Marie Antoinette

In her short life, Marie Antoinette was both adored and reviled. It's perhaps appropriate, therefore, that the most recent movie based on her life has garnered similarly split reactions. In its debut at France's Cannes Film Festival in May, media outlets reported audiences were split between boos and cheers—the revolutionists versus the royalists all over again.

As seen through Sofia Coppola's lens, one can imagine that Marie Antoinette would find all the hubbub amusing. Played by Kirsten Dunst, who manages the unique feat of being angular and cherubic at the same time, this Marie is full of naiveté, cheer, and courage. She is always in search of a good time, and I was quite often pulling for her to find it.

Kirsten Dunst as the title character

At 14, Marie was married to the 15-year-old boy who would later become King Louis XVI of France in order to stabilize and secure relations between her native Austria and the Gauls. But for a marriage quite literally dictated by politics, scant attention is paid to them in Marie Antoinette. Instead, we're entertained with the absurdity and frivolity of life at Versailles for the young bride—the gossip, the odd customs such as the dressing ceremony every morning that allowed the ladies of the court to dress the queen-to-be, and the ongoing attempts to consummate her marriage. The king-to-be, played perfectly by Jason Schwartzman, was quite shy.

The French government allowed Coppola and her team to shoot the film at Versailles; the sets are ornate, the costumes flamboyant, the props splendid—a visual feast. The prop budget for cake alone must have been steep—not only a reference to her famous non-quote, but perhaps also a sort of nod to Marie's high spending ways.

Jason Schwartzman as King Louis XVI, whispering sweet nothings to Marie

The script is informed largely by Lady Antonia Fraser's biography of Marie Antoinette, a best seller that is widely thought to be responsible for rehabilitating the image of the queen from a weak and morally lax spendthrift to a person historian Simon Sebag Montefiore called "a woman more sinned against than sinning."

Indeed, perhaps the trickiest aspect of the story as told by Coppola is that her protagonist is acted upon more than she acts. This dynamic means that the plot drifts at points. But the narrative is buyoed throughout by Coppola's use of a New Wave-spiked soundtrack that provides a creative point of access to the emotions of the characters—especailly Marie's angst at her unconsummated marriage and her boredom. Marie Antoinette is essentially a modern mood piece, despite its replendent period drama garb. When seen with her friends—all playfully stumbling in the pre-dawn grass after her blowout birthday party, hoping to see the sunrise—Marie and the isolated concerns of her rich, beautiful, and powerful circle call to mind the contemporary stories told of New York City's haute bourgeoisie by director Whit Stillman.

Marie falls for the Swedish Count Fersen (Jamie Dornan)

There are misteps. A musical selection or two takes the New Wave experiment off track. And I'm still unsure how I feel about the last ten minutes of the movie when the outside world crashes in on Versaille quite literally. It's arguable that the most gripping part of Marie Antoinette's life, certainly the period filled with the most political intrigue, was that which begins where the movie ends.

These concerns notwithstanding, Coppola has created a fantastic aesthetic experience that offers a sense of what it might have been like to be in the shoes of foreign 14-year-old girl who carried the great expectation of two countries on her shoulders.

Talk About It

1. Discuss the sorts of expectation and pressures Marie Antoinette faced. How do you think you would have handled those sorts of demands? Do you think Marie was brave in her optimism or cowardly in her isolation?
2. Marie indulged her whims. She was eventually reviled by the French public for what they perceived to be her excessive spending in the face of their poverty. And yet her spending seemed innocent in a way. What do you think about this aspect of her life? Do you think she understood the "plight of the people"? Should she have lived in a different manner
3. Marie liked to be amused. And she possessed a certain zest for life and beauty that is commendable. But do you think her enthusiasm for amusement led her into any wrong behavior? Discuss.

The Family Corner

There are several instances of partial female nudity. Marie is seen naked from behind at a distance and often seen in a sheer dress. Marie and Louis's unconsummated marriage, and attempts to consummate it, figures prominently, if not explicitly. Marie also engages in an affair. There are two instances of very muted violence.

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What Other Critics Are Saying

Quite a few critics have condemned Sofia Coppola's new film, Marie Antoinette, saying it is frivolously stylish and that it drains the suspense from a dramatic story. One religious personality even called it "one of the most boring, tedious, poorly made historical movies of all time."

But others have observed that the filmmakers sought to achieve something different than action, suspense, and melodrama. They're finding that Coppola, as in her previous films (Lost in Translation and The Virgin Suicides), is after something different than a conventional period piece. She's an introspective artist who explores the interior lives and curious behaviors of women who find themselves strangely detached from the rest of the world. Here, Coppola provokes us to consider how the pop superficiality and decadence of Marie Antoinette's impulsive young life reflects the way in which our own culture is preoccupied with childish tendencies.

In short, this is not a thriller but a loose re-telling of an historic tale crafted as an exploration of values. Is there anything of lasting value in Antoinette's life of self-indulgence? Do we see her learning anything in the process? Is there anything about her experience that mirrors the materialism that surrounds us today?

Brett McCracken (Relevant) says, "The pains director Sofia Coppola takes to modernize the tale … reveals that the goal is not the definitive portrayal of history's most notorious queen, but rather an examination through an iconic lens of much more accessible, universal themes of identity and impermanence. … Artistically, Antoinette is the most beautiful film of the year. … For all of its irreverence, Antoinette strikes me as one of the most resonant historical dramas I've seen."

Harry Forbes (Catholic News Service) has several complaints. "If only the drama were as outstanding as the sumptuous 18th-century production design. … Unfortunately, the film only hints at the queen's transformation from epicurean young woman to politically savvy political prisoner, one of the most fascinating aspects of the story, though it does suggest her growing maturation as a loving wife and devoted mother. Coppola's dialogue, striving for naturalism, is pretty uninspired. … "

Steven Isaac (Plugged In) says, "[I]f Marie Antoinette the movie has any message to impart at all, it is that life without purpose (and love) is not really life at all. … Her fixation on things (gowns, shoes and, more famously, cake) is emboldened onscreen by an utter lack of the good things in life that most of us take for granted." He also has a "quibble" with just how much of Marie is, um, revealed.

Sofia Coppola has certainly created a stir among mainstream critics. Half of them admire the film, half think it's a disaster. "To say that this movie is historically irresponsible or politically suspect is both to state the obvious and to miss the point," writes A.O. Scott (New York Times). "[T]he movie is only masquerading as a costume drama. It would be overstating the case to call it a work of social criticism, but beneath its highly decorated surface is an examination … of what it means to live in a world governed by rituals of acquisition and display."

Marie Antoinette: Greg Wright (Past the Popcorn) says, "[Coppola] illustrates that Marie Antoinette's lifestyle was as natural to her—and no more excessive—than a sheep's luxuriant meal of wildflowers, or a bumblebee's wallow in a blossom's pollen. Do we criticize a lamb for being a lamb, or a bee for being a bee? … Unfortunately, the final quarter of the film, in its relative rush toward the inevitable historic conclusion of Marie's tale, seems completely out of step with the rest of the movie."

Denny Wayman and Hal Conklin (Cinema in Focus) say that while the film "is somewhat historically accurate, it leaves many holes in the real story so it is hard to follow. If the viewer really wants to know what happened to bring down the French throne in a revolution, this film would not be a good historical source."