The King's Speech

March 2011

The Oscars have just awarded The King’s Speech for its best director, actor and original screenplay but most of all as the best movie. This can easily be explained by the fact that the feature film is excellent and touching.

As the title highlights it, the speech and also the way of speaking of a King is going to be exposed. What makes the story even more compelling and harrowing is that it is a true story. The one of King George VI of Britain (magnificently played by Colin Firth, A Girl with Pearl Earring, A single man) obligated to come to power and throne in 1936 when his brother Edward VIII (Guy Pearce) abdicated because of a woman. Edward VIII’s lifestyle of jazz, champagne, parties and love stories didn’t suit to the rank of a King. He didn’t want to handle it.

George VI has to do a speech to encourage his people, his nation and his troops at the beginning of the war in 1939. However, since his childhood, he faces a problem of stammer. The speech is even more important as new means of communication like the radio have developed faster and as new technologies have appeared, making the highest authority closer to the people. The late George V (Michael Gambon) has said clearly to his son that the King had to move with the times.

Thus, this very good historical reconstruction sets a human story. In fact, in the backdrop there are settings and costumes of the 1930’s, airships in the sky; but this is also the drama of a man who couldn’t express himself distinctly as he wanted to. The tragedy of a prince humanized while laughing and doing the penguin with his two daughters but so formal when these two little girls cannot hug their father anymore and must bow because he has just been crowned. The sadness of a man wearied down by his stammer.

Hence his wife Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon looking for an efficient doctor who could finally help him. Helena Bonham Carter, usually seen as freaking characters such as in Alice in Wonderland or Sweeney Todd, plays here a more restrained and traditional character, a wife helping and supporting her husband, in which she fits perfectly as well.

Lionel Logue (performed by the Australian Geoffrey Rush) is an eccentric, unconventional, extravagant character who is going to loosen the King up, this one ruled by the royal protocol. With provocation he calls him by his nickname Bertie to establish a colloquial relationship which will ease the progression of the recovery, despite the King's reserved behaviour. With a humorous hint he makes him practice language exercises. For instance George VI has to swear many times, to shout dirty words articulating because the strong feeling of anger allows him not to stammer: “it’s actually quite a good fun!” says the King’s wife while seated on her husband stomach who is trying to improve his breathing. With a tinge of irony, Lionel Logue laughs at the snobbish manners of George VI by doing jokes about knights and some inappropriate remarks. This underlines the social gap between the two men who have different educations, ways of life, ways of seeing the world that surrounds them, responsibilities... After all, the therapist is “only” the son of a beer salesman that is to say nothing compared to the King while the King is the King and this is enough to justify his importance and the deference people owe him. The scene when the two men fight is striking because we feel sorry for Mr. Logue who just wanted to help but instead was rejected.

Through the language exercises, musicality of English language and importance of pronunciation are depicted. When George VI reads his speech, the sheet of paper is full of red shafts and annotations to help him do the right breaks and rests (musical silences) so that he can sing with the best intonations. The microphone is an imposing vector, almost becoming a character full-fledged itself throughout the entire movie. It is a monster which intimidates the speaker and finally becomes his instrument. We wonder until the last minute if the King will succeed in opening his mouth to get out the sounds during the so waited speech. The suspense reaches its climax. English language is in this way valued. The dialogues are short (kind of stichomythia) but precise. The screenplay is amazing since each word is chosen cautiously and with minimalism. What is needed to be said is said, nothing less, nothing more. It conveys a “mise-en-abyme” of the stammer and the difficulties to speak and express oneself whether in arts, in a movie or in everyday’s life. It makes the viewer think about his own ability to talk and to yack about nonsense all the time. We feel desire to choose better our words and to think twice before talking.

Furthermore, there is a Freudian and psychological dimension which can be observed since the King bit by bit confide in his friend his uneasiness and his pain as a different born child. At first, he thinks his problem of stammer is physical but he understands it is more psychological. He needs even more than wants to assert himself and to be listened. For example he yells in Westminster abbey “I HAVE A VOICE!” This cry for help is moving and poignant. During the speech declaring war, people will finally listen to him. The images of different groups of people through England listening to the radio, soldiers or women, create an ekphrasis.

Thanks to many low angle shots, the camera gives the impression that even with a default the protagonist is powerful and superior. Many times the camera is “inside” George VI so the spectator feels his distress. Through his eyes, we see his hopeless vision. However we will never be able to understand his burden of “kinging” and handling a country with a problem of elocution and on the eve of a major international crisis.

The excellent, dramatic, intense and dynamic music (the seventh symphony of Beethoven or the compositions of Alexandre Desplat) lingers on the action or stops as the red blinker stops. Light is also very important. The fog of London contributes to the poetic picture of escapism and blur. But Lionel Logue enlightens the darkness of his own situation and the social problems.

At the end of the showing, the beauty, the strength, the talent of the director Tom Hooper, the screenwriter David Seidler, the cast and the movie left me totally speechless.

Do you know the F word?

F..F...Fornication?

Oh Bertie...

Shit! Fuck! ...And tits.

© - Tous droits réservés (images and clips from the motion picture)

« Rien ne se perd, rien ne se crée, tout se transforme. »

 Sucé-sur-Erdre 2010

                                                   Genève Lac Léman (L'aimant...) 2011

Je l’avais toujours perçu comme parfait. Ce ballet représente, incarne, est la perfection. Elle existe à travers ce ballet, ses mouvements, ses pas, ses interprètes, sa musique. Chaque coup d’archet, chaque coup de pointe, chaque porté, chaque levée, chaque pas chassé, chaque pas de bourré, chaque glissé, chaque geste des bras, chaque tour est parfait. Lorsque je vois le Lac des Cygnes, j’en ai les yeux qui pleurent. Ici j’avais juste les yeux plein d’eau mais tout de même. La réalité est paradoxalement retranscrite à travers la folie et la déraison. De manière subtile mais assez évidente, car tout est question d’équilibre, un équilibre fragile mais fort où tout est contrebalancé à sa juste mesure et où tout ne tient souvent qu’à une pointe, Black Swan nous jette en pleine figure la vérité d’un monde qui change, qui se transforme, qui grandit, qui évolue, qui se modifie à toute vitesse mais qui ne contrôle plus rien, d’un monde bouleversé et bouleversant comme le film, d’un monde complètement fou, dangereux voire même malade. La petite fille fragile jette sa boîte à musique violement parce que la petite mélodie devient grinçante, elle repousse l’autorité parentale, la figure du parent déchu qui transpose son rêve et ses espoirs à l’extrême sur son enfant, elle se met littéralement à nu pour mieux renaître. Sa peau est écorchée vif parce que cela lui en coûte que d’être en transition entre deux âges, deux univers, deux psychologies, deux manières de voir les choses, deux statuts : elle est d’abord retenue, faible et lâche puis lâchée, passionnée, forte et courageuse. Quelques plumes lui suffisent à ce qu’elle s’envole et trouve sa voie, celle de la gloire et de la réussite qui brillent, ce que nous cherchons tous plus au moins au fond : l’accomplissement personnel d’un rêve pour lequel l’on a tant bataillé, pour lequel l’on a du faire tant de sacrifices, pour lequel l’on a du tant souffrir enfin. Les danses se mélangent tout comme les lumières, les sons et les couleurs, tout part en transe. On ne distingue plus le drame de la joie, le tragique de l’euphorie, les pleurs de tristesse et de pression des pleurs d’exaltation et de satisfaction, le bien du mal, le songe de l’éveil, le cauchemar du rêve, la peur du calme, la réalité de l’irréel. Tout se transforme. Tout change et on doit accepter ce changement pour en ressortir vainqueur ou tout du moins atteindre la perfection. Elle l’a senti au plus profond de ses tripes et on l’a entraperçu avec elle parce que la caméra la suit partout et nous avec, parce que juste derrière son épaule, nous sommes son ombre. Ici c’est de la pure création. De la beauté à l’état brut comme un diamant qui scintille sous les projecteurs et s’éclate en mille morceaux sur le plancher martelé de la scène, comme le miroir qui se brise en mille morceaux et laisse couler le sang. L’épreuve est trop terrible. Le suspens est haletant et on ne voit pas une minute passer trop lentement. La photographie est époustouflante puisqu’on est au plus près des corps en travail, en sueur, des muscles tendus et au cœur des mouvements. La dynamique est l’objet principal ici. Il s’agit de vivre, de partir à l’aventure sur un coup de tête, de se laisser tenter encore une fois par de nouveaux horizons au lieu de rester confiné dans une routine trop rigide et une mentalité trop stricte. Il s’agit de se laisser porter par les rencontres et la nuit. Il s’agit de vivre pour pouvoir émouvoir et retranscrire la passion et la séduction sur la scène. La perfection de la technique ne suffit plus, il faut aussi avoir le talent et le style, comme dans tout art. La leçon n’en est que plus édifiante. A nous de ne pas nous noyer dans un trop plein d’eau, d’émotions, de confusion, de trouble, dans le lac de coïncidences, dans le lac de la perdition, dans le lac saumâtre de l’aveuglement.

« C’est un siiigne ! Y a plus que des canards qui passent… »