Oh Marie!
Marie Antoinette starts off with rock and roll and a splashy opening credit sequence, but after that, it’s a drama-less costume drama set to a soundtrack that varies from period music to rock. Lavish sets and opulent lifestyles abound, and we never see an interior that isn’t gaudy.
An all-star cast inhabits this film: Kirsten Dunst (aka Spiderman’s girlfriend, Mary Jane Watson) in the title role, Jason Schwartzman (aka Max Fischer) stars as Louis XVI, Judy Davis is completely underused as Comtesse de Noailles, and Rip Torn steals every scene with his knowing smile and too few lines as Louis XV.
So Louis XVI marries Mary Jane – I mean Antoinette, but he won’t sleep with her. That’s basically the “drama” that is supposed to drive the first half of the film. Marie Antoinette is from Austria, so their marriage is part of an important political alliance. Without a child, their marriage could be nullified, and France needs an heir to the throne.
In this first half of the film, we see Marie Antoinette eat sumptuous meals. We see her gossip about Louis XV’s mistress, we see and hear Marie Antoinette be the subject of gossip. We see her pick out extravagant clothes and showy hairstyles. We see her presented with dozens of desserts and pastries. But we never see behind the opulence. Sure, when she first enters the French royal family, she protests the ceremonious aspect of it.
”This is ridiculous,” she says.
”This, madam, is Versailles,” counters Judy Davis. From that moment on, it’s just Marie Antoinette acting like a spoiled brat. She’s young, filthy rich, powerful, and gets whatever she wants – from truffles, to dogs, to breaching etiquette at the opera.
She finally does get pregnant, and as a token of gratitude, Louis XVI gives her a vacation home. Here, she continues to do whatever she wants, only not so much under the watchful eye of her husband and the politicians that are always about the royal palace. So, as any bored housewife might do, she sleeps with a Swedish soldier. Why? Because she can. Because she’s bored. Because the movie needed a sex scene that didn’t involve Max Fischer. She eventually has two more kids, presumably fathered by her husband, and continues to live at the vacation home. Then one day, there are some angry peasants at the palace door, and so Max and Mary Jane have to move out. And that’s the end of the movie.
There are a lot of scenes of Marie Antoinette walking down hallways, Marie Antoinette eating, Marie Antoinette giggling with her friends. That’s the depth of her character. Louis XVI’s entire character is this: he likes locks and keys, likes to go hunting and he’s confused about sex. He’s given very little dialogue and so, there you go – locks and hunting. It’s too bad, because the lines he does have are pretty funny, and you can’t help but think that it’s Max Fischer in a costume drama. Was he cast purely because he’s the director’s cousin? Perhaps. He’s an odd fit for the role, but so is Rip Torn as his dad and they work as a father and son – the son with his plain, unaffected performance and the father with his all-knowing smirk and over-the-top delivery.
If you’re put off by supposedly French people speaking in all varieties of American accents with an occasional “au revoir” or “adieu” thrown in, or if you’re discomforted by Austrian people speaking with British accents, then this movie might not be for you. It’s a boring, undramatic costume drama. We are meant to be dazzled by the sets, by the costumes and by the rock and roll montages, and maybe we are, but we’re left wanting more. The characters are shallow and there is little-to-no conflict in the film. It’s the cinematic equivalent of a truffle: it’s not exactly junk food; a lot of work went into getting it to look just right and feel just so, but you know there’s really something more nourishing, something of substance.
