Yesterday, I went to see The Young Victoria with a friend. In one respect, I was quite satisfied: the movie was a two-hour lush-fest: sumptuous fabrics, intricate hairstyles, and endless rooms elegantly wallpapered and furnished, filled with beautiful stuff (The Victorians really loved stuff.) Miranda Richardson flouncing and huffing around as the Duchess of Kent with enough hair to keep a dozen Dickensian orphans warm on a cold winter night. Rows of men in plaid pants and impressive muttonchops. Jim Broadbent getting uproariously drunk. A large supporting role for Victoria's Cavalier King Charles Spaniel, one of the cutest fucking dogs in British history (thanks, Charles II!):
omg!
Anyway, the movie was unquestionably pleasing to the eyes. Unfortunately, that was about where it ended. Second to the sheer lusciousness of the production, the most impressive aspect of the movie was the fact that it seemed to have literally. no. plot. whatsoever.
This is not always actually a problem for me. As someone who spends an unspeakable amount of time each week simply looking at images of pretty things, I don't need a plot to make myself feel better about doing it. I suppose it is a bit like the way some people consider pornography: do we really need to know that Vivienne McGoodLay is a lonely housewife who needs a brawny young fellow to stop by and fix her, er- plumbing? No, thanks. Just skip to the goodies.
Sofia Coppola's Marie Antoinette gets the pretty things porn formula exactly right (and yes, Dear Readers, I understand that I am now, officially marking myself as unoriginal for bringing this movie into the mix. Deal). Coppola dispenses with plot almost entirely, but she makes it ever so clear that she has done so intentionally. She wants us to gush over shoes and macarons and corsets and Jamie Dornan without any pressure to remember which one is the Duchesse de Char and which is the Comtesse de Cavazzoni. The little glimpse of Converse in the pivotal shoe-shopping scene (I love any movie with a pivotal shoe-shopping scene) is a not-so-secret message: Enjoy the frivolity. Imagine that you, too, can have a picnic on a boat in a gigantic dress, drink a ton of champagne, and then sleep with whoever you want because you are the queen, goddammit.
I love the little girl's expression in the background.
The Young Victoria, I imagine, had greater ambitions.
Okay, I just tried for several minutes to formulate my impressions of those greater ambitions, and I came up with nothing. I honestly couldn't tell you what they were getting at with this movie. Yes, being a queen is hard. Yes, having a better job/ bigger salary than your husband can cause marital strife. Yes, Paul Bettany, despite looking dashing as fuck in a fancy hairdo and gilded military jacket, can potentially lead you to fall from favor among your people. So what??
He will charm you right out of those restrictive lace undergarments.
How I wish one or more of these themes (or another potentially more coherent theme) could have been explored in more detail, with more focus. Or, alternatively, that the director had given us free reign to sit back and enjoy the pretty things with some secret message of his own (my vote is a quick, nearly imperceptible shot of Rupert Friend jumping into his big royal bed in a pair of striped H&M boxer briefs. But this is only one option).
My advice to anyone who is considering spend ten hard-earned bucks on The Young Victoria is as follows: if you love the Victorian (or, sort-of-leading-up-to-Victorian) aesthetic, you will probably derive some enjoyment from the movie, plotlines be damned. However, do not expect any of the following: believable dialogue, boobs, Jim Broadbent lasting past the first forty minutes. The movie earned extra points from me because of the German dialogue and the excessive composer name-dropping (who knew that Schubert's Schwanengesang is actually the perfect theme for a movie created in the 21st century?), so if you are into that: go wild. But don't say I didn't warn you.
...
In keeping with the theme, a couple other points of interest:
http://www.vanityfair.com/style/features/2009/05/emily-blunt-portfolio200905
Emily Blunt as photographed by Michael Roberts, in the tradition of the September 2006 Marie Antoinette photoshoot in Vogue.
And, just to keep an air of class about the place:
Perfection.
PS: Hi! Welcome to my newest blogging experiment!
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