Review: FAREWELL, MY QUEEN

Cast

Léa Seydoux as Sidonie Laborde

Diane Kruger as Marie-Antoinette, Queen of France

Virginie Ledoyen as Gabrielle de Polastron, duchesse de Polignac

Xavier Beauvois as Louis XVI

Grégory Gadebois as Louis, comte de Provence

Francis Leplay as Charles, comte d'Artois

Noémie Lvovsky as Jeanne-Louise-Henriette Campan

Vladimir Consigny as Paolo

Julie-Marie Parmentier as Honorine

Michel Robin as Nicolas Moreau

Lolita Chammah as Louison

Marthe Caufman as Alice

Jacques Boudet as Monsieur de la Tour du Pin

Martine Chevallier as Madame de la Tour du Pin

Grégory Gadebois as Comte de Provence

Jacques Nolot as Monsieur de Jolivet

Serge Renko as Marquis de la Chesnaye

Anne Benoît as Rose Bertin

Dominique Reymond as Madame

Jean-Chrétien Sibertin-Blanc as Monsieur de Polignac

Jacques Herlin as Marquis de Vaucouleurs

Synopsis:  1789, at the eve of the Revolution, Versailles' occupants still live happily, unconcerned by the increasing turmoil in Paris. When news about the storming of the Bastille reaches the Court, aristocrats and servants desert the Palace, leaving the Royal Family alone. But Sidonie Laborde, a young servant who reads to the Queen, refuses to flee. She feels secure as she is under protection of the Queen of France. She does not yet know these are the last three days she would spend by her side.

My thoughts:  Since yesterday was Bastille Day, I thought it highly appropriate to see the new film FAREWELL MY QUEEN, starring Diane Kruger as Marie Antoinette and Lea Seydoux as Sidonie Laborde, the young reader to the Queen, a minor office but one that gives her a certain prestige amongst the other servants and access to areas of Versaille that others do not have.  The highlight of this film for me was seeing Kathleen  Turner standing on the line to see the movie.  I knew going in that I probably was going to be disappointed but I had no idea how much.

This film was BORING, vapid, and uninspiring, did I mention it was also BORING? The running time is about 90 minutes, but it felt like it took four hours to get through this film, there were moments when I was nodding off in my seat, it was that dull. The French Revolution took less time and was more interesting than this film. Despite the fact that the movie was filmed at Versaille, it looked like the budget was about 50,000 Euros.  I'm also no expert on 18th century costume, so I can't accurately state whether or not the clothing in this film is historically correct for 1789, but I welcome comments to that effect.  The film also seemed to be edited funny, scenes would end with almost a cliffhanger but then the next scene had nothing to do with the previous scene, it was as if scenes had been cut out in the diting process.

The movie is based on a novel by Chantal Thomas, who also co-wrote the screenplay.  Thomas also also written a well-regarded work of non-fiction detailing how Marie Antoinette was demonized by the pamphleteers of the time. The director claims that he was inspired by Thomas's feminist take on the story of Marie Antoinette.  That probably explains the lingering shots of nudity of both Madame de Polignac and Sidonie in the film.  I found it particularly shocking that Thomas, who did so much to disprove the lies about Marie Antoinette, particularly the rumors that she was a lesbian, would be part of a film that does nothing but perpertrate those same lies.  Seriously, WTF?

Lea Seydoux, who plays Sidonie, spends most of the film looking either sullen or petulant when she's not eavesdropping on private conversations.  The audience keeps being told how devoted Sidonie is to Marie Antoinette but we never learn why or really see it.  Most of the time, she looks put upon. The film also intimates that Sidonie's feelings for Marie are of the sapphic variety.  Can someone tell me when did feminist and lesbian become the same thing? Diane Kruger, ironically, actually impressed me as Marie Antoinette, although physically she doesn't resemble the Queen at all. I've never been a huge fan of Diane Kruger, apart from the National Treasure films, for the most part I think the roles that she's played have required her to do nothing more than look pretty (see Troy). To me she's been just another model turned actress, one who shows up at premieres looking fabulous but that's about it. However in this film, there was actual acting going on.  I felt for her when she was telling Sidonie about her feelings for Madame de Polignac, and her good-bye scene with her love, even though inwardly I cringed.

One thing the film does well is to give the audience a glimpse into what it was like backstairs at Versailles compared to the aristocracy.  We witness the servants in their small rooms upstairs in the attics of the palace to their downstairs lives in the dining rooms and corridors in the lower levels of the palace.  We see the intrigues, the romances and hear the gossip about those who live above stairs. Sidonie and Madame de Campan apparently each have only one dress which they wear daily, Sidonie has to contend with mosquito bites and the poor sewage at the Palace.  We also see the rooms of the minor nobility compared to the luxurious apartment of Marie Antoinette.  However, unlike the synopsis of the film on Wikipedia, we don't really see aristocrats and servants deserting the palace.  We do however hear a lot of talk about what is going in Paris with the fall of the Bastille.  In the end though it didn't matter, because for the life of me, I couldn't figure out what the point of the film was.

After the movie, I walked over to Cafe Boulud to have a nice glass of rose and a chocolate eclair to help wipe away the memory. I think the final word on this film can be summed up by what I overheard another audience member say on the line in the ladie's room, "What a waste!"

Scandalous Women on Film: Marie Antoinette (1938)

Marie Antoinette (1938)
Produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Directed by W.S. Van Dyke
Written by: Donald Ogden Stewart, Ernest Vajda, Claudine West (based on the biography by Stefan Zweig)

Cast:

Norma Shearer as Marie Antoinette
Tyrone Power as Count Axel von Fersen
John Barrymore as King Louis XV
Robert Morley as King Louis XVI
Anita Louise as Princesse de Lamballe
Joseph Schildkraut as Duc de Orleans
Gladys George as Madame du Barry
Henry Stephenson as Count Mercey
Cora Witherspoon as Countess De Noailles
Barnett Parker as Prince de Rohan
Ruth Hussey as Duchess de Polignac
 
When I was a kid, I had a book called The Great Romantic Films by Lawrence Quirk which detailed a list of about 35 films up to about 1973.  I used to flip through the book constantly, marking off all the films as I saw them at the old Regency theater in New York and on television. One of the films listed  in the book was the 1938 film of Marie Antoinette starring Norma Shearer as the doomed Queen. For some reason or another, I had never gotten around to seeing the film until last week.
 
Just a little background on the film.  Norma Shearer had been Queen of the MGM lot during the late 1920's and '30's due to her beauty and talent but also to the fact that she was married to the head of production Irving Thalberg.  Marie Antoinette was the last project that he worked on before he died in 1936, while it was in the planning stage. Shearer became determined to make the film, even though her interest in her film career was waning. William Randolph Hearst had wanted to produce the film for his mistress Marion Davies (which would have been a disaster), but he clashed with Louis B. Mayer so he and Marion packed up their trailer and hightailed it over to Warner Brothers.
 
According to Wikipedia, the costumer designer Adrian studied the paintings of Marie Antoinette, even using a microscope to see the details. Some of Norma Shearers gowns combined weighed over 1,768 pounds.  The gowns exist to this day, although I'm not sure where they are being kept. Fabrcis were specially woven, and the fur on one of Shearers costumes was dyed to match her eyes, even though the film eventually ended up being shot in black and white.  The costumes are lavish and overdone (who knew they used so many sequins in the 18th century?). The film cost $2.9 million and it was not shot in color because it would have added to the budget which is shame because I'm sure it would have been stunning to see some of those costumes in color. Although the film was shot on the MGM lot, some scenes were shot on location at Versailles.  Apparently the film was the first time a film crew was allowed to film on the grounds of the palace.
 
My thoughts:  The film opens in Vienna, when the 15 year old Marie Antoinette is informed by her mother, the Empress Maria Theresa that she is to be wed to the Dauphin in France. Over the course of the film, Marie Antoinette must learn to negotiate the tight rope of the French Court,  as well as forge a marriage with a man she has just met who is indifferent to her.  When the King's mistress, Madame du Barry sends the Dauphine a cradle on her second wedding anniversary as an insult to the childless couple, Marie Antoinette becomes determined to become a party princess, spending more time shopping, dancing, and gambling to fill the deep hole in her life.  After she insults Madame du Barry, after agreeing to speak with her at a ball (to be fair du Barry started insulting her first), the King decides to have her marriage to the Dauphin annulled. Before the annullment can take place, the King dies of small pox and Marie Antoinette and her husband are King and Queen. As Queen, she becomes a well-meaning but out of touch humanitarian, trying to steer her husband through the minefield of French politics.  During the last half of the film, Marie Anoinette finally 'achieved greatness" according to Zweig's biography when the family are imprisoned. The final scene shows Marie Anoinette, hair shorn and gray, on her way to the guillotine, as the audience hears the voice-over of the young princess who was so excited at the idea of being Queen of France.
 
While Sofia Coppola's film may be more historically accurate in terms of depicting Marie Antoinette's early struggles, including the scene where she is stripped of her Austrian clothing and dressed in the French fashions, and the claustrophobia of the court and the constantly being on display, I much preferred this version. The film runs through Marie Antoinette's entire life, including the Affair of the Necklace which seems shoved in without any real context, clocking it at a whopping 2 1/2 hours. There is a grandeur to the film which is missing in the Coppola version and any sense of pathos. Even though Norma Shearer is pushing 40 at the time the picture was made, making her less credible in the early scenes when Marie Antoinette was a teenager, she grows over the course of the film as the character grows and changes from an immature teenager to the mature Queen facing her death with dignity. She looks absolutely stunning in the gowns, but it is the final scenes where she chose to forgo make-up to look as haggard and exhausted as possible that you understand why all the fascination with Marie for the past two hundred odd years.
 
The most heartbreaking scenes in the film are the final supper that Louis XVI has with his family before his execution, I defy anyone not to cry when the Dauphin asks his father to fix his toy soldier for him, and Louis promises to bring it back to him the next day, and the scene the next day where the Dauphin is tore from Marie Antoinette's arms, as she begs and pleads for more time.  Finally she pulls herself together for her son's sake so that he'll be less frightened.
 
The film certainly lives up to its inclusion in The Great Romantic Films.  The jury is still out on the exact nature of Marie Antoinette's relationship with Axel Fersen, most historians are evenly divided on whether they actually had an affair or not, but the scenes in the film are wonderfully romantic. Tyrone Power is at the peak of his handsomeness in this film, and one can certainly understand why Shearer's Marie would fall in love with him.  Their first meeting in the film is not historically accurate, here Marie Antoinette is at a gambling den, when she spies him from a window, and convinces him to pretend to be a Russian soldier.  The scene goes on for way too long but Power looks dashing in his first scene.  In reality, Fersen and Marie met at a masked ball, and he didn't know that he was talking to the Dauphine of France until she finally removed her mask.

There is a scene in the film where he comes to her and tells her that he had fallen in love wih her before he even knew her that just makes your heart melt, as does Marie's as she falls into his arms. Again, the final scene of the film just is crushing as the camera pans to Fersen hearing the crowd roar as the guillotine falls, kissing the ring that Marie gave him.  Robert Morley is wonderful as the awkward, child-like, and strange Dauphin, who seems to have been dropped on his head as a child. Throughout the course of the film, the audience gets to see their relationship grow into mutual love and respect.  Joseph Shildkraut plays a machievellian and oily, Philippe Duc D'Orleans who would sell out his own family.  The film implies that there was some kind of flirtation between the two of them that ends when it looks like Marie is on a fast coach back to Vienna. John Barrymore has only a few scenes as Louis XV but he makes the most out of them, and he even gets to say in English, 'Apres moi, Le Deluge.'
 
Of course,since the film was filmed in 1937, the nature of the reason why the marriage between Louis and Marie was not consummated is danced around.  Louis never says why he can't until after the King dies, and he suddenly announces that things are all right downstairs. The love affair between Marie and Fersen is truncated by her becoming Queen and then the whole being in prison thing.  The film includes a scene between the two of them when Marie is days away from the guillotine. Of course, it never happened but it makes for a romantic and tragic scene.
 
Verdict:  This film is well worth renting from Netflix or your local library.  Even after 70 years, it stands up. If you have time, make it a double feature with the Sofia Coppola version.  It's interesting to contrast, not only the different styles of film making but also the acting.