A wonderful lesson in anachronism

Rating: 8/10 (9 December 2006)

"That wasn't realistic" an older man spat to his company as soon as the credits of the film began rolling. His friends all agreed, if only to humour him. He went on to say that the love affair between Marie Antoinette (Kirsten Dunst) and Count Fersen (Jamie Dornan) "had never happened", and that the ending was ridiculous, amongst other things. My friend and I just looked at each other and shook our heads. Perhaps Coppola's latest is not a film for everyone  but it should at least serve as a wonderful diversion from bitter realism.
Although it claims no historical biography tag, the film does document significant parts of the Austrian-princess-turned-Queen-of-France's life, such as leaving her family and beloved dog (the cutest creature I have ever seen, bar none) at home, stripped bare of all things Austrian and thrust into the cold court at Versailles to "cement the alliance". It even includes the notorious phrase "Let them eat cake" some years later and concludes with Marie and Louis siting stiffly at their grand dinner table, fingering pastries and sipping champagne, while the people revolt with pitchforks outside of the castle. Altogether, Marie Antoinette spans some ten or fifteen years of its titular protagonist's life  but mostly zooms in on the fun stuff.
When Marie finds the court cold and uptight and her husband unresponsive, she indulges in lavish shopping, gambling, pastries and parties in which smoking a pipe is the same as smoking pot. There is an endless charade of shoes, wigs, cakes, opera, flowers, stylists, affairs, coy smiles and gossiping to pop music  a chick-flick plugged right into the infamous court of Versailles and wrapped in fancy costume, creating the perfect juxtaposition. The decadent décor channels Gatsby, if anything, and the sheer golden scope of the spectacle sends shivers down your spine. Coppola offers us an invite to soak up the atmosphere, and we take it unflinchingly. There is so much windowdressing to the core of the film that it becomes its core. Soon Marie Antoinette loses itself in its own luxurious world, which is no misstep on Coppola's part, but an apt analogy as it is exactly what the protagonist does. Sweet materialism...
Kirsten Dunst is lovely as the Queen of France, handling the demanding role superbly with appropriate dramatic weight. Marie is only a teenager when she first arrives, after all, and Dunst effortlessly portrays that demographic. With her rosy cheeks, warm smile and childlike idealism she starts hugging the stiff pansies in wigs who recoil awkwardly, which gives us a taste of her innocent likability in the film. Luckily, she retains this bubbly attitude throughout. When Louis (Jason Schwartzman) finally warms up to and approaches her in bed, I felt an almost unreasonable happiness for Mariefor the both them in fact. If you scour the Versailles scene I'm sure more fine performances will present themselves but mostly it is quite barren and the only one who truly jumps out and grabs you at first glance in the film is Rose Byrne as Marie's wild friend and countess, providing for the comic delight.
Aside from setting, Marie Antoinette's goldmine is perhaps its music score. From calm acoustic, rock, pop, classical to techno, I enjoyed the brave scoring to each scene immensely and when Coppola blasted The Strokes to Kirsten Dunst running in the lonely halls of the court, she completely won me over. I am in fact pressed to find something tangibly wrong with the film, aside from the strangelty abrupt ending. If anything else, it occasionally drags and individual scenes are not always in-tune  but these are minor shortcomings and do not really detract from the overall experience  especially not when I kept smiling throughout.
8 out of 10