Stevecorp Don't listen to the negative reviews

Intcatinfo A Masterpiece!

Kaelan Mccaffrey Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

Caryl It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties. It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

threepines I don't think it's exactly a ten star picture, it's a modest film, despite the wide-screen, but I'm giving it ten because I think it is being undervalued here for failing to be what it's not trying to be. For example, the opening sequence is pretty strange action, I guess. No blood. A bit unrealistic in a way. But then suddenly, there it is. Real blood, real pain, real horror, out of nowhere. My feeling is that the "unreal" prior action exists to make the contrast hit home hard, creating a spiritual (to call it that) turning point out of butchery as usual. It's making a point.But then I like Tavernier a lot, and I've learned to accept his way of coming at a story. Like his laid-back, almost lethargic version of Jim Thompson's brutal Pop. 1280, Coup de Torchon. The first time I saw it was frustrating; I thought he'd missed the book. Seeing it again, I just watched what was on the screen, and had a real good time.Queen Margot, this film's more romantic twin, is one of my favourite movies because it pulses with so much colour and movement and life. The Princess of Montpensier is pulsing with something else. Pulsing with limitation? I don't know. The characters are all so trapped -- in the situation, in the era, in themselves. It's more sad than full blown tragic, and in that respect perhaps truer to life as it's lived and later understood, rather than dreamed. More like a Rossellini history film, say, than a contemporary, high production values epic.Beautiful to look at and lovely to listen to though, no doubt about it. And yet, at the same time, dry (the way that wine can be) and philosophical, in the sense of resigned. A song of experience, and quietly sustained anger, that tugs at your mind rather than your heart strings. Which appealed to me. In the right mood, allowed to do it's own thing at it's own pace, it's really good. I didn't even want to return it to the library, I kept putting it off until I started getting emails.

BOUF Some of the best things in this lusciously mounted historical ramble are the battle and fight sequences. They are exciting and convincing, as is the picture's milieu. Some of the relationships sporadically command interest,despite the central character consistently failing to provide any spark. The Duke of Anjou is the most watchable; a wonderfully slimy character, whose complicated duplicity and arrogance is highly entertaining. The actress who plays the princess may have superficially attractive qualities, but she has no personality. She's a sponge, who gives almost nothing and inspires only restlessness and tedium. Had she been at least interesting this may well have been an exciting film. After a while this viewer couldn't care less what happened to her. A shame because everything around her is designed to make for a stimulating story. It should be shorter, and it should be re-cast. The real princess was supposed to be a beauty. Mlle Thierry is quite good looking, but I suppose, at the time of going into production there wasn't an available attractive actress who is also vivacious, and/or interesting, and not too expensive. Heigh ho.

writers_reign Bertrand Tavernier makes excellent 'modern' films such as Round Midnight, Holy Lola, etc but clearly he has a weakness for 'costume' drama witness La Fille d'Artagnan, etc and now here he is at it again with his take on the Hugenots and the whole Catholic/Protestant set-up, a sort of French Wars of The Roses that you're not going to make much sense of unless you're a French History student/scholar. It's undeniably sumptuous, spectacular, well photographed and boasts two excellent actors in Lambert Wilson and Michel Vuillermoz but having said that we have to add that it also features Gaspar Ulliel, one of the 'new' breed of sullen, pouty, French actors on the order of Romain Duris, both of whom are guaranteed to make me run a mile in the opposite direction unless there is a writer, director, or other actors I admire as there was here in Wilson and Vuillermoz. One viewing is more than sufficient.

richard-1787 This movie is well acted, and some of the outdoor shots are beautiful to look at. I don't know how much sense a lot of it would make to someone without a decent knowledge of 16th century French history, as the dialogue doesn't explain a lot of the political background. I enjoyed this movie, but wouldn't have any desire to see it again.The one part that I felt unexplained is why, late in the movie, Chabannes lets de Guise in the château so he can spend the night with Chabannes'boss's wife. Why would Chabannes betray his master in that way? Also, a very minor question: when Montpensier hears a sound outside - it is one of his dogs being killed by de Guise - he gets up out of bed. Someone else gets out of the other side of the bed. So Montpensier sleeps with someone other than his wife. But the scene was too dark, and too fast, for me to catch who that other person was, or even if it was a woman. Just idle curiosity there.