The Queen

No, I am not referring to Paul in a derogatory manner. Rather I am referring to the wonderful movie starring Helen Mirren.

Last night our friend Ruth called up and aske dif we wanted to see a movie. She is on her number 7 of her '10 Movies Over the Christmas Break'. We were happy for a night out although our movie philosophy is slightly different. She goes to be entertained whereas I like to go to think. Luckily with this movie we both won!

The Queen is a docudrama that scrutinizes public events where the wounds are still raw. "Queen" slips audaciously behind the famous facades of Buckingham Palace, 10 Downing St. and Balmoral Castle to catch Queen Elizabeth and Prime Minister Tony Blair in action. Both still occupy those positions. The screenplay, which director Stephen Frears has brought to life, zeroes in on the traumatic week in August 1997 following Princess Diana's death in a Paris car crash. The film, a fascinating mix of high-minded gossip and historical perspective, examines the clash of values -- of ritual and traditions versus media savvy and political ambition -- that leads to a crisis for the British monarchy. It is fascinating to watch the crash of hundreds of years of tradition against modern public sentiment.

One is so used to seeing movies and TV shows mock the British monarchy that it takes a while to adjust: This is a serious attempt to delve into the thinking and beliefs of several extremely well-known yet distant personalities. The actors do not look too much like their real-life counterparts. But the actors and filmmakers are dedicated to capturing their behavioral ticks, speech patterns and mind-sets so as to accurately as possible catch their actions and reactions to this tragedy. After you get used to the fact that the physical appearances aren't the same you do start to see many of the characteristics of the real people represented by the actors.

In the days following Princess Di's death, Queen Elizabeth (Helen Mirren), cocooned with her family in dangerous isolation at her summer retreat of Balmoral in Scotland, seriously misreads the grief of her subjects. Her silence over the princess' death, which she considers a "private matter," damages her image and the institution of the monarchy. Blair, a slick political practitioner of spin and PR, seeks to overcome the family's denial and confusion with an aggressive and one assumes unprecedented mix of persuasion and pressure.
 
Mirren's Queen comes off initially as a relic of a bygone era with a direct link to Queen Victoria herself. But over the course of the week, she emerges as ... well, a queen with dignity and durability, a woman dedicated to doing her duty but needing to cope with a newly discovered "shift in values." Mirren is superb in finding those telling moments where the royal mask drops to reveal the flesh-and-blood woman.

So, too, must Sheen's Blair adapt to an evolving situation. Whereas he is a little weak-kneed in his first audience with the Queen, despite his wife Cherie's (Helen McCrory) well-known anti-royalist sentiments, he now exhales and begins to push none too gently. Sheen has played Blair before in a telefilm also scripted by Morgan and directed by Frears. Yet Sheen still lacks the politician's supreme self-confidence and smoothness.

Prince Charles (Alex Jennings, stiff but correctly so) comes off as the voice of modernity in the family, but also a bit wimpy as he fears assassination in the days following his ex-wife's death. The Queen Mum (Sylvia Syms) is the soul of comfort and tempered advice for her daughter, but the advice pertains to another era and is of no use. Only Prince Philip (American James Cromwell, who really does not fit into this mix) acts like a blustering fool. Could he really be this daft?

The film's design is terrific as the formality in the Queen's apartments contrast brilliantly to the rough-and-tumble casualness of Blair's office and household. So the film serves dual functions. It's a giddy delight to see how these famous people behave among themselves. Yet on the serious side, the film gives us a tantalizing peak at how people operate in the corridors of power at moments of crisis.

They say that the movie is up for a number of Oscar nods and well it should be as it was excellent! Mirren wasoutstanding in respresenting a woman who has dedicated her entire life to an role that suddenly changed in a manner she didn't understand. Her gradual realization of this and her coming to terms with it makes for some very well-acted momments.

Comments

[redtown]

The film is brilliant in every way, save one.  In reality, the Queen's reactions to Diana's death surely covered a range of ambivalent feelings, and was not just a cold insistence on protocol and tradition, as suggested by the film.

Prince Charles tells his mother, "The Diana we knew was very different than the Diana idolized by the public", but this truth is never developed in the film.

Indeed, the "people's princess" remains the icon of superficial popular culture, the Royals knew a very different, darker character behind the facades of glamour and pseudo-compassion.

Both Diana and her brother, Charles Spencer, suffered from Borderline Personality Disorder caused by their mother's abandoning them as young children.  A google search reveals that Diana is considered a case study in BPD by mental health professionals.

For Charles Spencer, BPD meant insatiable sexual promiscuity (his wife was divorcing him at the time of Diana's death). For Diana, BPD meant intense insecurity and insatiable need for attention and affection which even the best husband could never fulfill. 

Clinically, it's clear that the Royal family did not cause her "problems". Rather, Diana brought her multiple issues into the marriage, and the Royal family was hapless to deal with them.

Her illness, untreated, sowed the seeds of her fast and unstable lifestyle, and sadly, her tragic fate.

Diana was no saint, and the Royals were not cold-hearted, as often portrayed in tabloids and films.