THE FAVOURITE (Yorgos Lanthimos 2018)

Olivia Colman's nomination for Best Actress Oscar is somewhat like a Time MagazinePerson of the Year nomination. These nominations reflect neither the ethical right or wrong, good or badness of what the character or person reflects, but the significant consequences or outcomes of such a character's or person's actions or behavior. We find in Olivia Colman's performance as Queen Anne a rather intriguing but distasteful personality, someone who appears to rely too heavily on others to make weighty decisions and at other times seems to focus too much on less weighty matters of State. Yet Colman's Anne is a fascinating and brilliant performance that reveals a seedier side to the Royal Court. And the entire movie has a rather dirty underbelly while a few comic flourishes only seem to add to the irony of that something is rotting inside the Court halls. Marketed in trailers as a comedy, this movie is no comedy and delivers itself as a voyeuristic look into the slimy political machinations of the people who inhabit the Royal Court. The Favourite is far outside the public mainstream and askews any resemblance to a traditional or populist storyline or plot. Instead one must walk in muck and slime and experience the debauchery and selfish schemes that only result in a sordid, rather vague ending.

As a postscript, Wikipedia's more contemporary assessment of Queen Anne's reign raises speculation on whether or not the depiction of the Queen in The Favourite really took place for the most part. Thus, this award nominated movie might be considered much more of a fictional drama than a dramatization of events that took place. Oddly in some respects, if Colman had been allowed to perform with a script that portrayed Queen Anne in this more admirable light as more recent historians' assessments claim, her Oscar nomination and the movie itself might have stood on an even a stronger foundation and merit.