Film Review - The Favorite (2018)

The Favorite is directed by Yorgos Lanthimos and stars Olivia Coleman as Queen Anne during the time of War with the French, her aide Lady Sarah (Rachel Weisz) is her right hand but one day Sarah’s cousin Abigail (Emma Stone) comes to work at the palace and starts to covet favour with the Queen which makes Lady Sarah jealous.

I have mixed feelings of the film now that I have had a chance to think it over a little bit and let it stew in my mind and to start I will go with the positives the sets, costumes, cinematography and editing are all superb, the film is gorgeous to look at with its candle lit sets, well tenured palace grounds, large halls with giant portraits and paintings and enormous bedrooms that befit royalty plus the editing here is smooth and flows really nicely with hardly any real cuts at all.

The film also has a fantastic performance by Ms Coleman who really threads the needle between serious drama and black humour and her skills in both fields over the years (to me she will always be PC Doris Thatcher in Hot Fuzz) serve her very well here, I also really liked Nicholas Hoult as the British Opposition Leader hungry for power and he really plays that kind of foppish ponce really well and I wish he was getting more awards love for his performance.

But alas I think the film suffers from some slight tonal issues between the black humour and the serious costume drama and I enjoyed the film the most when it was that black comedy with everyone swearing their heads off as opposed to the costume drama the film seems to settle into in its second half which kind of left me a little bored after a while.

And also as good as Ms Weisz and Ms Stone are I didn’t think they were that good here now don’t get me wrong I don’t dislike their performances at all but they stand no chance against just how good Ms Coleman really is and she just blows both of them away.

And that was my review of the Favorite and I am mixed on the film it looks great and technical elements shine as does Ms Coleman but the costume drama second half bored me, 2 and a half out of 5.