Grace of Monaco

Oliver Dahan's biopic of Hollywood's darling, Grace Kelly, has been pretty much thumped by critics universally. Most would have you believe Grace of Monaco is an arduous, dull swamp of a film on a par with Oliver Hirschbiegel flop, Diana.

It isn't. Not quite.

Described as a fictional story based on true events, Grace of Monaco looks at Grace Kelly's (Nicole Kidman) struggle to maintain her own identity as her marriage to Monaco's Prince Rainier III (Tim Roth) bounces around the rocks while her husband's subjects reject her and his staff resent her. Add to that Charles De Gaulle's impending invasion and the principality's nosedive into economic ruin, and all was not happy in Grace's life. Allegedly.

Grace of Monaco is a long way from Dahan's 2007 biopic triumph, La Vie en Rose. It is far too long, far too dull, with questionable 'truth' and rather too much melodrama. Dahan repeatedly cuts to lingering ECUs of Kidman's eyes, vainly hoping that soft focus shots of her regal visage will imbue his film with serenity and beauty. It doesn't. It merely serves to increase the boredom and slow the pace still further.

No matter how good Kidman and Roth are, they cannot raise Grace of Monaco above the status of star Sunday afternoon matinée to the magnificent period piece it desperately wants to be. Both actors are pleasant to watch here with Grace's relationship with Frank Langella's Father Tucker a highlight that allows Kidman to scratch under the veneer of the princess. Likewise, Roth is more than adequate as the overbearing monarch who occasionally remembers to show he cares about his wife, but it lacks the truth of his sensitive and truthful performance in last year's fantastic Broken.

When Roger Ashton Griffiths waddles onto the screen as Hitchcock aiming to seduce Grace Kelly back to Hollywood, the teeth begin to rattle as memories of Toby Jones pouring out the definitive depiction of Hitch in The Girl diminish anything that Ashton Grifiths can produce. Amongst the supporting cast Robert Lindsay, surprisingly cast as Aristotle Onassis, and Derek Jacobi as Count Fernando D'Aillieres engage the eye but there is a very odd collection of accents on display for a film set in an annex of France.

The production design is eye-catching and detracts momentarily from the clunky dialogue, but it isn't sufficient compensation. Contrary to popular opinion, Grace of Monaco is not a turkey. It is merely overlong and dull. Approach with low expectations and you won't be disappointed.

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First of all, this is not a biography, it's about an event that apparently took place in Monaco in the early 1960's. The French President deciding Monaco should pay taxes to France? After all the negative reviews, I was expecting the worst, but was surprised I quite enjoyed it. Nicole Kidman was most effective as Grace Kelly, and I can't think of anyone else today who could have handled that difficult role so well. Tim Roth was not as good looking as the real Prince Rainier, and Nicole's 5'11" towered over him. I thought the guy who played Hitchcock was better than the recent screen versions! Perhaps the film should have been titled 'Monaco in Crisis' or some such, so as not to mislead people into thinking this would be a bio of Grace Kelly?

I was really pleasantly surprised by this film. It was interesting and well played. I like Nicole Kidman and she really looked like a princess in this film.

Story of Monaco was very interesting and this particular episode in life of the Principality was well described in the history and well portrayed in this film.

In the movie theater where I watched this film 99 percent of the audience were women. I guess all of the dream to marry a Prince charming. Be careful what you wish for, you might get it! My ex got her and she ran for her life ;)

The one to blame for Tippi Hedren, and not Grace Kelly, starring in Hitchcock's 'Marnie' is really Charles De Gaulle. At least, that's what 'Grace of Monaco' suggests. It's probably not quite true, but the film doesn't pretend to be historically accurate. It says so at the beginning: it's a fictional drama, based on true events.

The film shows a relatively small part of Kelly's remarkable life. After having been married for six years to Prince Rainier of Monaco, she is visited by Alfred Hitchcock who offers her the lead in his film project 'Marnie'. She wants to do it, but reviving her acting career turns out to be impossible because of a crisis in Monaco, caused by French president Charles De Gaulle's political manoeuvrings.

We see Kelly as a somewhat naive Princess, who against her will becomes involved in political power-play. When a French diplomat suggests that Europe should become a third pillar of world power, next to the Soviet Union and the US, the American-born Kelly quips that this wouldn't be necessary if Europe wouldn't have invented communism and fascism. It's one of the best one-liners in the film.

The story switches nicely from Rainier's political problems to Kelly's own personal doubts. She is not happy as a Princess, and has trouble with the rigid conventions of life at the palace. The film even suggests that her outspoken opinions help solving the problems with France in the end. This may not be historically correct, but it makes for a nice script.

Much has been said about casting Nicole Kidman. I think there are very few actresses on the globe who would have done a better job. I'm not exactly a big fan of Kidman, but in this case she shows exactly the right mix of a strong will, a fearless non-conformist attitude and a superb elegance. She fits in perfectly with the cinematography, full of warm colours and lush images.

I liked the way the script works towards an apotheosis: a speech by Kelly at a high-profile philanthropic event in Monaco. The speech is truly great; either it's very good script writing, or Kelly employed a very talented speech writer. It's the highlight of the film: Kidman delivers her text in a truly heartfelt way, with the camera extremely close, so only a part of her face is visible.

The film has weak points. The dialogue sometimes feels clumsy and pompous, there are too many subplots and intrigues, and the director indulges a bit too much in the glamorous palace life. But at least this film doesn't make the mistake of cramming too much biographical information into a 100-minute movie. It's an enjoyable movie about one of the most interesting women in film history.

The bad thing about messing up history and making a movie about a real person that is not based on facts but fiction is that we tend to remember the movie. So, now thousands of people will believe that Kelly saved Monaco (de Gaulle never went to any ball, the situation was negotiated peacefully with France at the end). They will believe that the marriage with the prince did not include numerous extramarital affairs on both sides and they will believe that Grace was as tall and elegant as Nicole Kidman, the perfect princess. Too bad, because reality was good enough. The movie is beautiful, superbly esthetic, but that is all.