The Queen (2006)

Premise: After the death of Diana, HM Queen Elizabeth II (Helen Mirren) struggles with her family's public perception, as well as to understand the public's outpouring of grief, while newly elected Prime Minister Tony Blair (Michael Sheen) attempts to seize the moment politically as well as guide the Queen into the modern political arena.

You guys, I don't really feel like reviewing this movie. After all the attention it has received, after Mirren's win last night, what's the point, really? Basically, you're thinking, is it really that good? Short answer: Yes.

Long answer: This is so stupidly obvious and done at this point, but, my goodness, people, look at Mirren go. One of the keys to Mirren's talent is the way she creates a new body language to go with each role instead of relying on actorly tics, to the point where you sort of forget that she's an actress at all instead of, well, Her Majesty. Never mind the balls it takes to play the royal currently sitting on the throne, you'd be hard pressed to come away from this film without new found respect for the Queen. By the time Mirren, director Stephen Frears (a jack of all trades, that one), and writer Peter Morgan are done with her, all your sympathy lies with the woman forced to go against decades of training for the sake of her country.

Morgan may present it as a comedy of manners, and, to a certain extent, it is, but there's an undercurrent of tragedy that kept the laughs from turning into howls. And no, I don't mean the death of Diana, although that was tragic in and of itself. I mean the way the country expected HM to turn on a dime and lay prostrate in front of them in rendered clothes with ashes on her head for an ex-HRH. To be honest, I found the public outpouring of grief a little bizarre both then and now, and good for HM to show a little restraint and respect.

Sheen doesn't seem to getting attention, which is too bad, as he had the equally difficult task of playing a now-reviled politician back when he was quite popular. And he manages to make him likable. It helped that Helen McCrory played Cherie as a shrew that I wanted to smack. Even so, I felt a twinge of sympathy for the man who was determined to "save these people from themselves" when everyone around him was happy to hand them a few more inches of rope.

My viewing partner had one complaint, which I will let her express for herself in comments, and I will move on to my one complaint: Alexandre Desplat's score was, at times, a little too whimsical for my tastes. There were moments when I half expected Mirren to wander off into Narnia or metamorphize into a woodland creature.

So, yeah, it is all that. Go see for yourself. A