Pre-Victorian Beckham

The Duchess stars Keira Knightley as the titular duchess, Georgiana Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire, in the big screen adaptation of Amanda Foreman’s award winning biography of the first it girl.

Starring: Keira Knightley, Ralph Fiennes,
Charlotte Rampling, Dominic Cooper & Hayley Atwell
Directed by Saul Dibb

Release date: 05 SEPTEMBER 08
Cert: 12 A
Running time: 1 HR 50 MINS

Here’s how biopics work- you write down a famous person’s life, cut out all the boring bits, keep all the important/exciting bits, then juggle them into an interesting narrative. Here’s how a period piece works- you take a character, show how incredibly boring their life is, introduce the glamour of aristocracy, slap on some romance, throw in some fancy clothes, top it off with ridiculous hair, and slip in a candle-lit sex scene or two. The Duchess attempts to have a pic’n’mix of the two genres despite them being at odds on certain key factors.

The Duchess tells the story of Lady Georgina Spencer(Keira Knightley), who became Duchess of Devonshire when she married the 5th Duke of Devonshire, William Cavendish(Ralph Fiennes) in 1774. It is a tense, loveless marriage due mainly to the fact that the Duke is not best pleased that his lovely wife cannot produce an heir for him. Georgina, or G as she is often called, invites her best friend Bess(Hayley Atwell) to live with her and The Duke. One thing leads to another and Bess ends up being a live in lover for auld Willy. Later G will get her own back. Needless to say it’s all very scandalous.

The movie is directed by Saul Dibb, who also has writing credits and was heavily involve in the casting process. Mr.Dibb is best known for his 2004 film bullet boy, in which So Solid Crew member, Ashley Walters plays a young man who has just been released from prison after going down on gun charges. Dibb brings a new style to the period movie by being more focused on the biographical elements of the story than the period in which it is set. He does such a good job avoiding the unneccessary pomp that usually accompanies period movies that the Duchess comes in well under 2 hours. Well done sir. Also he doesn’t get too bogged down worrying about hair and wardrobe, a number of Knightley’s wigs look like they’re made from brillo pads.

Keira Knightly was reading Foreman’s book on the set of another film when she was offered the script for The Duchess so she is well versed on the subject matter, and it shows. KK received an oscar nomination for her role in Pride and Prejudice and adds to her period piece stock here with a fine performance. I’ve just one problem; women of the aristocracy at that time were generally of the plumper variety. SHE’S A STICK.

Ralph Fiennes weighs in with a good performance aswell. Anybody who enjoyed is calice, heartless schtick in Schindler’s List will be happy to see him slip into his monster’s skin again.

The movie unfortunately glosses over certain elements of Georgiana Cavendish’s life. The fact that she was a compulsive gambler who lost millions of pounds and died in huge debt is excluded from the story. This could have been squeezed in to create a more rounded character but it doesn’t make the final cut.

Also I can’t figure out why anybody would bother to make a film about this person. The woman never did anything of any real historical importance. She was the Paris Hilton of her day. If it wasn’t for the scenes of a sexual nature and scandal nobody would really care.

Having said that I am definitely not the target audience for this flick but it still managed to keep a faint grip on my attention. If this sort of thing is your bag then you should enjoy it.