Last week while Queen Elizabeth II was on her tour of the United States my co-workers and I got into a discussion regarding the royal family. One of my co-workers had recently rented The Queen and thought it was a great movie. I didn’t know much about it, other than it had won an Academy Award, but it sounded fascinating so I watched it last night.

The movie starts in 1997 with the election of Tony Blair as the new British Prime Minister and then quickly transitions to the day of Princess Diana’s death. The movie focuses around the Royal Family and Tony Blair’s interactions on how to mourn Princess Diana.

In the beginning the Queen comes off as cold and distant, not wanting any public acknowledgment of the Princess’ death since she was no longer a Royal. Tony Blair disagrees with her and feels that her popularity amongst the people warrants a large-scale public funeral. As the public turns on the Royals, Blair works hard to convince them that for their own survival they need to adapt to the situation and break from their Royal protocol. The Queen hesitantly accepts Blair’s proposals and works to repair the damage done to the Monarchy, earning the viewers sympathy along the way.

The movie did an amazing job of showing the Queen in a way that I don’t think many people have ever imagined her. I certainly never pictured the Queen driving herself across the Scottish countryside or trying to fix her own vehicle when it breaks down. Other members of the Royals didn’t fair too well in the movie, especially Prince Philip, who comes off as insensitive and arrogant.

Helen Mirren did an amazing job portraying the Queen and was well deserving of her Oscar. While she seems to have won most of the praise, I have to say that Michael Sheen also did an excellent job portraying Tony Blair, especially capturing the spirit and youthful charisma of Blair when he first took office.

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