The Lion in Winter
A husband and wife who have grown apart after years of game-playing bicker over the property, the children and (past and present) infidelities, gradually coming to terms with the passage of time, generational change and each other. Should probably have been titled WHO’S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLF IN A CASTLE (AND WITH KIDS)?, this is above all a writer’s attempt to give actors a chance to enjoy themselves and audiences a chance to enjoy watching them do it. On the other hand, perhaps John did not need to be played as quite so hopeless.
Even if a reaction like Pauline Kael’s (“it just won’t do to have actors carrying on as if this were a genuine, ‘deep’ historical play”, when it is in reality just “a family of monsters playing Freudian games of sex and power” – Kael, Going Steady, p. 174) may be understandable (although, really, the film is not nearly as pompous as she seems to think), for this viewer the result was hugely entertaining and ultimately, and rather surprisingly, quite affecting. Moreover, whereas the earlier, related movies, BECKET (1964) and A MAN FOR ALL SEASONS (1966), featured similarly wildly-enjoying and power-loving monarchs, in both cases this was only in order to form a contrast, a tension and a conflict with the conscience of a respected but doomed religious figure. Here, the conflict between church and state has been ditched, and this apparent lack of interest in “serious questions” is why these games of sex and power are not considered to be genuine or deep. But in fact, this film is superior to its two predecessors for precisely this reason, and not because this removes any serious questions, but because it deepens them, and approaches more enigmatic mysteries, about what precisely it is that makes life seem significant, when one no longer relies on easy oppositions of the divine and the secular, the celestial and the sublunary, and so on.
Even if a reaction like Pauline Kael’s (“it just won’t do to have actors carrying on as if this were a genuine, ‘deep’ historical play”, when it is in reality just “a family of monsters playing Freudian games of sex and power” – Kael, Going Steady, p. 174) may be understandable (although, really, the film is not nearly as pompous as she seems to think), for this viewer the result was hugely entertaining and ultimately, and rather surprisingly, quite affecting. Moreover, whereas the earlier, related movies, BECKET (1964) and A MAN FOR ALL SEASONS (1966), featured similarly wildly-enjoying and power-loving monarchs, in both cases this was only in order to form a contrast, a tension and a conflict with the conscience of a respected but doomed religious figure. Here, the conflict between church and state has been ditched, and this apparent lack of interest in “serious questions” is why these games of sex and power are not considered to be genuine or deep. But in fact, this film is superior to its two predecessors for precisely this reason, and not because this removes any serious questions, but because it deepens them, and approaches more enigmatic mysteries, about what precisely it is that makes life seem significant, when one no longer relies on easy oppositions of the divine and the secular, the celestial and the sublunary, and so on.
Mini Review: A husband and wife who've grown apart after years of game-playing bicker over the property, the children and infidelities, gradually coming to terms with the passage of time, generational change and each other. Should probably have been titled WHO'S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLF IN A CASTLE (AND WITH KIDS)?, this is above all a writer’s attempt to give actors a chance to enjoy themselves and audiences a chance to watch them do it. Hugely entertaining and ultimately, and surprisingly, quite affecting.