Marie Antoinette

Rating:	★★★
Category:	Movies
Genre:	Other

It's been a year since the movie was released and I finally got around to watching it. I remember being intrigued by all the fuss about the historicity of the film and fresh approach that Sofia Coppola used in portraying the tragic queen.

Well, the historicity is a bit off. There were incongruencies with what really happened. For instance, Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette had four children, not three. The second child, Louis Joseph died of tuberculosis at age 7, while the baby Marie Sophie died as an infant. Of the survivors, the eldest, Marie Therese, was the only one to reach adulthood. Louis Charles died in prison at the tender age of 14 as he was proclaimed Louis XVII by the royalists when his father was beheaded.

Also, the portrayal of Marie Antoinette herself was a little off. Historical accounts all point to her mellowing down and being very committed as a mother to her children.

In her early years at the French court though, well, that was more to the point of the story, I guess. She was portrayed as an innocent royalty thrust into a position of power without much preparation for it, being a teen-ager and all that. Still, one wonders, didn't she get the same education her other royal counterparts got?

I also find it a bit remiss when it came to the question of her unpopularity among the French masses. There was no mention of the Affair of the Necklace which was pivotal regarding her "descent from grace" among the nobility and the masses alike. There was also no mention of any kind of politics that she did get into to support the French monarchy.

In this movie, we see a young woman pampered all too much by courtesans and politicians. She was in a dreamy world of luxury and lofty leisures, and nothing more.

It's the nothing more that bothers me, since further reading indicates that she was not so. She was more than the air-headed princess. While there was more she could have done in her position, she certainly didn't remain unperturbed by what was happening outside the palace.

Having read about the era, especially Les Miserables, one could not see how such suffering cannot reach the queen. Too bad, the production showed promise.