The Favourite (film): One of the better movies I have seen in a while
This was recommended by a friend. I had never heard of it and it somehow managed to pass me by without ever noticing that it even existed. It is based on actual English Royalty in the 18th century with some names that you might know if you really paid attention in history class.
I watched this thinking that it could be based on real events and it is, but only in a very loose way. Almost all of the specifics of the events that are mentioned or shown in the story are fictionalized, so keep that in mind before you start running around telling everyone that the Queen of England was involved in a lesbian love triangle.
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If I ever did end up hearing about this movie I know why I would have ignored it. It appears to be some sort of royals drama from the 1700's complete with powdered wigs, servants, horse-drawn carriages, and rather innocent love trysts. The way that the film is shown though, is done very differently.
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Emma Stone (always a favorite of mine) plays the role of Abigail, who is a distant relative of Sarah Churchill (Rachel Weisz) who is a high-ranking member of the Queen's court and a close personal confidante. Abigail on the other hand has fallen well out of favor with the Royals and she arrives taking the job as a servant as a favor based on her lineage, and gradually takes steps to curry the Queen's favor and backstabbing a ton of people along the way.
The methods that she uses are rooted in a sexual nature and the critics of this film have kind of been brutal to the film for presenting the conflict between Abigail and Sarah as being one of attempting to seduce the Queen. There is no historical record of Queen Anne ever being anything other than completely loyal to her husband at the time. This is a complete work of fiction but I suppose it does kind of fit in with the sort of things that Hollywood was turning everything into during 2018 times.
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Sarah and Abigail are constantly at battle with one another despite being cousins, and this is actually quite humorous and even has some unexpected twists in it as far as how devious both of them will be to benefit themselves without the Queen taking notice.
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You can't help but feeling a bit bad for the Queen during all of this because she is in bad health and treats both of them as if they were trusted friends as well as women to mess around with in the sack.
The sexual nature of the movie isn't terribly graphic if that is a concern. It is more implied than shown.
The films is presented in acts that are kind of reminiscent of something that Guy Ritchie would do - maybe I have that wrong. But each section of the way and I believe that there are 9 of them, has its own theme and certain ways in which the balance of power shifts from one person to other.
The script is damn near perfect, with them able to make old English ways of speaking humorous in a way that we the modern audience can still understand. The three main characters put on an outstanding performance and all of them deserve any accolades that came their way as a result of this film existing.
Virtually every professional reviewer and most of the audience scores for this movie are really high and for once, I don't think that it was rigged in order to make that the case. This film on the surface looks like something I wouldn't enjoy but instead, it was one of the best films that I have seen in recent times and I can't believe it was never mentioned to me until recently. Sometimes your off-the-cuff conversations with your friends can be fruitful.
Despite the fact that most of this film is just all about talking and interesting dialogue for a full 2 hours, it never gets boring. When I needed to leave the room I actually paused it and never looked at my phone. When I can do both of these things we are talking about a very good movie.
Your alliance will change direction multiple times as the film goes on and the only "beef" I have with the entire production is that I didn't really understand the ending, which is the only artsy and difficult to interpret part of the entire film. You will likely have to look it up as well.
Should I watch it?
I think the only compelling reason I can think of to NOT watch this would be if English is not your first language. Many of the subtle quips that are made in this movie could likely get easily lost in translation and therefore a lot of what makes this film great could be difficult to grasp unless you know all of the English language.
I would ask for you to take a gamble on this one even if it sounds like something you wouldn't enjoy because I bypassed it for multiple weeks after promising to watch it because the trailer, the poster, and the synopsis sounded boring to me. I was terribly wrong about that. This is an absolutely fantastic film.
Make sure to put the "U" in the name of the film when searching for it. There is another film called "The Favorite" and it is not at all related to this movie.
As far as I can tell this movie cannot be legally streamed for free anywhere. It can be rented for a few bucks on Apple, Amazon, Roku, and Fandango at Home.