The King's Speech — an entertaining film in a disappointing movie year — can expect "a bevy of Oscar nominations," says Isaac Chotiner in The New Republic. But as a history lesson, the movie, which purports to relate King George VI's battle with a speech impediment, is a complete bomb. It sanitizes the king's "treasonous" older brother, David (aka Edward VIII), "an ardent admirer of Hitler" whose abdication to marry divorcee Wallis Simpson put King George on the throne in 1936. The film shrugs David off as merely a "self-indulgent brat." It also suggests that King George himself was "staunchly anti-fascist from the start," when he, too, made nice with Germany before "rallying his people to the battle against fascism." Here's an excerpt:
The strange unwillingness of The King's Speech to mention any of this is at least somewhat surprising for one reason: The actual arc of George VI's character would make a fine and interesting movie. Just think: A king fights against a stutter and his dastardly, treasonous brother, while eventually sloughing off his old instincts for appeasement. He even overcomes his distaste for Winston Churchill — the politician who bent over backward for that very same brother — and lends his steadfast support to Churchill's aggressive policy against fascism.
Why wasn't this story told? The likely answer is that even highbrow critics and audiences love to toast the House of Windsor. While the Royal Family may frequently appear more tawdry than anything else, cheap American Anglophilia can always be counted on to provide thunderous applause.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Why is Trump’s alleged strike on Venezuela shrouded in so much secrecy?TODAY'S BIG QUESTION Trump’s comments have raised more questions than answers about what his administration is doing in the Southern Hemisphere
-
Vance’s ‘next move will reveal whether the conservative movement can move past Trump’Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
-
Why recognizing Somaliland is so risky for IsraelTHE EXPLAINER By wading into one of North Africa’s most fraught political schisms, the Netanyahu government risks further international isolation
