The Good
Helen Mirren and the rest of the cast are superb.
The Bad
I wish there would have been a BBC documentary on the history that was put across in this film.
The Queen is a well told, almost by the book tale of the aftermath of the death of Princess Diana. This film examines the class systems in England, but at the same time it also examines the class system that had evolved in the Royal Family due to Diana and Queen Elizabeth II (Helen Mirren) not getting along. As most of the world new of this rift, it made Elizabeth’s almost non-recognition of Diana’s death play very coldly to the rest of the world. To the Queen this matter was one to be dealt with amongst members of the Royal Family. For Prince Charles and newly elected Prime Minister Tony Blair (Michael Sheen), they realize that the world probably isn’t going to see things this way. As the public outpouring grows and grows, it eventually seems to become incumbent upon the new regime to sort of “handle” the situation.
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Eventually, Queen Elizabeth does the right thing. It isn’t because she is forced (and it certainly isn’t because she didn’t want to), she is just simply someone from an older school of thought. Hidden away in Buckingham Palace it looked like she and other members of the Royal Family didn’t care. In the end, people come to realize just how strongly she was effected by this unfortunate situation. In a cast filled with stirring performances, it really says something about Helen Mirren’s work that she was widely lauded (above all others) for her portrayal of The Queen.
Features
This DVD features two sets of tracks. There is an audio commentary with British Historian and Royal Expert Robert Lacey, author of the book Majesty. The other track features Director Stephen Frears and Writer Peter Morgan. I decided to listen to the track from Frears and Morgan. They discussed creating the environment in which Mirren and the cast could do their best work, historical accuracy, and how they were effected by the events depicted in the film. In some ways their discussion of the film was a bit stodgy, which I half expected, but it in other ways they really engaged me. Especially when they talked about Diana, the Royal Family, and bringing their own personal touches to the story.
The “Making Of” The Queen
While not the most in-depth piece on this movie, I would say watch it if you are fan and were absolutely intrigued by the work that Helen Mirren did. This segment is good but I really can’t say that it illuminates much. If you have seen the film you could skip this and if you have seen the film and listened to one of the commentary tracks, you definitely could move on to the next DVD in your collection. We get to hear from Helen Mirren and some of the other actors about playing their roles, why they think the situation went down as it did, and the effects that it did or didn’t have on Queen Elizabeth’s legacy.
Video
1.85:1 - Aspect Ratio. 1080p HD resolution. While I thought that the Standard Version of this release was good, I guess I was expecting more from the Blu-ray picture. Make no mistake, if you can see the movie on Blu-ray disc this is certainly the way to go, but I wouldn’t say that that is how you must watch this movie. The film is composed of pretty harsh colors (dark browns, blacks, rouge, etc); There are very few in-betweens. Also, the exterior shots seem to have a grayish, downcast look about them. They juxtapose nicely with the interior shots, especially the lighting of both The Queen’s and Tony Blair’s home.
Audio
Dolby Digital 5.1 - Uncompressed Audio. The sound was solid but nothing about the audio really grabbed me, which was actually a surprise of sorts. However, when I watched this movie in the theater I can’t say that anything about the soundtrack really stood out there either. I turned things up to a fairly respectable volume, but I never found that the soundtrack had any amazing sort of impact on me.
Package
They have made Helen Mirren look like a corpse on the front cover of this Blu-ray case. Having caked her in white powder she almost seems to blend into the wall behind her. The back cover of this release serves up images from the movie (Helen Mirren has a lot more color), critics quotes, a description of what this film is about, a Special Features listing and system specs. Aside from the next generation look of this Blu-ray disc case, it isn’t too much different than its standard counterpart.
Final Word
I waited until the absolute last minute to see The Queen and the only reason why I saw it was because, as someone who watches the Academy Awards every year, I always feel the need to see the movies nominated for Best Picture. I am not saying I never would have seen this film but I probably wouldn’t have watched it in the theater. I was very surprised with how easy it was to get caught up in these performances. Also, we always hear how good people are in this or that role but Helen Mirren really delivers the goods. Also, nobody seemed to mention the work of Michael Sheen as Tony Blair. He not only looks like the Prime Minister, he sounds like him as well. It was uncanny the way he nailed this performance, and it just seemed like yet another layer to this richly composed film from Director Stephen Frears.
The Queen seems destined to become a classical and remembered throughout cinema history.
The Queen was released September 15, 2006.
