Cast: Emily Blunt, Rupert Friend, Paul Bettany, Miranda Richardson

Director: Jean-Marc Valée

Screenplay: Julian Fellowes

Running time: 1 hr 4o mins

Genre: Drama/Romance/Biopic



CRITIQUE:


The trouble with British costume dramas, especially starring the royals, is that despite of the vast palaces for sets and lavishly adorned costumes, there is very little room for stories to spread its wings and soar. The British history is festooned with monarchs, the repressed and radical ones, and its central conflicts usually loop around who beheaded whom, who slept with which, who controlled what. And there’s always the question between love and love for the nation. The Young Victoria, for all its sheer elegance, magnificently mounted cinematography and confidence in its execution, feels like a distant cousin to Elizabeth, Shekar Kapur’s first frolic with the strong-headed queen. HRH Victoria, who ruled Britannia the longest of all monarchs in history, spans an enormous amount of history that this film had to centre at a stage in the queen’s life: her rise to the throne and her undying love for Prince Albert. Yet with such deliberate cutback, the storytelling moves incredibly fast, the cross-cutting from one scene to another dizzying, that it feels like we’re watching a précis of the whole story. Canadian director Jean-Marc Valée (whose name sounds French) employs swift filmic techniques here, in vein to the French jump-cuts, but sadly a technique that does not quite harmonise. The film succeeds, meanwhile, in its tender moments where scenes are allowed to breath. This is a story of the gentle romance between Victoria and Albert, both children of guarded upbringing, who found freedom with each other. Rupert Friend gives a subtle performance as Albert, a proud yet forbearing figure, a wonderful foil to Emily Blunt’s spirited and loving Victoria. Blunt here erases that common image of the morose, black-clad Widow of Windsor and gives Victoria a sassy, sexy finesse; once a woman in love with her man and her nation.


VERDICT:

A gorgeously mounted costume drama that swathes a slapdash storytelling. All hail to Emily Blunt and Rupert Friend for saving The Young Victoria from being nondescript.



RATING: B