Paramount Home Entertainment Australia
Available on DVD and Blu-ray
Whether or not The King's Speech is indeed the Best Picture of 2010, only the staunchest of supporters of The Social Network (the film many believe it usurped for the Oscar), would begrudge its win. For here is a film that is entertaining, eloquent and emotional, though the latter in that reserved British monarchy kind of way.
The King's Speech is a well written, solidly directed (though Fincher really should have won Best Director), and, above all, superbly acted film. And let's be honest, far less worthy have been crowned by the Academy.
It is no Schembri-esque spoiler to reveal that The King's Speech concerns itself with King George VI's lifelong battle with a chronic stammer (brought into sharp focus when he unexpectedly assumes the throne following his brothers's abdication) which he triumphs over in the early days of the war with Nazi Germany. With $31 million at the Oz box office, you're very much in the minority if you haven't yet seen TKS.
Of course, the main reason to see it – and see it again and again – is for the impressive double act that is Colin Firth and Geoffrey Rush. For The King's Speech, a period drama of royal intrigue, is first and foremost an odd couple, bro-mance, buddy film between Firth's King George – a volatile mix of rigidity, fear, frustration and anger – and Rush's Lionel Logue, the unconventional Australian speech therapist with a healthy disregard for authority who finds himself teaching a British monarch how to speak.
Other performances – Oscar nominee Helena Bonham Carter as George's wife (and future Queen Mum), Guy Pearce as the abdicating Edward, Timothy Spall as Winston Churchill, and for Pride and Prejudice fans, Jennifer Ehle as Mrs. Logue – are uniformally good, but it's Firth (the Best Actor Oscar winner) and Rush (unlucky to come up against an in-form Christian Bale in The Fighter) who are the jewels in The King's Speech crown.
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