Young Victoria
6/10
Docudrama-lite. Very shallow story of young queen Victoria, how she became queen, the infighting and personal drama of her immediate family. Some interesting parts, how she was basically verbally and possibly physically abused by her mother's consort who wanted to use her to seize power, how her mother refused to help her and kept her isolated and totally under her control.
There is some implication how she wasn't ready to rule since her mother was to be regent with her and so they kept her pretty stupid and when Victoria refused to go along, she ended up on the throne unprepared. And since Victoria wasn't precocious like Elizabeth I was as a child, we end up watching a naive, not very well educated young woman try to catch on and that's not very interesting.
The politics around her ascension are dealt with as serious, but a sideshow that isn't given as much weight as needed. Seems like since our focus is on Victoria, we're as much in the dark about what's going on politically around her as she is.
Also, not interesting.
Her love affair with her cousin moves very quickly. I don't see how they became so deeply enamored of each other. I guess the movie implies that they write each other a lot, but you don't get that feeling that they connected very well.
Fast forwards through a lot of things.
Lavish costume drama, an eyeful to look at, pretty-faced leads,both him and her, and since it's a British production, almost everyone who's anyone in British cinema is in it and recognizable, so excellent acting all around.
Vaguely enjoyable. Seems like they really could have done something more serious here, but missed the opportunity.
Anonymous
8/10
Amazing story of the Oxfordian theory of Shakespeare authorship that holds that Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford, wrote the plays and poems traditionally attributed to William Shakespeare. VERY complicated story of the cultural restrictions of nobility, treason, the fight over the ascension to the English throne after Elizabeth I, religious clashes, bribery, blackmail, and murder.
Yeah, once you find out the secrets, it's really far fetched, but it's extremely enjoyable, another costume drama, very realistic.