The King's Speech

The King's Speech

The King's Speech is a british film that came out in 2010. It's set in 1930's Britain, The film is the private story of a famous public man, King George VI [known in his family circle as Bertie], the woman who loved him and became his queen, and an Australian speech therapist Lionel Logue, who helped him control and come to terms with the stammer that had tortured him since childhood.

Britishness

The King's Speech is a very British film. The Director was Tom Hooper a director that's always been involved in the British side of things. When looking upon his previous history he's only over recent years began to direct films that are watched in cinema, with big audiences. In 2009 he direct the film 'The Damned United' this was about the manager english manager, Brian Clough and his managerial career. This was an extremely british film, with a very british cast. Similar to The Damned United, The King's Speech is an extremely british film. First of all the overall plot about 1930's Britain. It is all about the Royal Family and the reign of different Kings. The film, for the majority of it is filmed inside very Royal surroundings; big Royal houses, old Royal cars, the same as they would of been back then. Everything about the film is very british, they have obviously done a lot of research into everything that the Royal family would of been wearing back in the 30's, how exactly the would speak, and all of the actors have been well selected to represent the characters in a very british way.Colin Firth, in today's film industry is most probably the most sought after British actor, and was perfect for the lead role. The other actors around him were also perfectly selected, Helena Bonham was selected to be Colin Firth's wife in the film, once again a great choice, she's known to be one of 'the UK's finest' and also to be very versatile and her part in The King's Speech was played exceptionally well. The film was mainly targeted at a UK audience, however also with the USA in mind. 

Exhibition Issues

The King's Speech did extremely well at the box office. It did a lot better than was even expected of it, with even distributor Momentum Pictures's wildest expectations being exceeded with a £3.52m opening weekend, including modest previews of £227,000, this outshining many other film's that have done well in the UK - considering the opening grosses of Slumdog Millionaire [£1.83m],Calendar Girls [£1.88m], Atonement [£1.63m] and Pride and Prejudice [£2.53m], it's clear The King's Speech has taken a huge leap forward, even allowing for the current inflation.

The film also do incredibly well considering the time of release. With the release date so close to another huge British film '127 Hours'. There was a lot of discussion as to whether The King's Speech or 127 Hours would suffer, and it was the latter that did.

Exhibition Reviews 

The film has been  critically aclaimed by most respectable organisations. The Guardian wrote a really good review on the film, it talks about the 'skilfully written and impeccably played scenes' and also, saying how 'overall the film is a major achievement, with Firth presenting us with a great profile in courage'. It was nominated for 14 Baftas in 2011, which was the highest amount of nominations for any film, the film was nominated for a number of the big awards, including  best film, outstanding British film, best director and best actor, for Globe winner Colin Firth. Firth, the lead role in the film,  was also nominated for his 'exceptional' performance in almost every category. 

In terms of Oscars, The King's Speech was nominated for twelve of them. Comments from critics such as 'Firth more than makes up for that with what is one of the great performances not just of this year but in cinema history.' Shows just how amazing Firth's performance was in the film and he has, justifiably been noticed for this.

Other reviewers have criticized the film, as not being award worthy, and just a 'worth seeing' film.

It was criticized by The Guardian , for having the representation of certain people wrong; 'The film is not without its odd faults, the truly annoying one being the representation of Winston Churchill'. Christopher Hitchens is critical about aspects of the film's historical accuracy and how this may wrongly influence the movie-going audiences as to what actually did happen back in those times. The Telegraphs criticizes the film for things such as they used the font Helvetica, despite it not being around for another 30 years. Also, things such as women wearing hosiery without seams when seamless stockings did not arrive until later,  a frustrated king throwing down his speech only for it to reappear in his hand the next second and the use of a plastic model biplane when the ones of the time were wooden.

The film also features a Tiger Moth plane with a registration which did not exist until 1941 and 

refers to the now Queen's younger sister as "Princess Margaret" when she was known 

throughout her childhood as "Princess Margaret Rose".

  However, these reviews are the minority, with the majority believing that it's definitely worth the awards it has already won.

There's been a lot of youtube reviews of the film, in particular in the USA. It has been received well out there also.