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The King's Speech

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Jude
Post subject: The King's Speech
Posted: Wed 05 Jan , 2011 2:30 am
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This is the best movie I've seen in ages. Certainly the best I saw in 2010. Go see it!

I've seen footage of the real King George VI giving a speech before his treatment. It was heartbreaking to watch - it kept looking like he was going to burst into tears at any moment, but he bravely carried on to the end.

Colin Firth had the voice down pat, both in accent and tone colour. Helena Bonham-Carter missed a bit of the Scottishness of Queen Elizabeth's accent, but apart from that she was brilliant. The woman who played Queen Mary showed a slight trace of human feeling. Which was totally inaccurate, because the real Queen Mary was totally devoid of humanity. :P

I loved the whole movie - the dialogue, the humour, the characters - it was brilliant. Go see it!

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LalaithUrwen
Post subject: Re: The King's Speech
Posted: Wed 05 Jan , 2011 2:59 am
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I rarely go see movies at the theatre, but I will definitely put this on my Netflix queue.

Queen Mary, as in Bloody Mary? :scratch: I'm confused! (I could look this all up, I suppose, but then that would deprive you of the chance to talk some more about it all. ;) )

Is this the King George who abdicated because he wanted to marry the commoner?

I'm not that firm on the details of the recent monarchs.

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Jude
Post subject: Re: The King's Speech
Posted: Wed 05 Jan , 2011 10:28 am
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No, that Queen Mary was almost 400 years earlier (Mary I, or Mary Tudor). I meant Mary the wife of George V.

Edward VIII, or Prince David, was the one who abdicated to marry a divorced woman. It was his brother, who this film is about, who got suddenly thrust unwillingly to the throne and overcame many personal obstacles to lead Britain through one of her most difficult periods ever. Talk about teaching your kids to swim by tossing them into a shark-infested lagoon!

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LalaithUrwen
Post subject: Re: The King's Speech
Posted: Wed 05 Jan , 2011 3:35 pm
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Aha. Okay, I'm with you now. Obviously, I knew Bloody Mary was from about 400 years ago, but I didn't know if the movie traced the history of the monarchs or what. So how does George V fit into the picture? Father of George VI? And, then, is Elizabeth his daughter or something?

(Again, yes, I know I could go look it up, but it's more fun to ask you. :P )

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vison
Post subject: Re: The King's Speech
Posted: Wed 05 Jan , 2011 3:52 pm
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LalaithUrwen wrote:
Aha. Okay, I'm with you now. Obviously, I knew Bloody Mary was from about 400 years ago, but I didn't know if the movie traced the history of the monarchs or what. So how does George V fit into the picture? Father of George VI? And, then, is Elizabeth his daughter or something?

(Again, yes, I know I could go look it up, but it's more fun to ask you. :P )
Yes, George V was the father of George VI. George VI was known as Bertie within the family. Our present queen is the daughter of George VI and the Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon who became his Queen and after he died she was known as The Queen Mother and, of course, she died at the age of 102. I remember very clearly the day we were told at school that the King had died and that day we sang "God Save the Queen" instead of "God Save the King". When I was a little girl, Canada was a BRITISH country.
:D

This was a really good movie. I wish they could have made it about 3 times as long, so as to present a fuller picture of what an incredible dork Prince David (Edward VIII) was.

He was really a pretty total fool. I've never been sure what he thought, did he think he could be King and marry "that woman"? Or was he such a helpless sex/love slave of Mrs. Simpson's that he really couldn't imagine living without her? The thing is, I have come to be pretty sure that she didn't really expect or even want to marry him. They could have gone on with their relationship and no one would have cared. Royal princes usually have married mistresses anyway.

In this movie he is not presented as being the ass he was. He seems more of a playboy type, which he really wasn't. He went on to live the most tragically useless life imaginable.

But everyone of my Mum's generation admired King George VI. He was a good man, by all accounts, and certainly a wonderful symbol of Great Britain all through the war years.

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LalaithUrwen
Post subject: Re: The King's Speech
Posted: Wed 05 Jan , 2011 4:07 pm
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Very interesting! Okay, I'm really looking forward to watching this movie. :)

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MariaHobbit
Post subject: Re: The King's Speech
Posted: Wed 05 Jan , 2011 10:18 pm
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vison wrote:
He was really a pretty total fool. I've never been sure what he thought, did he think he could be King and marry "that woman"? Or was he such a helpless sex/love slave of Mrs. Simpson's that he really couldn't imagine living without her? The thing is, I have come to be pretty sure that she didn't really expect or even want to marry him. They could have gone on with their relationship and no one would have cared. Royal princes usually have married mistresses anyway.
This is a really alien viewpoint for me. A guy refuses a hereditary job and marries the woman he loves. This is wrong how???

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Jude
Post subject: Re: The King's Speech
Posted: Wed 05 Jan , 2011 11:54 pm
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He was worse than useless, in fact. Before and during the war, he made no secret of his Nazi sympathies. After abdicating, he and Wallis toured Nazi Germany and were photographed many times smiling and chatting with Hitler (see example). He even toured one of the concentration camps, and said publicly "It's none of our business to criticize Hitler's policies, regarding Jews or anything else". He gave many defeatist and appeasement interviews to anyone stupid enough to listen, and was believed to have leaked Allied war plans for the defence of Belgium.

On Churchill's advice, the couple was shipped off to the Bahamas to be installed as governor - not because of merit, but because it was considered that he could do the least damage there. Anyone else probably would have been hauled up before a court to be tried for treason.

After the war, they moved to Paris and spent the remainder of their lives in lavish and totally subsidized retirement. He actually produced a ghost-written autobiography, "A King's Story", in which he portrays himself as giving up everything out of principle for the woman he loved, rather than as a useless git. It's an interesting read, but needs to be taken with a rather large grain of salt.

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vison
Post subject: Re: The King's Speech
Posted: Thu 06 Jan , 2011 12:05 am
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Ack. I lost my post.

But Jude covered it all.

I am no particular fan of the British royals nowadays. But I am old enough to remember how King George VI and Queen Elizabeth were admired. They never left London during the war, even during the worst of the Blitz. They did not send their children to safety in Canada. They were a symbol that the British people could fasten on, and their courage was remarkable.

Whereas, David, Duke of Windsor, brought up in a life of extraordinary privilege, wimped out when the time came to pay for it. A more useless and wasted life is hard to imagine.

Find a photo taken of those two at a nightclub, say in the 1950s. His face tells it all. When he died, Queen Elizabeth II allowed him to be taken to England to be buried with his family. Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother hated the duchess, she apparently felt that having to become King had ruined her husband's health and led to his early death. So the duchess was received by the family, but only privately. And she was never called Her Highness the Duchess of Windsor, which the Duke tried to make happen.

She is famous for having said, "You can never be too rich or too thin". That was her philosophy of life. They did nothing of value. No charitable works, nothing worthwhile left behind. She spent the last years of her life in a coma, having fallen into that coma after having one too many facelifts.

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yovargas
Post subject: Re: The King's Speech
Posted: Mon 10 Jan , 2011 2:59 am
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Saw it! Loved it! Beautifully done and very, very charming. :)


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vison
Post subject: Re: The King's Speech
Posted: Mon 10 Jan , 2011 4:37 am
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yovargas wrote:
Saw it! Loved it! Beautifully done and very, very charming. :)
I'm so glad you liked it!!! :hug:

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RELStuart
Post subject: Re: The King's Speech
Posted: Tue 01 Feb , 2011 9:51 pm
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I must add my admiration for the film. So well done! The dry British humour was excellent. The story was moving and though some of friends thought it a little long, I thought it was well paced. It was elegant and touching. I suspect I will purchase the DVD when it comes out.

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Jude
Post subject: Re: The King's Speech
Posted: Sat 05 Feb , 2011 10:08 pm
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BBC Article
Quote:
The Queen has appeared to have given her blessing to the Oscar-nominated film The King's Speech, which portrays her father King George VI.

The BBC's Rajesh Mirchandani said Her Majesty is understood to have had a private screening of the film and is said to have found it moving.

The story details her father's battle against his speech impediment and also shows a young Princess Elizabeth.

Screenwriter David Seidler said the approval was the ultimate honour.

The Queen Mother, who was married to King George VI, once asked Mr Seidler not to make the film, our correspondent added.

"When her mother asked me 30 years ago to wait, because the memory of these events were still too painful, I understood the intense feelings that were involved," he said.

"And now that the film has been written and made with love, and respect, and admiration, the fact that Her Majesty has recognised this is incredibly and wonderfully gratifying."

Mr Seidler could win an Oscar and a Bafta for his screenplay as the film leads the nominations for both awards.
It says a lot when a film gets the approval of people so close to the subject.

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Jude
Post subject: Re: The King's Speech
Posted: Wed 02 Mar , 2011 10:15 pm
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ToshoftheWuffingas
Post subject: Re: The King's Speech
Posted: Sun 17 Apr , 2011 1:51 pm
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And our very own Ro knows the producer! :toast:

Everything that Jude said about the repellent Edward VIII. We were well rid of him. He would have been an enthusiastic puppet monarch for the Nazis and I too consider he stepped well over the line into treason on behalf of our nation's worst mortal enemies. But as always the upper classes look after their own. I'd add as one more damning titbit that he enjoyed a free house from the French government which was remarkably generous of them all things considered and still he
whinged all the time about lack of money. His favourite house guests there were Oswald Mosley and wife, the leader of the British Union of Fascists. I couldn't care less about his love life.

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Nienor SharkAttack
Post subject: Re: The King's Speech
Posted: Tue 17 May , 2011 1:28 pm
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I am very happy to have this movie being the first movie I saw at the cinema with my boyfriend - at a South African shopping mall. ;) Absolutely brilliant. I even almost literally forced my parents to go see it, and they loved it, which is saying something.

I wish more movies were like this one.

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Jude
Post subject: Re: The King's Speech
Posted: Tue 17 May , 2011 2:30 pm
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Hey Sharky! Are you in South Africa now?

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Nienor SharkAttack
Post subject: Re: The King's Speech
Posted: Tue 17 May , 2011 4:45 pm
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No, back in Norway now, been back since mid-April. :) Boyfriend following in two weeks! :banana:

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