Dir. Saul Dibb, UK, 2008, 110 mins
Cast: Keira Knightley, Ralph Fiennes, Dominic Cooper
Review by Carol Allen
This film represents another change of direction for the versatile Dibb, who made his debut with the gritty contemporary gun culture movie "Bullet Boy" some four years ago, then going on to direct the television adaptation of Alan Hollinghurst's Booker prizewinning novel "The Line of Beauty" about gay life in the eighties. Here he demonstrates his ability to handle a big budget costume drama with great assurance.. For a start the costumes and the locations, which include Chatsworth, ancestral home of the Devonshire family and London's Somerset House, standing in for the exterior of their now demolished London home, Devonshire House, not only look gorgeous but contribute effectively to the story.
The Duchess of the title is Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire (Knightley), an eighteenth century ancestress of the late Princess of Wales. While the film does not specifically mention this - how could it? It's in the future - there are certain parallels in the stories of the two women, on which it is quite valid for the film to draw. Georgiana is married as a very young woman, seventeen in her case, to a much older man, whose objective is purely to produce a male heir. She becomes a fashion icon and society leader, a popular public figure and a centre of attention for the tabloids of her day, the cartoonists, while her marriage is the inspiration, it would appear, for the characters of Sir Peter and Lady Teazle in the hit play "The School for
Scandal" by Sheridan (Aidan McArdle). Georgiana however gives birth only to girls and soon finds herself in a "ménage à trois" situation, when her husband makes her best friend Bess (Hayley Atwell) his mistress and brings her and her sons to live with them. A situation complicated by the fact that Bess and Georgiana have dabbled in a bit of lesbianism earlier. There are other significant differences between Georgiana and Diana, in that Georgiana is presented as an intelligent and politically aware young woman at a time when women had no power in politics, who also has a penchant for gambling. When she eventually takes a lover herself with tragic consequences, it is the rising politician Charles Gray (Dominic Cooper).
Knightley fills the Duchess's extravagant dresses and wigs with elegance, looking particularly good in the Gainsborough style fashions, and while not demonstrating any great emotional range, is touching and engaging in the title role. The acting honours of the film though go to Fiennes as her husband. He does at times sound and behave very much like Prince Charles in terms of being taciturn and unemotional, but he gives also gives depth and ultimately sympathy to a character, who would otherwise be rather uninteresting. Despite the potential of her dramatic situation Atwell as Bess doesn't make quite such a strong impression as one might expect, in that once she's established in the Devonshire household, the character's a bit sidelined. Cooper too has limited opportunities as Georgiana's lover Charles Grey, wisely never referred to by his now famous as tea title, Earl Grey. The sex scenes in the film are well and discreetly handled, each one making a dramatic point, such as in Georgiana's uncomfortable wedding night and her sexual awakening by Bess, rather than being there just as a bit of bodice ripping. There's also a good performance from Charlotte
Rampling as Georgiana's's mother, a woman doing her best for her family within the constraints of the social mores of her time. While not great, ground breaking cinema, this is still a very entertaining and classy British costume drama and the outcome of Georgiana's story is poignant.
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