Before we get into the gloriousness that was The Young Victoria, let's digress and talk about the previews. All the previews were for action and/or horror movies, which is an odd fit for an English period drama, but I guess the marketeers were going for the disgruntled boyfriend market. The lamest of the lame previews was for The Crazies, an upcoming thriller starring Timothy Olyphant and/or Josh Duhamel because I can't tell them apart. Something weird is happening to the townsfolk...dun dun dun! Think Children of the Corn meets Day of the Dead meets a Sci-fi channel original movie. Normally I'd brush this off as a stupid looking movie with a dumb name, but then a moment of music blasphemy happened which motivated me to trash The Crazies here on Yeah Right. What song played throughout said trailer? "Mad World" by Gary Jules...aka the Donnie Darko song. Some songs are intimately connected to a movie and it feels like cheating to have them in another. Think "Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)" in Kill Bill Vol. 1 or "Girl, You'll Be A Woman Soon" in Pulp Fiction. "Mad World" falls into that category for me. So two thumbs down for The Crazies.
Onto The Young Victoria, which was fabulous. The acting was superb, the plot was engaging, and the sets (including interior shots of Buckingham Palace [Victoria was the first monarch to live there] and Kensington Palace [where she lived with her mom before becoming queen]) and costumes were breathtaking. From what I know about Victorian era England, it was a pretty accurate portrayal of the events (minus the fact that Victoria was left-handed and Prince Albert never got shot). Even with the added dramatization, the simple facts of Victoria's youth were bound to make a good plot: King William is super old. Victoria, the queen in waiting, is only 17 and has been largely shielded from the royal court from her mother. There was intense pressure for her to sign a regency agreement (basically turning over power to someone else) since she was so young. Victoria refused to sign said regency agreement. King William holds on until Victoria turns 18 then promptly keels over. Victoria becomes queen (three cheers for the coronation scene) and promptly flubs a lot of things up because she doesn't quite know what she's doing yet. And all the while, countless adults are trying to manipulate her and countless suitors are vying to be Mr. Queen Victoria. Hello, real-life drama.
Even with all the interesting history and political conflict, the central force of The Young Victoria is the love story of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, played brilliantly by Emily Blunt and Rupert Friend. They had great chemistry for a couple whose courtship consisted of brief visits and lots of letter writing. Clearly that worked out for them, as they were quite the tag-team of rulers. After Albert died, Victoria even insisted on wearing a toned-down crown so as not to be flashy in her state of morning (which lasted a really long time, as she was the longest serving British monarch).
Verdict: Four stars.
Onto The Young Victoria, which was fabulous. The acting was superb, the plot was engaging, and the sets (including interior shots of Buckingham Palace [Victoria was the first monarch to live there] and Kensington Palace [where she lived with her mom before becoming queen]) and costumes were breathtaking. From what I know about Victorian era England, it was a pretty accurate portrayal of the events (minus the fact that Victoria was left-handed and Prince Albert never got shot). Even with the added dramatization, the simple facts of Victoria's youth were bound to make a good plot: King William is super old. Victoria, the queen in waiting, is only 17 and has been largely shielded from the royal court from her mother. There was intense pressure for her to sign a regency agreement (basically turning over power to someone else) since she was so young. Victoria refused to sign said regency agreement. King William holds on until Victoria turns 18 then promptly keels over. Victoria becomes queen (three cheers for the coronation scene) and promptly flubs a lot of things up because she doesn't quite know what she's doing yet. And all the while, countless adults are trying to manipulate her and countless suitors are vying to be Mr. Queen Victoria. Hello, real-life drama.
Even with all the interesting history and political conflict, the central force of The Young Victoria is the love story of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, played brilliantly by Emily Blunt and Rupert Friend. They had great chemistry for a couple whose courtship consisted of brief visits and lots of letter writing. Clearly that worked out for them, as they were quite the tag-team of rulers. After Albert died, Victoria even insisted on wearing a toned-down crown so as not to be flashy in her state of morning (which lasted a really long time, as she was the longest serving British monarch).
Verdict: Four stars.
dude, when John and I saw this at E Street Theatre there was this BIZARRE preview for a french animated film that looked like Gumby on crack - did you not get that preview?!
Posted by: Whitney | February 08, 2010 at 03:19 PM
I would have loved a Gumby on crack preview! I got five action and/or horror previews which seemed totally out of place for TYV.
Posted by: Allison | February 08, 2010 at 09:41 PM
I've spent most of SnOMG watching episodes of Monty Python's Flying Circus, so I should also point out in this discussion of Queen Victoria that she inspired some pretty awesome Monty Python sketches over the years. My favorite is the Queen Victoria Handicap from the Hamlet episode. I could only find part of it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ktYMkxD0Fzc
Posted by: Allison | February 11, 2010 at 01:16 PM