The most underrated film of 2008 ...

Rating: 9/10 (18 January 2012)

I've always appreciated movies set in the eighteenth century for their aesthetic value on the surface and in the content, for their depiction of a world disguising under a mask of elegant sophistication the hideous face of decadence. This kind of ambivalence is so appealing that the odds of me enjoying a period film are generally very high. And Saul Dibb's "The Duchess" didn't disappoint me.
I remember the first time I saw it in 2008, in a French movie theater during a very rainy day; I left up the place with delighted eyes and a broken heart. "The Duchess" is a dazzling celebration of the weirdest and fascinating world of the eighteenth century's European aristocracy, through a lead, Georgiana Kavendish who, beyond her Duchess of Devonshire title was a real Queen of fashion, and the story manages to betray the very feeling provided by the art and costume design by depicting this world as a golden prison endured by the heroine, played by Keira Knightley in a performance that should have earned her an Oscar nomination.
I still wonder why the film was overlooked by the Academy, except for a lousy art direction and costume design nomination (a deserved win) when the epic "Benjamin Button" bore garnered much more accolades, I guess the film didn't have much more a drama except for the constant evolution in the relationship between the Duchess and the Duke of Devonshire. "The Duchess" might have disappointed the aficionados of the genre who were waiting for suicide attempts, duels, war, anything but bloodshed! But sincerely, even this relative peacefulness is handled with the sincere poignancy of a Bergmanian character study minus the philosophical undertones.
"The Duchess" never falls in the melodramatic trap because Georgiana is indeed a strong character. In the beginning, while she's playing with boys and girls of her age, her domineering personality leaves no doubts, she outshines everyone. Ironically, at the same time, she's seen through a window by her to-be husband, William, Duke of Devonshire, an affable ad quite-sinister looking Ralph Fiennes and the other girls all appear out of focus, literally. Georgiana's mother, Charlotte Rampling is praising both the physical and intellectual merits of her daughter, promising that she would be a credit to the Duke, as she already is to her, and we do believe her. The core of the story is foreshadowed when what preoccupies the Duke's mind the most is mentioned: having a son, the happiness of the couple would only rely on Georgiana's capability to give a son to the Duke, and history can be very capricious.
"The Duchess" works on the Fiennes – Knightley total opposition, he's reserved with a seriousness so icy it confines to indifference, while she's elegant, flamboyant with a level of wit that matches her style. During a dinner, she admirably retorts to one politician's pompous rhetoric in one of these particular scenes full of ambiguity, especially when the Duke leaves the party, is he upset by her behavior? No, he simply doesn't fancy these displays of political smartness, he's a practical man, who enjoys the company of his dogs, manly pleasures and more than anything wants to have a son. "The Duchess" would eventually overshadow her husband until he'd become the only one not in love with his wife, and the constant irony of "The Duchess" is that her popularity would always stop in the walls of her own house.
The tense relation with her husband made of hypocrisy, cheating, and sterile conventions, constitute the golden cage in which she's condemned. One of the merits of the film is to portray not just the hellish marital existence of a woman, but the constant need of love, of friendship consequent to that privation. The nuptial scene is a demonstration of how unaffectionate and careless of the Duchess' nervousness, and in a way, it represents her marriage lifestyle in microcosm, something that invites the Duchess to find other ways to compensate a cruel lack of affection, popularity, fashion, parties, politics, and a heart-warming friendship with Bess Foster, the woman who'd ultimately become her rival, she obviously has some appeal for the Duke, or is it because she had three sons? Ralph Fiennes beautifully portrays the antagonism, pushing the degree of vileness to historical standards that almost make him look vulnerable. Totally, incapable of having sons, his harshness is like the awkward demonstration of his own weakness.
The film doesn't portray the Duke in a harsh way either, in one scene, he's having some time with Bess' sons, teaching the older on the way to use a gun. We feel sorry for a man who can't fulfill his own dreams and by extent, for a couple who seems miserable in its incomparable wealth, both imprisoned by a poisoned dream that never seem to happen. The script manages to detach itself from the 'having a boy' plot by exploiting the real core of the film, which is simply the need of love. When the Duchess lives her first moments of pleasure with Bess and when she makes love with her real lover, the scenes are graphic as to illustrate the real contrast with the nuptial scene. The Duchess feels that this world is capable of love after all. The film evolves into the crucial conflict between what is done in the name of love and in the name of those we love, two elements that sometimes doesn't match.
The film works as beautiful display of real human relationships trapped in a world of conventions and obligations, even more pitiful that they could have been avoided. I wish I'd find something that the movie lacked or that could have justified its overlook by critics and Academy, but I can't  I for one, think it's one of the best of 2008.