s wonderful in his or her part. I’d just seen Pearce as the earnest, frustrated Leckie a few days before; he’s just as good and believable here as the self-absorbed, easily led Edward VIII. It’s a pleasure to watch this group of pros at work (although, much as I loved the “and…will Their Majesties be staying…to dinner?” line and her flawless delivery thereof, I wish Jennifer Ehle had more to do). Helena Bonham Carter in particular is a joy, because she plays straight so well and seems to do it so seldom. That four-second sigh of utter relief towards the end is a story in itself.
The film is almost predictable in its highs and lows, but not entirely, and predictable isn’t necessarily bad, not when it’s done as well as this is. The camera finds ways to crowd Colin Firth and isolate him by turns, putting characters in unexpected places in the frame, and the script finds ways to explore some moments and elide others we don’t need. I also appreciated that the King isn’t “fixed” at the end. I had expected (or feared, really) 1) a revelation scene, a la Good Will Hunting‘s “it’s not your fault” sequence that tried to explain the origins of the stammer; and 2) a “survived the big speech, all better now” ending, and on a human level, I’m sorry for Bertie that it didn’t go down like that. On a movie-going level, thank God, on both counts.
Colin Firth: what can you say. I think the conventional wisdom here is that he’ll “win for” the Oscar he didn’t get for A Single Man, but this is a great performance of its own. That he can render Bertie’s struggle so effectively and vary and build on it in each subsequent battle with the letter P is really something. He’ll win regardless, but I hope it’s genuinely for this, because it’s great work.
The other actors probably don’t figure in their categories, which is too bad. Geoffrey Rush is not often my favorite — he lays it on a bit, in my opinion — but Logue has a handful of small bits here, realizations about himself, that I really liked; alas, it’s Bale’s. Bonham Carter has no shot either, and I love her performance here, but that category…oy. I don’t understand Adams’s nomination at all. I really like her; she didn’t register with me to that degree, acting-wise. The writing of the character, the directing of her, sure. Leo, similar problem: she’s a fantastic actress, she should have gotten more attention for Frozen River, but here, it’s like…trashy styling is not acting. She’s good, but she’s not that good. Steinfeld: wrong category (not that she’d have won in Best Actress, but still).
Anyway: good movie. All the praise it’s getting may have you braced for Masterpiece Theater meets After School Special, but ten minutes in, it’s clear that it’s more than that. And best of all, I knocked off nine categories in a single viewing. Thanks, Firthie!
Tags: Amy Adams Christian Bale Colin Firth Eve Best Geoffrey Rush Guy Pearce Hailee Steinfeld Helena Bonham Carter Jennifer Ehle Melissa Leo movies Oscars 2011 Death Race Timothy Spall
I’m just very grieved by the studio’s decision to (somehow!) remove the scene with the profanity in order to drop the R rating for the re-release. This is one film in which the language genuinely serves the story (something which is very, very rarely the case); I think it’s a shame both that the studio would cave in order to market the film, and that the review board (and parents/teachers) don’t have the sense to see and understand that.
To be fair, my father, who is British and remembers King George’s wartime speeches, says it’s nonsense and the real King George would never, never ever, have let such words ever pass his lips no matter what the circumstances, and that the filmmakers erred in the first place by including them. (He hasn’t seen the movie, though.)
I’ve been anticipating your review of this movie for weeks! I am so glad you approve of it! Its just so wonderful in SO many ways and Colin Firth is deserving of any and all praise for his role!
Thank you, Sars!!
I completely agree that the casting is phenomenal (altho’ Spall is two feet too short for Churchill; all of his scenes should have been seated) and that each actor’s perfomance was incredibly keenly observed.
In the scene where Ehle meets Firth, her gasp of recognition was a micron away from her Lizzie Bennett’s “Mr. Darcy!” at Pemberley, but that made me love it all the more. (Seriously, though, how is it that Jennifer Ehle doesn’t get more work? Here’s hoping that she’s all the time on stage rather than in films, but I don’t know for sure, so I’ll just fume at the injustice of it all.)
Guy Pearce is seven years younger than Firth — and looks it — but I think this is another coup of casting. The age difference highlights the callowness and immaturity of the character. It’ll be fun to compare Tom Hollander and Gillian Anderson’s take on Edward and Wallis this weekend in Masterpiece to Pearce and Best (OMG Nurse Jackie’s Dr. O’Hara! Flove!).
I also appreciated the humor and restraint of the film; for the former, my favorite of many examples is the swearing scene (and on a tangent, I really hope Weinstein doesn’t edit this scene just to get a PG-13 rating), and for the latter, my favorite of many examples is the scene where his daughters have to greet Bertie for the first time as king. This is a really well-written screenplay, and while I think others in that category were better (ANOTHER YEAR and INCEPTION), I won’t mind if it wins.
Having said that, I did find fault with the film in two areas. I’m afraid I disagree about Guy Pearce being well-cast; while I know Edward is supposed to be more callow, and Pearce certainly acts that well, he’s also supposed to be older, and he never convinced me he was older than Firth. Also, some of the choices in how to photograph it seemed very odd. I understand the rationale of having a close-up right on Firth when he’s muffing that opening speech (the claustrophobic effect), but other times, it’s very distracting. Mind you, it’s not enough to dissuade me from recommending the film, I just don’t think it’s the Best Picture of the Year.
@Katharine: Wait, that scene is gone now? I’m so confused!
I loved everything about this movie, most especially how it was such a great depiction of friendship. And while predictable in some areas, these were/are real people who really lived these lives. The only thing I wish there had been more of was HBC, partly because I adore her and partly because I would have loved to explore what it’s like to marry a member of the royal family and have reservations about that aspect of it…and then have that person become king.
I know all about the ‘controversy’ concerning the strength of the real Bertie’s stammer, and the Nazis, and etc. But come on folks, it’s a dramatic retelling, not a documentary. Whatever haters – I just loved it! I haven’t had such an enjoyable experience watching a movie in a long, long time. Three cheers!
@Esi: It’s not gone yet, but Weinstein is pushing really hard. Apparently neither the director nor Geoffrey Rush think it’s a good idea, and both have spoken out against it.
For some reason, a thought came to me when I went out to lunch today regarding this film, and it came from the movie Ten Things I Hate About You. Bianca and her friend are walking through a parking lot, and the friend says “I know you can be underwhelmed and you can be overwhelmed, but can you ever just be ‘whelmed’?”. If you can (I think that movie’s joke was “you can in Europe”), that’s precisely how I came away from The King’s Speech.
The thing is, I can’t disagree with you on any of your observations about the casting, directing, acting, any of it. I just could not bring myself to care about this film. To me, it had the same kind of bland Driving Miss Daisy-type of “Oh, well, that was pleasant. Wait a minute, the movie about the old lady and her chauffeur just WON BEST PICTURE?!?” feeling to it.
It’s all perfectly pleasant, even enjoyable, and as ludicrous as the Oscars are under all of the artifice, there’s still an air of importance to them, and this movie didn’t feel important, or even particularly powerful, which is why although I’m fine with Firth winning (and it is a consolation prize for last year), once it started wracking up every Guild award in sight, I started getting irritated. I guess it’s comforting in a strange way that Bob Weinstein’s still got a bit of money for Oscar campaigning left, but if he does, he should have thrown it after Blue Valentine, not this.
This is not dislikable, and it’s a measure of how good the prestige-picture crop is this year that it represents the low end for me. It’s well crafted; it’s well performed; it’s easy to look at and listen to. It’s also jerry-rigged and phony, and its gentility and elevated tone are keeping too many people from either noticing or minding. This is the kind of movie that uses low humor as a sort of anesthetic, or distraction technique. So, having had the expectation that it’s going to be a boring endless trudge, you chuckle a little and relax in your seat, and then it gets by with just being shopworn. Going in knowing very little about this king and his speech therapist until I read up on the subject afterward, I still could hear the gears grinding every time the script reordered, compressed, and artificially inflated facts in order to satisfy its very conventional narrative aims. One would have the impression, for example, that all of these events took place over the span of a few years, rather than that these two began working together 13 years before the climactic speech, and a decade before the abdication “crisis.” And oh, OF COURSE, they’re going to have their “You’re not properly trained and licensed!” / “I never claimed to be! But I helped you!” third-act throwdown on the floor of Westminster Abbey, at a pivotal moment for Bertie’s speech struggles and (we must believe) the fate of mankind. And of course this will be because of the digging and meddling of that moustache-twirling representative of the bad old British class system. The same British class system that keeps Geoffrey Rush from getting parts! (I mean, Logue. GR does well for himself, obviously.)
I’ll admit, an element of my having a hard time investing in a way that would allow me to shake off those minor irritations was deep personal cynicism about all things British Royal. I don’t care how loudly you blare Beethoven’s Seventh at me and how many relieved and newly determined prole faces you show me while One Man Wins A Small But Symbolic Battle. It cannot make the scene more than the reenactment of a scripted address by the powerless figurehead of a system that was quaint and, even by that point in history, heading for its overdue irrelevance. If fewer people in 1939 thought of it in those terms and took great comfort from his words, I’m actually glad. But…I’m still watching it in 2011.
The Queen (to which this is often compared) was a deeper and more involving movie.
It was not until I read Sarah’s breakdown of Supporting Actress that I realized, however, I would give Helena Bonham Carter an award for this performance ahead of either of the two women from The Fighter…and I liked both of them. It’s also interesting that HBC’s name has different associations to different people; we think of one or the other type of movie/performance as her “usual.” I still associate her first and foremost with very restrained performances in literary/period films (A Room With A View, Lady Jane, Howards End, The Wings Of The Dove). So to me, that is her fixed image, and when Sarah writes, “[S]he plays straight so well and seems to do it so seldom,” I have a momentary “Wha?!” reaction. Then I remember…yeah, some people hear her name and think of Fight Club and the Harry Potter series and some more recent batshit turns I did not see.
@Drew, do you think it’ll win Best Picture? It does have the most nominations, and sometimes it’s the least problematic movie that ends up sneaking through with a victory, but for some reason I’m not seeing that happening.
But I felt the same way about BV that you felt about this. Actually, that’s not true: I was underwhelmed, on balance, by that one.
As far as cutting the cursing scenes, that’s obviously ridiculous, but with that said, it was one of the few scenes I didn’t care for, because it pandered.
I really liked this movie. Didn’t quite love it: still had a wisp or two of “After School Special” about it here and there, but in the main, it didn’t try to overtell the story, which is why it succeeded for me. Desperation isn’t always turned up to 11–Bertie probably had plenty of days when his stammer didn’t bother him much (bother as in annoy/humiliate, not “wasn’t around”.) But to feel this inoxerable chain dragging you towards microphones, microphones, everywhere, and thinking that you will always and forever be that stammering, redfaced, tortured child that your father tormented; it was all in Firth’s face as the film went on.
I especially loved the scene with his daughters and his telling them a story. Firth said it was very important, to show that the stammer was a permanent part of his life and not just a “fear of public speaking” thing, and that while he was relaxed around his family it didn’t magically conjure it away.
And HBC, she was fantastic. “Would you like a sweetie?” “It’s Your Royal Highness *waves a gloved hand* and then Mum after that”–just loved her to pieces.
I read a quote about the real Queen Mum, when she was a young woman, from a soldier from WWI, when her than-residence was being used as a hospital for wounded soldiers and she was very much involved in their care: “The woman should be hung, drawn, and quartered. Hung in diamonds, drawn in a carriage, and quartered in the best house in the land.” Sigh.
@Sarah/Drew: I’m thinking it has Best Picture and several other things. It’s acquiring that inevitable air. The Social Network peaked too soon; the Academy is still oldish, and British accents in the 1930s will trump hacking and coding in the early aughts.
My problem with the cursing scene was that, post 2002, I cannot watch a character yelling random profanity without thinking of Larry David’s method of defusing the Tourette’s-afflicted chef’s outburst at the restaurant opening. Enjoy. (Language warning, obviously.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LTmHS-T5dLA
@ Sarah: I absolutely think it will win Best Picture at this point. Social Network seems to have run out of steam in the weeks since it won at the Globes (it’ll probably still pull off Best Adapted Screenplay, and possibly Best Director for Fincher), but the more wins King’s keeps piling up, the more I think it’s going to take it (I actually hadn’t thought of the fact that it led the nominations). If memory serves, the last film to win Best Picture that didn’t take home most of the Guild awards was Crash. King’s has won all of them except the WGA. It’s got the momentum.
I totally agree about Amy Adams, she was really nothing special at all in The Fighter. My pick for that category is Hailee Steinfeld.
TKS felt like a pretty formulaic movie to me, so I don’t get why the director is winning awards for it. I’d say he did a competent job but nothing special. The performances are the draw here. I’ll have to disagree about Guy Pearce though. He did do a good job (as did everyone) but he’s just so obviously younger than Colin Firth that it kind of took me out of the movie.
I too think that Firth genuinely deserves an Oscar for this role. The man does so much with his face and body language, it’s amazing. The scene where he’s talking about the abuse he suffered at the hands of his nanny as a child was chilling.
I’d agree that it’s obvious & sentimental in a lot of ways that scream “Oscar Bait!”, but in similar ways that Black Swan’s crazy ballerina schtick also does. This always happens, and Driving Miss Daisy probably isn’t the most egregious offender ever (I have to think about which one is).
It’s the more subtle, less message-delivered-with-cricket-bat-upside-the-head type of film that I think is better represented in this category this year, like Winter’s Bone and The Fighter, that I wish would win but most likely won’t, unfortunately.
And don’t get me wrong, I can dig the cricket bat movies if they’re well done. Wait until Redford’s the Conspirator comes out; I saw it in September, and while it was also obvious, historical & messagey, it was really well done. A lot can be forgiven with really well done, and it happens often at Oscar voting time.
As for Katharine (NTFO)’s father, I’d like to think that behind closed doors good ol’ King George was different than anyone in the public would have ever thought him to be.
I loved this film from start to finish, and when it was over I wanted to buy another ticket and see it again. I often think Geoffrey Rush lays it on a bit, but I didn’t think that here. Maybe because he has a few moments of quiet perfection that slay me. In the scene where Bertie talks/sings about the cruel nanny who wouldn’t feed him, Firth was heartbreaking, but it was GR’s reaction shots that knocked the wind out of me. And when he was in the booth with Bertie for the big speech, it was like he was watching this man become a king before his very eyes. Great work there.
HBC was so enjoyable, much because I was relieved I wasn’t seeing a twitchy, crazy person (Bellatrix can be a bit much) and her exchanges with Firth were so delightful. The bit about Wallis calling Elizabeth the “fat, Scottish cook” and those lines, “I am getting plump,” “but you rarely cook.” Loved those little moments. Loved it all. I’ll be delighted to see it win Best Picture.
Sars, it’s great that with this movie you knocked out a bunch of categories; you may win the race yet.
I enjoyed the heck out of this film, and everyone’s performance in it. And how embarrassing, I didn’t recognize Jennifer Ehle at all. I love her.
The theater was full when I saw it, so I had to sit in the front row of an IMAX theater. Colin Firth’s head was ENORMOUS.
I’m with Allison in that I really wanted to sneak back into the theater and watch it again, immediately. Colin Firth is so wonderfully Firthy, and Rush, Carter, Spall, and even Ehle in her small role also performed admirably – I was never taken out of the story by seeing or hearing them onscreen or by any of their acting choices. One thing I really enjoyed about TKS is that while, yes, there is some simplification, the characters are not outright caricatures – they are complex, there’s no real hero and no real villain (except perhaps the prospect of Hitler looming on the horizon), and they don’t necessarily improve on all of those imperfections throughout the movie. I can see where some folks lose interest because it focuses on the British royalty, but that’s simply where history places this story. If it was the story of (for instance) any other everyperson shunned or made fun of for a stammer, and the friendship s/he developed with an instructor from a different walk of life, I’d like to think that it would have had the same emotional resonance to me – that it was the beautiful writing and acting that brought out those feelings, and not the setting. Two very different people with their own foibles found a way to connect and develop a friendship despite what would otherwise be an insurmountable obstacle (in this case, monarchy vs. the common man) and they way they got there is to me a very moving story.
@ cayenne: Interesting that you thought of Winter’s Bone as a message movie. I came away with the least impression of that possible (and Sars, I think you still owe us your review of that one, considering you promised it in the first essay of this year’s Death Race). To me, it’s greatest strength lied in simply laying things out as they were, without judgment. I’ll hold off on the rest of it until Sarah posts her review, but that was my main impression.
Sars – could you expand on why you thought the cursing scene pandered? I had a stammer growing up, and while I was too young for this, cursing like this (or at least getting angry) is, from what I’ve read, a valid technique in trying to deal with a stammer. Plus, I must admit it gives the film a “rough around the edges” feel to keep it from being as twee as some people are calling it.
@Sean: I’m sure it’s a valid technique, but it felt scripted for an easy laugh. There’s even a scoring cue that makes sure you know it’s 1) a big breakthrough and 2) hilaaarious. Ha ha, the uptight royal who refused to call him “Lionel” is shrieking profanities! I enjoy a string of unpleasantries as much as the next girl; this felt cheap.
I’d agree with the “pandering” criticism, but, to me, the entire scene was redeemed by that last “…tits.” And it only worked because Firth spent the whole movie up to that point earning that particular cheap gag by how he built Bertie–it worked on at least a few more levels than “uptight British royal is *cursing!*” It seemed, in a way, like a Bertie way to end a string of profanities.
Or maybe I’m saying that it pandered, but it pandered *really well.*
Or, maybe I’m a cheap date. Hee…”…tits.”
I agree with you about Hailee Steinfield belonging in another category, but I’m pretty sure they stuck her there so she’d have an outside chance of winning. She’s never win in Best Actress, but maybe in Best Supporting.
I would argue that NO OTHER actor could have made the role of Logue resonate the way Geoffrey Rush did – and that is something that could earn him the Oscar over Bale, whose role was one that could have been portrayed by any fine, sinewy actor.
@Drew: oy, tripped up by poor sentence construction, cos…I didn’t think Winter’s Bone was a message movie. Sorry to be so unclear. And I agree with everything you said. Of the bunch that I’ve seen that are on the BP list, Winter’s Bone is my favourite. It’s just so clear, unsentimental, non-judgemental, non-messagey. Plus the adaptation from the book is really, really good, small alterations aside.
@Allison: Oh god, the part about his nanny just about BROKE me, as did the part about having been a lefty but “trained” to write with his right hand. My Father has a stammer AND was left handed and forced otherwise AND grew up with a crazy person who was abusive. The parallels there were hard.
@ cayenne: Not your fault at all. I reread your earlier post and realized that I completely misread what you had said, which was perfectly clear. You hit it right on the head. The simple ones are the ones I’ve responded to the most, as well this year: True Grit, Winter’s Bone, and Blue Valentine.
FWIW, although Guy Pearce is younger then Firth, GP is actually about the same age Edward was during the events of the movie (GP is 43 and Edward abdicated at 42). Firth is a touch old for the role, as Bertie was 40 when he became King and CF is 50.
That actually bugged me during the first scene in the movie when Bertie gives the disasterous speech. It was 1925, which meant Elizabeth was 25 and Bertie was 30 when that happened and the actors are two decades older.
But that minor quibble aside I really enjoyed the movie.
I loved this film. It’s not particularly to my taste, but I was able to take my 94yo grandmother and my 65yo mother to see it and all three of us were crying at the end. My grandmother remembered hearing the speech live on radio at the time (we are Australian) and she is a monarchist so it was very special to share this with her.
I don’t know what version was shown in the USA but here the swearing was retained (that sort of thing isn’t an issue here – I don’t recall there being any public discussion of it)and I thought it was intergral to the story.