Grade: B-
I was recently asked, and now I wonder if I would review some of these movies as favorably if I were seeing them early in their initial theatrical runs, before any awards buzz or nominations. Take The Favourite, for instance. I saw it because it is nominated for Best Picture, but it is otherwise not one that would interest me, unless I had to see it due to this being a full-time job (maybe one day). It is an old-timey, female-driven English period drama, complete with accents, wigs, and lots of makeup. It is not my cup of tea. I don’t fancy it. And yes, my grade here is probably padded.
But I didn’t hate The Favourite. It had its moments. The trio of nominated performances (Olivia Colman, Rachel Weisz, Emma Stone) are all excellent. Stone in particular has the most unique and memorable internal monologue you’re likely to see in a movie this year. Let’s just say she can multitask. My favorite plot point was the love triangle between the three aforementioned ladies. I enjoyed every scene pertaining to that, and wanted more. I’d’ve been satisfied with a movie about just that, and less to none of the other stuff.
Half the score is typical for an English period movie. Lots of violin. The other half sounds like they hired the organ player from Count Dracula’s house. I did like how when a character rings a bell, it is in the same key as the last chord we had just heard a few seconds ago. A nice touch was the chapter numbers and titles throughout, like a movie-as-book. It was cool to hear Elton John’s Skyline Pigeon play over the end credits. I rarely listen to the original studio recording. This was an eccentric movie, with some one-liners that did give me a chuckle. I can’t decide if the final shot was brilliant or just strange and anticlimactic. It just kind of fizzled out. This review will end about as well as I thought the film did.
Grade: B-
Film Reviews by Mark 
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