Yorgos Lanthimos (The Lobster, The Killing of the Sacred Deer) is not my favorite director. His latest film, the Olivia Colman (Murder On The Orient Express, Locke) led The Favourite, is not my favorite film. His style doesn’t work for me. I like creative movies. I like unique films. I sometimes like eccentric movies. But weird movies are hit or miss, and his are mostly a miss for me. Ironically, The Favourite is probably his most “normal” to date. But I found myself disinterested in it from the start. Just as ironically, the much lesser recognized Mary Queen of Scots, which was released within a week or two of this movie (and a film that I enjoyed), was widely disregarded by critics and audiences alike (63%, 44% on Rotten Tomatoes compared to 94%, 61% for The Favourite). I’m only reviewing this movie because it will likely get nominated for many Academy Awards, and sadly, Best Picture will be one of those.
2018 was a year that crawled to the finish line. Most of the good movies were released before Oscar season began. The November/December releases could have been better. There were exceptions (Vice, Green Boo), but as a whole, your usual Oscar nominations do come out during this two-month timeframe. The Favourite could have been a better movie. I did not enjoy it at all. It was boring. It lacked flow. It felt pointless. It mocked itself as well as its time and location in history.
The acting, which also is likely to garner nominations for Colman (Best Lead Actress) as well as supporting actress nominations for both Emma Stone (La La Land, Crazy, Stupid, Love) and Rachel Weisz (Disobedience, The Light Between Oceans), both of who have an Oscar for acting on their bookshelf already. Three great actresses…I don’t know much about Colman, but Stone and Weisz are as good as they come. They deliver entirely overrated performances. Though considered a drama, The Favourite is more a comedy than anything. If you listen to movie podcasts (like, sigh, I do), you’ll hear the podcasters say as much. And when you hear people say something like, “This movie is more of a comedy,” but don’t sound super confident, that doesn’t bode very well for the movie.
England is at war with France in the early 18th century. Queen Anne (Colman), one of the lesser-known monarchs of England, is relatively weak and ill. Her childhood best friend Sarah (Weisz) is the Queen’s closest advisor, primarily because she is smart and even-tempered. However, Queen Anne can be quite rash in her decision-making. This is especially dangerous during times of war. Abigail (Stone) is Sarah’s cousin. She visits the estate of Queen Anne reasonably soon into the film. When we first meet her, she is shoved out of the carriage in front of the castle and lands in a fair amount of mud.
At this moment, if not sooner, this movie will not have anywhere close to the intensity of Mary Queen of Scots. It was at about this moment that I checked out. The remainder of the two-hour runtime took about five hours. At least, to me, it did. Movies like this aren’t made for someone like me. For the most part, I like my films to be intense. Or at least heavier than this. Abigail arrives looking for a job. Her father is sick, and she has fallen on hard times. The aloof Sarah doesn’t seem to care that Abigail is family and gives her a job in the basement with the other maids, far away from the Queen. But she doesn’t quite fit in with the other maids, and they are not kind to Abigail. It seems Abigail will be regulated to menial duties during her stay.
However, Abigail finds a way to apply a special herb treatment to help with the Queen’s most recent gout flare-up. She sneaks into her chamber and applies the cream, only to be punished with ten lashings because she saw the Queen without permission. But before all of the lashings are taken out on Abigail, the Queen intervenes. The cream that Abigail applied to her gout has relieved her pain. And before we know it, Abigail is given her own chamber and is the Queen’s new favorite.
After this, it becomes a back-and-forth between Abigail and Sarah, trying to win favor in the Queen’s graces and be “the favorite.” There aren’t many lengths that either won’t go to one-up the other. Keep in mind that there is a war going on out there, and decisions need to be made on who/when/where to attack, how to finance the war, and who to trust and not trust. But it’s all done with such silliness that it can’t be taken seriously. But, again, there is an audience out there for a movie like this. I like my period pieces, especially those surrounding war, to have a seriousness that wasn’t displayed here. The Favourite certainly wasn’t mocking those types of movies. It was a different style of movie that people responded to for reasons unknown to me. This film might earn more Oscar nominations than any other 2018 movie. It’s likely to earn Best Picture, Best Actress, Best Director, and two Best Supporting Actress nominations, though many other performances this year feel more deserving. Very often, some of the very best movies get snubbed. It should not go unnoted that The Favourite has a Rotten Tomatoes. 93% critic score but just a 62% audience score.
Character Development 6/10
Character Chemistry 6/10
Acting 8/10
Screenplay 7/10
Directing 6/10
Cinematography 8/10
Sound 5/10
Hook and Reel 5/10
Universal Relevance 5/10
61%
D
Movies You Might Like If You Liked This Movie
- Mary Queen of Scots
- The Other Boleyn Girl
- Phantom Thread
- Elizabeth
- The Lobster