Marie Antoinette

Have you ever watched a film that never. seemed. to. start? No, not like coming in late, feeling like you missed a chapter (buffs, see BUCKAROO BANZAI or MIAMI VICE). I'm referring to the sort of film that just comes on, continues, fades out. Shapeless. No real form. Yes, reader, I know that many independent and avant-garde films fit that description. I am not a viewer who requires linearity, strong narrative, or even a point, Lord help me. What I do object to is a film that is ostensibly trying to make some salient points and then ends up feeling like a 2 hour trailer. 

 That's generally how I feel about writer director Sophia Coppola's 2006 MARIE ANTOINETTE, a lushly photographed but frustrating gaze at the charmed life of a former Archduchess of Austria who becomes the Queen of France in the eighteenth century. Coppola gamely tries to frame it all through Marie's (Kirsten Dunst) point-of-view; the politics, the financial considerations, the mounting disintegration of her kingdom-not really of her concern. She loves her high life filled with endless parties and fabulous garments. Savoring truffles and various libations took priority over Versaille, which would fall a few years after her becoming queen at the age of nineteen. I understand the m.o., but it still doesn't really work. Dunst looks the part and even conveys at times some of what I imagine Coppola was trying to say. But the actress' voice is flat, her performance seeming to lack in confidence. When she is required to look bored or cheerful, she just appears like she is waiting for something (direction?). 

As Louis XVI, her king, Jason Schwartzman seems like he will burst out laughing at any moment. Like a permament unsuccessful-attempt-to-conceal-a-smirk is always gracing his youthful visage. This is especially true during the scenes where the King and Queen spend many awkward nights before their marriage is finally consummated. The other actors are fine but underused, such as Rip Torn and Judy Davis. The whole affair is, listless. My patience waned more than once as we drifted through scene after scene of a vapid life. Attempts to add a contemporary touch by utilizing 80s New Wave songs was here nor there to the film's success. It all felt like an ambitious thesis, filled with lovely passages and color, yet far adrift from whatever statement it was trying to make. Odd failure, this film. If there were not indications of a serious theme, but rather a mere bubble-gum romp, I might've felt the film would've been more successful.

 MARIE ANTOINETTE seems very conflicted, wanting to um, have its cake and eat it too, if I may make a weak allusion to the infamous alleged quote of the Queen's. Can a work of art be a feast for the eyes and ears while engaging the heart and mind? Well, of course. If you have some bandwidth I can name you several examples. Instead, we have with this film a screenplay layered with poignancy that just doesn't quite transfer to film. I bet it would make a good read, however. A novella or such would allow us to get a deeper understanding of this (revisionist?) young lady. As a movie, it's just all dressed up with nowhere to go.