The Lion in Winter
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Movie Reviews of The Lion in Winter
Movie Review: One of the Classics You Must See
Summary: 5 Stars
This is one of the few perfect movies. No special effects to make you forget there's no plot, just amazing acting by some of the best there have ever been. The plot is taken from the pages of history: The time of Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine, with Peter O'Toole, the star he is, as Henry and Katherine Hepburn at the top of her game as Eleanor. A very young Anthony Hopkins gives an outstanding performance as their third son Richard the Lionheart. He already tears up the screen with his intensity and brilliance. During a Christmas holiday Henry has decided all members of his family should meet to decide the fate of the kingdom once he dies. He has kept Eleanor locked up for years to keep her from scheming with Richard, her favorite. Henry's favorite is his youngest son, John (you know him as the evil King John from the Robin Hood myths). Their two eldest, William and Henry, are already dead and the fourth oldest, Geoffrey, is along for the ride, resenting everyone and everything. The only fight scenes are those involving wars of words and these are some of the fastest and sharpest you'll find. The deviousness of those in command in the Middle Ages makes most of our current leaders look like children having tantrums. Hopefully, this movie will entice you to start studying the very rich and pertinent period in World History known as the Middle Ages. A must for anyone building a movie classics library.Movie Review: 23 years old and it holds up
Summary: 5 Stars
Having just read the Alison Weir bio of Eleanor, I re-viewed this film that I had seen when it was in the theaters. As a film, only the sound betrays its age. For me, it was even better with the background fresh in my mind.
The movie provokes thought. While this is a hypothetical Christmas, the real ones must have been something like this. The facts of history are all on display, Alys and her dowery, the French king (son of Eleanor's first husband) ever ready to deal, the dubious sexuality of Richard, control of the Aquitaine, the naming of a successor before primogeniture was institutionalized, Henry's love child Geoffrey. The casting is perfect especially Hepburn and O'Toole, I can't imagine any others in these roles. The acting, the sets, the costumes... first rate. The ending is wonderful.
While the script is fantastic, it is only one reading of history. While this family has to be as complex and dysfunctional as the movie portrays, I think it's hard on Eleanor. She was a landed woman in her own right, and Henry was a philanderer of the first order, how SHOULD she have reacted? John might be overplayed as a simpleton, but when he does become king, he loses almost all of England's continental lands and signs away some rights of kings (Magna Carta). No wonder Eleanor wants Richard to be king.
Movie Review: A period pageant, only electified by Peter and Kate.
Summary: 5 Stars
It has a fairly young Peter O'Toole stepping *up* in age (most actors have to step down in age to fit a role) to play a king of 50 most marvelously; and it has a 60-ish Katharine Hepburn in probably her greatest role and the role which best fits her affected and high-tone style of speak. And the story and script (swathed in family dysfunction) is courtesy of James Goldman- and is stunning indeed. Though the royal heads are married, they compete for everything, and are at constant verbal odds regarding the successor to the throne and the spoils that come with it. Henry has a favorite son; Eleanor has a different favorite son. Problem is, there are *three* sons, a mistress, an adoring public, and a visiting king of France- all crashing together during the warm, fuzzy, Christmas holiday. The film's medieval detail is marvelous (shooting was in Ireland, Wales, and France), but the witty, literate, scenes with O'Toole and Hepburn alone are worth the price of admission ("Give me a little peace." "Why be so modest? How about *eternal* peace- now there's a thought"). As a result, it paces more like stage theater than film- and the action (for those who need that for entertainment) is minimal. But Anthony Harvey directs marvelous, Oscar-nominated performances, and can be heard analyzing such on the DVD's special material.Movie Review: A dysfunctional British royal family??? Who'da thunk it???
Summary: 5 Stars
I'm not going to attempt to compose a brilliant summary of this extraordinary film. Others have done an excellent job of that already. I merely wish to add my voice to those proclaiming "The Lion In Winter" as a masterpiece.
Even if the script WERE less than brilliant, a cast such as this could most likely win awards just reading aloud from the Peoria, Illinois telephone directory.
Oh, and just in case you wonder what relevance this historically based film might have for us today, consider that it was John [eventually crowned king] who signed the "Magna Carta" in the year 1215. This document was the first in British history in which a king agreed [admittedly under great pressure] to limit his monarchic power.
This, then, became the cornerstone of what was later to emerge as England's limited parliamentary monarchy and that of other nations as well. It further becomes the inspiration for limited government in general and more specifically for that republic that was to eventually emerge in the colonies across the big pond, so to speak.
Consider also that Richard was to go on and become King Richard II, famous for his crusades to the Holy Land.
Relevant today? You BET. And never was learning history so enjoyable as this film makes it.
Movie Review: The ultimate family Christmas movie
Summary: 5 Stars
No movie sums up Christmas or brings back so many memories of Christmases Past than The Lion in Winter. It's 1183 and Henry II's let his wife out of prison to decide the succession at Christmas court in Chinon: he favors John, she favors Richard and nobody cares for Geoffrey. Cue daggers, plots and reopened wounds as everyone tries to kill everyone else and nobody gets what they wanted for Christmas. Part costume drama, part Who's Afraid of Eleanor of Aquitaine? as these jungle creatures scratch and claw at each other's weak spots and almost certainly a lot closer to history as it was lived than as it is written thanks to a truly great screenplay by James Goldman (who stumbled across the plot while researching a play about Robin Hood that would later become the sadly underrated Robin and Marion) that's done justice by it's cast. Katherine Hepburn may have got the Oscar, but Peter O'Toole before the rot set in, reprising and bettering his role from Beckett, matches her tooth and claw, with Anthony Hopkins, Timothy Dalton and John Castle picking up a few tricks en route. The weak links are the reliably awful Nigel Terry's overstated John and Jane Merrow's Alais, a performance as flat as her singing voice, but as they are required to be simpletons and ciphers they don't get in the way. Terrific nasty fun.