Well, to be fair to Dame Helen, she did a cracking job despite the script she was given and that's all an actress can do. In this profession, you get a script and you take it because not doing it means not eating and even when you've made a fortune like Helen, you don't break the habit of a lifetime as a jobbing actor/actress. Now, I hated the film and thought it was dribble snot but Helen Mirren did the best she could. I'd also take umbridge with you saying it was an uninspiring part - it was a VERY inspiring part because the woman she was playing is inspiring but the script wasn't there to make that inspiring part an inspiring reality on the screen and what we saw, was one of our best actresses trying to make s**t look like sugar. It also isn't just Hollywood, it's everywhere and when was it ever different?
Look at the 1956 movie with Ingrid Bergman and Helen Hayes, 'Anastasia'. Now that movie has stunning costumes, the music is fabulous and the cast is gold. I mean, we're talking the cream of the crop from the well knowns such as Yul Brynner to the ones who should have been well knowns such as Martita Hunt. It won awards but the script was dire. That movie actually makes me flinch with embarrasment not because the actors are bad but because the script is and all too often in this profession, you see fabulous actors really let down by the script writers. But 'Anastasia' wasn't off limits. She'd been dead for quite a while but Anna Anderson wasn't and quite a few Romanovs were milling about - was it right to make the film and make money off of it? Well, that's the role of theatre and cinema - to entertain and to inform. Movies are not like 'Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?' or 'African Queen' where we watch, enjoy but there's no reality in it at all. Movies have to be informative and when we say, "Well, this is off limits and so is that", then we're buying into censorship to spare blushes and I don't agree with that. At the same time, not every biographical film needs to be an axe in the back. 'The Nun's Story' was done exceptionally well, 'Evita' was a musical that was amazing with an equal measure of affection and criticism - these people existed and their stories have to be told.
Now, we don't know how true 'The Queen' was but I hope it inspired people to look into the reaction more than we were doing. I loathed the film but I was pleased that it made people think twice. It made people question the response and it showed the press for what they were. I think the problem is, we tend to think once history is over it's over and it isn't. It has to be constantly reviewed and re-evaluated so that we can pick up on what we've missed and learn from it. I thought the movie was sheep crap but I suppose it did encourage people to think twice and thats what that whole era in British history needed - a review. It was always being painted as the Queen bending to the public whereas in reality, it was the Queen doing what her Prime Minister advised which to me is much more significant when the roles should be reversed in that relationship if that's the system we have. I don't want that but I'm saying, if that's what we've got then it should work properly. Bear in mind that this is one of 3 films that Frears has made/is making about Tony Blair and in which Michael Sheen has played the former PM. I think if anything these films are a much needed look at the Blair premiership of which Di's death was unquestionably a big part.
