A Royal Affair (2012)
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A Royal Affair Movie Review
A Royal Affair is a 2012 Danish historical drama film directed by Nikolaj Arcel and starring Mads Mikkelsen, Alicia Vikander and Mikkel Følsgaard. It’s a straightforward, but very well made movie.
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“You have ideas as the same rate that the rest of us change clothes“
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A young queen, who is married to an insane king, falls secretly in love with her physician. Together they start a revolution that changes a nation forever. A lavish period piece that is also juicy in its drama, this is pretty much a Danish ‘Dangerous Liaisons’. In its two very distinct sections, the film is wildly uneven as one is much more interesting than the other.
I am talking of course about the political landscape of the time. The turmoil of this important century and the arrival of the Enlightenment movement to the country of Denmark were beautifully explored here. The second half became tragic very quickly, but that revolutionary spirit drove this part of the story to great effect.
The relationship between the two male characters is fascinating. The king being a neurotic buffoon and his advisor actually being the one in charge made for a very interesting dynamic that is very historically accurate even if the rest of this story is not. The almost homoerotic element to their relationship was also interesting and so was the very honest, brutally funny depiction of the court’s more promiscuous and earthly affairs.
What I did not care for is the romance. Alicia Vikander is a fantastic actress, but in this film she was reduced to an uninteresting love interest. All of the scenes between her and Mikkelsen’s character were thoroughly uninteresting and whenever the movie focused on romance, it stalled significantly. The political backdrop was much more intriguing this time around.
A Royal Affair is a sumptuous period piece with gorgeous costumes, stunning sets and a great score. However, in many of its sequences the story just went through the motions with the many clichés of period pieces being present, such as the epistolary narrative approach for instance.
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The acting is the highlight here. Mikkel Følsgaard is superb as this crazy king and he should have received more great roles after this terrific turn. As for Mikkelsen, obviously he stole the show, but the level of detail and expert emotiveness that went into his performance here was astonishing in one of his career-best turns. The movie deserved its Oscar nomination for the acting alone.
