Review of Queen Margot (1994) by Byron B — 09 Mar 2010

Good movie about love, family, religion and politics with an interesting historical background!

The story is adapted from one of Alexandre Dumas' novel of the same name. I didn't read the book but I presume the movie is a summary of the novel.

Since I knew french history, it helped me to understand what is happening in this movie but you don't really need to have any knowledge on this time period to understand it because there is a good written introduction to the historical situation. So the movie is set up in 1572 in a dark and difficult time for France. Wars of religion are dividing the country between Catholics and "Huguenots" (which are how the french called protestants back then). The royal family are having trouble with the stability of their kingdom so they are planning a wedding of one of theirs with a protestant in the hope that it will ease relations with the "huguenots". But everything is not what it seems...

The emphasis is on the theme of love with a sad tone to it like most old love stories. The theme of family is very present too. We see a portrait of a royal family that is controlled by a murderous mother ready to sacrifice a lot for the control over the young king which is her son. This creates a situation where siblings are pitted against themselves and they all suffer because of her destructive nature especially the young king which is on of the characters that gets a lot of attention in this movie and he is indeed a very interesting one although a very special one too.

I find the story very well done and well structured. What actually happenned in history is retold with more details, those that history didn't tell us. Details that have been invented by the author so he could make a magnificient and complex story out of them mixing history with fiction. It creates a very believable story not like most hollywoodien modern movies where there's big holes in the scenario. And there are a lot of character development and the relations that they have between them.

In this paragraph I talk about my impressions on the movie as a historical buff. First of all I find the love story taking too much space especially with Queen Margot's real lover which seems to be a fictious character. I also think that Henri IV looks too weak. His personnality doesn't shine enough. Then, we also don't see much the "Duc de Guise" which was a pivotal character during this historical period. Meanwhile, I love the costumes. Renaissance and age of reason movies are always full of beautiful costumes. So that's it folks!

Overall I highly recommend this movie if you like a love story in a historical context which explores ties between royal family members. After whatching the movie maybe you'll even read Alexandre Dumas' novel :).