young victoria

hollywood royalty (martin scorcese) and actual royalty (sarah fergeson) have come together to produce a film about the longest reigning royal in english history- victoria.  this story starts when she is very young and ends when she is a little less young.  i wish they re assemble everyone from this movie and make "middle aged victoria", and "elderly victoria" and maybe even "dead victoria".  i'd watch them.

the rule for quite a while in oscar world has been: play an english queen and win a nomination and or an oscar- helen mirren played and won for elizabeth II, judy dench for elizabeth I and cate blanchett was nominated (and was robbed) for a younger elizabeth I. emily blount as victoria is beautiful (difficult in the bizarre hair and dress fashions of the early 1800's) and gives a lovely performance, but she should be happy with a nomination. it's not her fault, the script isn't very meaty despite all the dramatic opportunities in her early reign. there really isn't that much for her to do that oscar likes to reward.  the performance with which i was most taken was rupert friend who plays vicoria's much beloved  husband, alpert of germany.(she built a huge gold statue of him as just one of her tributes to him) rupert was earnest, elegant and also lovely.  he reminded me of a young omar shariff in "the mayerling" or louis jordan in "the swan" with his very chiseled features and gracious, believably royal demeanor.  paul bettany, miranda richardson, and mark strong, give good supporting performances as the evil self promoting adults who are meant to protect and guide victoria  in her earliest days.  mark strong needs to stop playing villians, he's good yes, but i have only seen him play bad guys- "sherlock holmes", "rocknrolla", "miss pettingrew lives for a day" and "stardust".  jim broadbent gets to have the most fun playing the spoiled, over privileged king william. just for grins, princess beatrice, 5th in line for the english throne, had a non-speaking role as an extra at the wedding of her great-great-great-great grandmother victoria. it helps having mommy as a producer.

the sets are beautiful- it was filmed in kensington palace where victoria acutally lived ( i've been there), windsor castle, blenheim palace, arundel castle and belvoir castle.(it helped having a duchess on the payroll)  the jewels and costumes are gorgeous.  there is not a lot to not like. but, the editing while sometimes is very fun, can be clumsy.  also, the movie seems to just stop. it gets running at a good pace and then drops you off a cliff. the end it's over.  which was disappointing because i could have watched much more of it.