Historic Footnote Makes A List

Rating: 8/10 (23 April 2011)

Can Guy Pearce make it a triple crown this year? What movie is he working on and can he be the actor cast in 3 Hollywood Best Pictures in a row? Of course he had no chance of the Best Acting Oscar here.
This film to me has great performances by Geoffrey Rush as Lionel Logue, speech therapist & Colin Firth as George VI. Pearce is definite support here as Edward VIII who steps down. There is a lot of other solid support too and it thankful that Director Tom Hooper keeps it under 2 hours.
What impresses me the most about this film is how well fleshed out the relationship between Lionel Logue and George VI is portrayed. You can feel the realism in the acting between the two. That is because 9 weeks before the film production began the producers found Lionel's Grandson had personal letters written by Lionel & Goeorge VI in his home along with a hand written diary. This allowed the script to put some of the real lines from the letters into the script.
The history around the film being set from 1925 to 1939 is very well thought out and portrayed. The film while rather dark has some impressive sets in it. While the film focus is in the speech because of the title, I believe the story could be better told by revisiting the diary and letters that were found before the film was made, and rewriting the script to focus on the reality in those documents. In other words, the relationship between Logue and George VI being the centerpiece of the story instead of the speech would make it a better film.
Still this is a more than adequate portrayal of the real history being brushed across the top. This is drama and there are a couple of bursts of language that make it a PG 13. This is a light rating though as the kids in the film indicate in one scene.
Pearce's accidental best picture streak has a lot to do with luck here. The Academy of Motion Pictures chose this as Best Picture for a very good reason. This film is about as Conservative a portrayal of real History as you can get. The Election in the US last November indicates that this film is a very safe choice for Best Picture as this movie has almost nothing that can be considered Liberal. In January, 2014 when America starts fining it's own citizen's for not carrying Health Care insurance, there will be a real test for where political opinions are going.