The Queen - best British movie for ages

[vison]

I'm reading a book about the daughters of George III right now. It's a very interesting book, although rather slow-going. The thing is, there are portraits of the girls (George III and Queen Charlotte had 15 children!!!) and the family resemblance to Queen Elizabeth and her children is amazing. There is no doubt they are part of the same family.

[Túrin Turambar]

I did wonder at the scenes showing Cherie Blair cooking the family dinner. That’s Cherie Blair, the slightly controversial leading QC, with a more than adequate work load of her own, I thought? Is that at Number 10, where they would have staff, or in their house in their constituency? However, I thought Helen McCrory was spookily spot on in that role.

I believe that Number 10 does have a housekeeper, but most of the scenes of the Blair family were at their Sedgefield home. I imagine the family would stay there when possible to not interrupt Mrs. Blair’s work or the children’s’ schooling.

I saw this today and thought it was very good – many of the performances were eerily spot-on. I could buy into the idea that I was actually watching the real thing unfolding. I loved James Cromwell’s Duke of Edinburgh.

It was almost enough to make me a monarchist

[baby tuckoo]

I'm reading a book about the daughters of George III right now. It's a very interesting book, although rather slow-going. The thing is, there are portraits of the girls (George III and Queen Charlotte had 15 children!!!) and the family resemblance to Queen Elizabeth and her children is amazing. There is no doubt they are part of the same family.

Yes, and though the first three Georges married cousins (as did Victoria) it didn't cut into their reproductivity of good Hanoverian stock. I don't mean "good" in the moral sense. All of George III's sons were wastrels. Perhaps the wastreliest was the oldest: the future George IV. He too married a first cousin, Caroline of Brunswick, his father's niece.

I finally saw The Queen, and I like it a good deal. But first . . .

. . . yes, George and Caroline begot a daughter rather quickly (perhaps on their wedding night) and likely never again performed the unpleasant duty that would produce another. Just as well. (Their daughter Charlotte later died in childbirth.)

When George IV died without man-child, younger brother William found himself King. He was 64 and nearly as mad as his father. He'd sired at least 11 children out of wedlock. But poor Adelaide of Saxe produced only two girls who died in infancy. Despite seven sons, George III couldn't get a grandson it seemed. Maybe all those cousin links were finally catching up. Finally the Duke of Kent (the fourth son) abandoned his mistress of 28 years, married, and produced a daughter. It would have to do.

William died just after Alexandrina turned 18, so a Regent (her shrewish mother) would not be necessary. "Drina" became Victoria and reached the throne in 1837. By the way, the title "Elector of Hanover" couldn't pass to a woman, so it went to fifth son Ernest, Duke of Cumberland, who spoke no German and was, as aforementioned, a wastrel. This is ironic because George I, the first Hanover, hired because he was a Protestant, spoke no English. But he wasn't a wastrel.

It was through similarly unlikely circumstances that Elizabeth II reached the throne. Victoria wouldn't have admitted it, but the monarchy had already become symbolic, though potent, in her age. Elizabeth wouldn't admit it either, but the monarchy in her age is symbolic and impotent, like the opinions and presence of Bono, only less so.

The stag in the movie ("Oh look," everyone shouts, "maybe bt actually has a point to make!") is Royalty itself. The multi-point stag is often referred to as The Monarch of the Forest, much like the lion is the King of the Jungle. And for centuries, the attitude of the stag has been that of the British monarch: head held high, crown above, aloof and wary in the rich woodland. Elizabeth stares at it as one stares in a mirror that reflects oneself in an earlier, better day. In the movie, the stag is brought down by a commoner, then butchered.

Victoria and Albert had nine children and actually seemed to like each other. Edward, the oldest son, didn't succeed until he was 60 and was resentful for being shut out of the inner circles until then. Victoria thought (really!) that the effort of getting Edward out of a sordid affair with an actress had weakened poor Papa so that he caught a bad cold, which aggravated his typhoid fever, which caused his death.

That's unfair, but indeed Edward preferred not to study affairs of state, or books, or business. He preferred women, food, drink, horses, gambling, and women, in that order. He even brought a number of his favored mistresses to events also attended by the lovely Queen Alexandra, a Danish beauty. This happened even when Victoria was alive, so you can see why she judged her son's judgement.

During Edward's final illness, in 1910, Queen Alexandra sent for his "enduring" mistress, Mrs. Keppel, to come see him. She met her at the door and took her upstairs then left her alone with him.

That, my friends, is royal poise.

[Crucifer]

I just saw this film.

Stephen Frears

Wonderful. Absolutely wonderful.

[vison]

I love reading almost anything about George IV. I love that he locked Westminster Abbey against Queen Caroline so she couldn't come to his coronation and that two parliamentary committees looked into her behavior, examining evidence about the contents of chamberpots and other lofty things. I love that he became convinced that he had fought at Waterloo. He was not mad, merely wilful, spoiled, stupid, and Royal.

The goings-on of George III's sons make Charles' devotion to Camilla seem quite wholesome, despite his longing to be a tampon . . .

The book about the daughters of George III was saddening, in the end. These women were only women, after all, longing for marriage and children. They were mostly denied any kind of normal life, and why? The King and Queen vetoed nearly every marriage proposal that came in their way, for one thing. King George III was a really devoted and loving father, and a loving husband, as well. Quite an exemplary character, in many ways. But like all Kings (so we read) he came to hate and fear his heir.

His madness was almost certainly due to Porphyria (sp?), poor man. When you read about the treatments he was subjected to, and the theories of "madness" and the harshness of his keepers, it would bring a tear to the most ardently Revolutionary eye, I promise you!

Victoria's Albert was a nephew of Prince Leopold, the widower of Princess Charlotte. Albert was Leopold's project, a lifelong work. Many people feared and resented Leopold and his influence over Albert, thence over Victoria. But in the end, Victoria was Queen and Albert only Prince Consort, like the present Prince Phillip, Duke of Edinburgh. I love the story of when she and Albert had quarreled and he locked himself in his room and she knocked on the door, demanding to be let in. "Who is it?" he asked.

"The Queen," she answered.

"Go away," he said.

She did, miserable. After awhile, after some thought, she knocked again.

"Who is it?' he asked.

"Your wife," she answered.

And he let her in. Or so the story goes.

Certainly Victoria came to love him passionately. (One of their daughters burned Victoria's diaries, embarassed by the Queen's frank entries about her sex life with the Prince Consort.) She was not always the glum, stout old lady in the pictures. She belonged to an earlier era, the era in which her father and uncles were rakes and libertines, nothing like the era which came to bear her name.

[baby tuckoo]

True, vison, it is unfair to label the age and attitude after the Queen, who indeed loved her Prince passionately, to the tune of nine children and thirty years of grieving.

The anecdote above is no doubt apocryphal, but it illustrates well the reason Parliament had for denying Albert the title.

[Holbytla]

I was at the Dr's office today, and of course I had to wait to be seen.
I picked up the top magazine on the stack to read.
It happened to be an AARP magazine.
The cover was Helen Mirren, and inside was a pretty good biography/interview. I absolutely adore her, and think she is just gorgeous. A bit of a wild child too. Wooohooo!!

Anyway she stated that this role was the best role she will ever have, bar none. Nothing can top it.
I certainly remember the week, and I do remember the seemingly bad press the Queen and Royal members recieved.
I wonder how true or accurate the portrayal was, or as a matter of fact how true the press was.

Anyway I think I am in love with Helen Mirren.

[axordil]

I've loved her since Excalibur. She really does get finer with age, though.

[baby tuckoo]

I had a brief but lingering affair with her in my forties.


It was just one of those things. Our careers . . . you know. And those people always about. A man likes to sit unbothered in public on occasion while all who pass admire his companion.


That's what a man likes.

[Crucifer]

A man likes to sit unbothered in public on occasion while all who pass admire his companion.


That's what a man likes.

Too true.