Excellent script

Rating: 7/10 (26 December 2017)

The King's Speech is a lovely movie that is well worth your time. It could have been terribly plodding and dreary, but the writers inject so much wit and humanity into the story that it keeps you interested and entertained. It's possibly the best (the only?) movie made about public speaking,, and about people who are terrified of it.
Despite being a 'nobody' Australian speech therapist, Lionel Logue (Geoffrey Rush) proves to be the perfect person to treat the stuttering King George (Colin Firth). As an Aussie, super persistent and confident, with an irreverant streak and with decades of experience, Logue is able to deftly analyse George's psychological barriers and figure out hiw to get around them.
Rush is typically brilliant in this role, but he's pipped by Colin Firth, for whom the King is the the role of a lifetime.
Firth plays him as often whiny and needy. But in the end, unlike his playboy brother Edward (Guy Pearce) he did step up to lead the UK when it needed a steady authority.
When the King is walking to the microphone to make his last speech, it's like he's walking to the guillotine. Lionel his therapist really seems to care and is not after some reflected glory.
As always, the sign of a good movie is the quality of the supporting cast, and here it's A-grade, including Helena Bonham- Carter as the King's wife, the wonderful Derek Jacobi as the Archbishop, and a sincere Timothy Spall as Winston Churchill.