A great cast, fascinating period story and striking physical production pull you in to this absurd & funny, vicious & ultimately melancholy look at a lethally bitchy rivalry between two women at the British court, competing for the ear (and favors) of an increasingly frail, increasingly needy, increasingly explosive Queen Anne during her twilight years in the early 1700s. Olivia Colman got all the notices & awards as the prickly, love-hungry Queen (with a host of debilitating medical conditions, how could she miss?), but Emma Stone is just as fine, bright blue eyes flashing after a fall to reduced circumstances, now rising thru slander, gossip, flattery & masturbatory manipulation from lady’s maid to new-minted aristo. Best of all, Rachel Weisz (in a role Kate Winslet turned down) as the Queen’s longtime confidant & policy advisor, married to that warring patriot Lord Marlborough, but now finding herself outplayed by a fresh upstart. The problem for the film is that director Yorgos Lanthimos is so busy putting his authorial stamp on everything, he over-eggs a rich pudding to the point where it never sets. Pushing his cast to tear a passion to tatters when a wink would suffice; skipping basic character info that would help the plot cohere (Emma Stone marries who?)*; shooting with distorting ‘fish-eye’ lenses as if the absurd clothes, makeup & hair styles of the day weren’t ridiculous enough all on their own. A great pity since so much is so very good in here. Fortunately, Lanthimos (eventually) calms down and the end makes its mark. Though even here, an indication of the fates of Queen Anne (soon to die) and Lady Marlborough (three decades to go) would have been nice.
SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: In the moments when the film runs off the rails, you can spend the time before it gets back on track imagining Weisz & Stone doing a read-thru of ALL ABOUT EVE.
ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *For instance, how might our feelings toward the Queen change if we knew of the twenty-four (!) children she & her late husband lost thru miscarriage, stillborns & early death?
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