Late to the party on this one. In fact I’m so late that everyone else has
moved on to other parties about one specific time in a famous person’s life
like The King’s Speech, Lincoln and Behind the Candelabra ‘n’ shit. Well it’s a pretty good party anyway. I especially like the venison hors d'oeuvres.
Who the fuck knew something like not acknowledging Princess
Diana’s death could be so goddamn interesting.
I actually thought this film was supposed to be about the whole life of
Elizabeth II but it only showcases one week.
These couple of days sum up perfectly though not only her as a person
but also the monarchial institution.
Here’s how shit went down.
Princess Diana dies in a car crash in Paris in 1997 (oddly enough this
is one of those I-remember-where-I-was-at-the-time things for me, watching Saturday Night Live (it was funny back
then), when they stopped the show for breaking news) and of course Elizabeth is
kinda sad. She never cared for Diana
very much but she was still the mother of her grandchildren and future kings. The rest of the English people are immensely upset
over Diana’s death because she was the people’s Princess and all that. Elizabeth just wants to move on from this and
pretend like it never happened.
The newly elected Prime Minister, Tony Blair, tries to
convince the Queen that she needs to address her people and show that she gives
a shit. Elizabeth refuses and the
country turns on her. At one point one
in four are in favor of eliminating the monarchy and establishing a republic in
its place. All because the Queen won’t
show Diana any respect.
And part of it really is about giving respect to get
respect. Elizabeth thinks she has been
selected to lead her nation by God so in turn she also thinks that her people
need her more than she needs them. This
upheaval shows that this isn’t the case.
The commoners don’t want a Queen if she’s not going to respect them and
their wishes.
Another part of it is about appearances. Elizabeth feels she needs to hide her
feelings and essentially be a robot. She
wants to put her needs second to those of the country. The whole notion of stiff upper lip and
carrying on no matter what the difficulty is a British trademark. The Queen is supposed to embody this
ideal. Ironically by acting this way she’s
not putting the needs of her people before her own. The country needed to grieve but Elizabeth
didn’t want to join in. She’s a
surrogate mother to all her subjects and they need her to mourn with them. By ignoring their feelings Elizabeth is
holding England back from properly processing Diana’s death and moving on.
There’s also the deer allegory. Throughout the picture there’s mention of a
big deer roaming the woods in the Scottish countryside where Elizabeth has
retreated to until the Diana thing blows over.
She sees the thing and it really is a beautiful looking animal with a full
rack of antlers and a robust build. This
is supposed to represent the monarchy in all its glory. Later the deer is shot and beheaded. Elizabeth goes over the detached head and
pets it realizing that the monarchy is not an indestructible establishment. If the people don’t want it anymore then they
can cut its head off. In order to
preserve this wonderful (and fantastical) concept Elizabeth knows that she has
to go to London and do what her people want her to do, tell them she’s sorry
Diana’s dead and show up at the public funeral.
Alright, I’m gonna be real upfront about this, the reason
why I bumped this to the top of my list was because when I recently upgraded
the “Movies I’ve Talked About” section I noticed that I haven’t talked about a
movie starting with the letter q. It didn’t
seem right to neglect that particular grapheme so I went to my Netdicks
list. Turns out The Queen was the only one on my radar that started with a q and the
rest is history.
I’m really glad I saw this.
I didn’t think I would like it as much as I did and found this near
brush with dissolution very fascinating.
The story doesn’t sound like it would make for an entertaining movie but
goddamn is it engaging.
Also, I really appreciate that the filmmakers put the camera
down for this picture. I don’t think
there’s one steady cam shot in the whole thing.
Thanks director Stephen Frears (High
Fidelity) and cinematographer Affonso Beato (Ghost World), you made my day.
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