The retelling of France’s iconic but ill-fated queen, Marie Antoinette (Kirsten Dinst). From her betrothal and marriage to Louis XVI (Jason Schwartzman) at 15 to her reign as queen at 19 and to the end of her reign as queen and ultimately the fall of Versailles. (imdb.com)

Marie Antoinette is a very pretty film. Period pieces should be, especially of the 18th century France variety. The costumes were exceptional. But the, costumes worn by Kirsten Dunst as Marie Antoinette were simply spectacular. Versailles was captured regally and yet more intimately than it has been in other films. The costumes, the setting, the limited dialogue, and some very stylized and romantic scenes of Marie in a garden or on her own at a given time, all made this movie simply lovely and not at all what I expected given my skepticism of casting Kirsten Dunst as Antoinette.

I did not have knowledge of the history of Marie Antoinette, the causes of the French Revolution or all the events surrounding her reign as Dauphine, and later Queen of France. I think this let me enjoy the film on it’s own rather than checking and criticizing on historical accuracy. Sofia Coppola has a certain directorial style. Romantic, simple, contemporary and fresh. It’s difficult to go into a film with preconceived notions of what the title character of a film is, given her place in history. But with Coppola’s films, you must. Granted there has been only one American film specifically about Marie Antoinette in 1938 starring Norma Shearer, so perhaps people are hankering for an epic period piece about the controversial Queen with all the grandness and detail of say The Last Emperor or the much less successful, but still grand and epic Alexander with Colin Farrell. But, if you’re any kind of a movie fan, you must take into consideration the director and the cast. If James Ivory or Ang Lee chose to direct a film on the life of Mare Antoinette, you can expect grand, epic, historically detailed and so forth. But if Sofia Coppola directs a film, simply expect something different and not worse.

Coppola’s a young person’s director. The main cast is young. The movie was not about the tragic, the epic, the grand, the history. It is a more personal, specific feeling about who Maire Antoinette was at a given time in her life. In Coppola’s eyes, she was a young, too young Dauphine, who took on grave responsibility of being a 14 year old Dauphine of France, and later, an 18 year old Queen. The careless extravagances Antoinette was said to indulge in are shown as the careless extravagances of a teenager spending money she did not work for. Sound familiar? Her inability to seduce the Dauphin to consumate their marriage, was less about his alleged impotence or her alleged frigidity and more about two teenagers being forced on some level to get it on to produce an heir to the throne of France. Wouldn’t you be a little nervous? Coppola did a bang up job empathizing, though romantically, with Antoinette.

Though the film got a little muddled, a little lazy at the end. Perhaps a little rushed, overall it is well worth watching on the big screen, if not for the costumes and the rare glimpses into Versailles. I suspect Marie Antoinette will be nominated and perhaps win for Best Costumes at the Oscars in 2007.

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