Movie Review - 'The Young Victoria'

The Young Victoria Starring Emily Blunt, Rupert Friend, and Paul Bettany Directed by Jean-Marc Vallée Rated PG

It's not exactly true that every year about this time, a British costume drama arrives in theaters pushing for Oscar glory. It's not exactly untrue, either. Last year it was Keira Knightley's The Duchess, and the year before that it was Knightley's Atonement and Cate Blanchett's sequel to Elizabeth. So, at the very least, we're getting our fair share of this sort of thing, which brings us to The Young Victoria, a bio-pic of the longest tenured British royal. Victoria reigned for almost 65 years and is certainly worth a movie, probably a better one, even. It isn't that The Young Victoria is a bad film, just indifferent. It is easy to look at, of course, following the blueprint established over recent years. It features a nice, mostly convincing performance by Emily Blunt. It handles the era pretty well. But it's a movie for audience who have some grounding in the subject matter or at least people who don't mind a rather incomplete picture of the life in question. We don't see as much of the political machinations of her reign - there were plenty of those later in the 19th century - but instead more of the courtship rituals and attitudes of the time as the eligible young princess takes many a suitor during her rise to the throne. That stuff's fine. But that she went through troubled love doesn't make Victoria special, so it should be in the back seat. The love story involves Prince Albert (Rupert Friend), who himself is being pressured into finding a love connection. Friend and Blunt play it pretty well, and as much as the weakness here may be the dependence on the romance, the romance is also one of the film's biggest strengths. The supporting cast is as strong as you'd expect for a film like this. Jim Broadbent, Miranda Richardson, Paul Bettany, and Mark Strong are all up to their usual standards, more or less, and like everything else in the film, they're paraded through scenes in rich, detailed costumes that, once the movie starts to bog down, becomes something you can focus on. Truly, there's no faulting the production design, art direction, costumes, and all of that: The Young Victoria looks the part. But there needs to be a little more to put around it. Blunt recently earned a Golden Globe nomination for this film, having won several years ago for The Devil Wears Prada. It's almost that kind of permanent breakthrough role that keeps Blunt in leading roles instead of supporting ones. Almost. It could use a little more fire, but you can see her potential to one day be the central focus of a great film.

Comments

[Yavor]

well the movie is called "The Young Victoria" I think they achieved what they had in mind, they wanted to portray her difficulties in the very very beginning; it is trues that the movie could've used more spark, but it's a good movie and Emiliy was great in it;

Keep your statistics right, by the way, as Emily Blunt never won the Golden Globe for The Devil Wears Prade (she was nominated), she won it for a TV performance :)

[SEAN]

I enjoyed it as well, but it needed much more, indifferent is the perfect word to describe it actually...

I agree the love story should have been the backseat of the film, but I think it wasnt b/c they wanted to market it as a love story, if it was more about "politics" im sure they wouldnt know how to market it properly....

Very ambitious project it comes up short but the peformance is great & very globe worthy (oscar nom worthy Im not too sure) & poor Emily tries to salvage the indifferent films & nearly does but falls short

[Melbourne]

Oh!!! Wow, It is really a great and so useful article. I enjoyed it as well, but it needed much more, indifferent is the perfect word to describe it actually...

I agree the love story should have been the backseat of the film, but I think it wasnt b/c they wanted to market it as a love story, if it was more about "politics" im sure they wouldnt know how to market it properly....
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Melbourne

[ErikaGriffin34]

freelance writer