What's the point? The point is...

Rating: 9/10 (17 December 2006)

I always read the negative reviews on IMDb first. I do this because, sometimes, in my mind, I have a very "blinder view" of a film and like to hear the opposing view...or, I like to commiserate exactly what I felt was lacking.
In this case, I'm torn. Make no mistake--the film was wonderful, to put it mildly, but, I won't even begin to debate its authenticity of the plot line--given that I'm a born and bred American who hasn't a clue as to how the Monarchy is perceived in modern England.
That being said, I had to think of "Angels in America." The play, later adapted to the small screen, took a particular community--that being those individuals directly living day to day with AIDS and HIV--and used them as a way to convey a bigger theme. Many categorize "Angels" as being an AIDS play--but the characters and their individual challenges are merely a catalyst to the overall message.
In "The Queen," I felt the overall, universal message was watching what you've known to be true become false before your very eyes. Here we have Queen Elizabeth II, thrown into a position that, while hereditarily probable, was quite unrealistic in the broad scheme of things. She learned, at an impressionable age, the rhetoric and protocol that she wasn't raised to enforce. So, sitting on the throne for 50+ years, she reacts the way she feels is her legacy. She's seen, while choosing to ignore it at first, that she is quite wrong in her assumption. The people want and need more. While none of us has sat on throne in England (save, of course, the loo), we can all identify with the conflict at large.
Helen Mirren is uncanny in appearance and supposed conduct of Queen Elizabeth II. She conveys the confusion, agony, and submission of the Queen in such a palpable way that I stopped wondering or caring whether or not it was documented fact.
This could have been any family in Anywhere, World, and the message--accurate or not in its conveyance--was abundantly clear. No one likes to be thrown under the bus--whether we're raised to be in that position or whether we find ourselves there through no other reason than happenstance.
Ignore the details and enjoy the film for its message. If that's too much to take into a movie theater, then, look elsewhere.