The King’s Speech: Thoughts

The King's Speech

6. There are children everywhere.

For a country that’s decidedly not Catholic, England has a lot of stray children roaming its streets and halls. Who are all of these people? Are they orphans? Urchins? Porcelain dolls? Whatever they are, I don’t trust them.

7. Even archbishops had to freelance!

With the advent of new media comes the advent of overworked creatives. When the Royal Court decides to release a newsreel that includes the King’s coronation, the Archbishop of Canterbury hires himself as video editor. That’s kind of like Pope Benedict offering to design your business card.

8. Class differences are hilarious.

Or so we’re supposed to think. Logue is a middling immigrant from Australia, and Bertie, of course, is the King of England. So, every now and then, the movie mines this hierarchical divide for some soft laughter. But there are poor- and hungry-looking children filling the streets (see #6) — stop laughing and start king-ing, Bertie!

9. Colin Firth should be in everything.

Seriously, this guy is something else. Every time I see this charming chap in a movie, I get mad at all other movies for not having Colin Firth in them. Even if he had just a minor role as, like, a British janitor or a British… person, he could instantly add buckets of charisma to any production.

10 Thoughts About... The King's Speech
The King’s Speech

10. Crowd-pleasing! Inspiring! Rousing! It left me speechless!

Movies like this one are the reason Alexander Graham Bell invented the Academy Awards so long ago. It’s a costume drama set within the dusty House of Windsor and filmed in Britain, but if you didn’t know better, you might think that the movie came straight out of a beaker in some Hollywood producer’s lab. That’s not necessarily a bad thing — movies don’t become worse simply for aspiring to win awards and accolades. And this movie evidently does deserve them, having won 8 Oscars, including Best Screenplay. Basically, if you don’t like this film, the Golden Globes, Oscars and BAFTA’s all disagree with you!

BRWC is short for battleroyalewithcheese, which is a blog about films.

NO COMMENTS

Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.