"The King's Speech"-REVISITED

Monday March 7, 2011 One of the problems with having a day job & seeing multiple films over a course of a week is the necessity of spending a couple of hours in a darkened theater after a particular grueling day of work. That is to say, at times, depending on the stress I've encountered, and/or the fact that I'm just plain exhausted, and/or I'm in a bad mood-I'm just not as focused as I should be and, consequently, my opinion of a particular film might be skewed as a result. I've tried not to let that enter into my writings. Thankfully, this has happened only on a very few occasions. That being said, since I started this site over three years ago, there has only been one other instance where I've slightly changed my opinion of a film after repeated viewings, and both films, in my opinion, turned out to be the best films I had seen that year. The first time was in 2008 when I revisited "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" after screening it twice. The latest instance is "The King's Speech". Both films I initially gave 3 1/2 stars. Yesterday, after re-screening "The King's Speech", I walked out thinking that I slightly misjudged this absolutely wonderful, perfect, masterpiece. From the first frame to the last, few films have affected me, taking me through the gamut of emotions I experienced that, somehow, eluded me the first time around. Fully rested. Fully involved. Fully blown away. This film was clearly the best film of the year and deserved every accolade it has received from nearly every corner of the film community. What particularly struck me was how wonderful Geoffrey Rush was in the role as the king's speech therapist. In addition, Alexandre Desplat's score, whose distinguished career includes, interestingly, the score for Benjamin Button, is woven perfectly into the film-which helped make this a complete filmic experience. The Academy got it right. "The King's Speech" gets a 4 solid stars.