I can think of no better review for Yorgos Lanthimos’ The Favourite than the man sitting next to me in the theater audibly gasping four different times at the cinematography. Perhaps more than any other 2018 original release, I enjoyed the physical act of watching this film: of marveling at the amorphous mise en scène; of drinking in stately hallways drowned in natural backlighting or claustrophobic drawing rooms peppered solely with candlelight; of bedchambers and forest roads stretched like taffy by fisheye lens in one shot yet flattened by anamorphic ones in the next. I’ve seen many detractors complain that Lanthimos’ restlessly unmoored camera and schizophrenic lens selection were hollow stylistic flourishes. But as a firm believer that style IS substance, I found the choices a bold rejection of the cinematic language traditionally associated with European dramas set among 17th-19th century aristocracy, films which so often prefer calm, stasis, and decorum over bold expressiveness (this is partly what made Stanley Kubrick’s Barry Lyndon with its stunning frame compositions and candlelight sequences seem such an atypical revelation). This stylistic renunciation matches his contempt for historical verisimilitude vis-à-vis his subjects: Queen Anne (Olivia Colman), her favorite Sarah Churchill (Rachel Weisz), and court upstart Abigail Hill (Emma Stone). Rejecting modern reassessments of Queen Anne as a stubborn, conflicted, yet decisive force in a tumultuous era of political evolution, the film portrays the monarch as an impulsive, impetuous buffoon deadened and psychologically savaged by a lifetime of grief. She’s less human being than prop to be manipulated and controlled in the erotic power struggles between Sarah and Abigail. This is all in keeping with Lanthimos’ career-long obsession with cold-blooded power inversions in universes devoid of moral centers (notably he removes all reference to the religion and faith that proved such integral parts of Anne’s life, going so far as to depict a wedding sans clergyman). Watching it, I was struck for the first time how much his movies remind me of Paul Verhoeven, both his misanthropic Danish thrillers and his equally misanthropic Hollywood blockbusters—both treat emotional innocence and sincerity with sneering contempt; anyone who CAN assume power over others has the inherent right to so long as nobody can stop them. This gets to the heart of The Favourite: it’s not a Queen Anne story. It’s a Lanthimos story using Queen Anne and her retinue like action figures.
Rating: 8/10
0 Yorumlar