The King's Speech

2010 - Dir.: Tom Hooper.

Shown at the FeckenOdeon on 24th September 2011

It's a peculiar person—if not an unabashed
sadist—who takes pleasure in someone's stuttering, particularly at a public
event. Yet when filmmaker Tom Hooper heard that Colin Firth couldn't stop
stammering while accepting an acting honour for "A Single Man," he
couldn't hide his delight. That Firth was able to transplant King George's
faltering diction onto his own tongue meant that audiences could see, and hear, how disabling a speech impediment can be. We may never have been able to admire Firth’s efforts without the intervention of the Queen Mum. Screen writer David Seidler wanted to make this film in the mid-1970s. He wrote to Queen Elizabeth asking permission to tell the story. She wrote back saying that "The memory of these events are still too painful" and that she wouldn't accede in her lifetime... the Queen Mother lived to be 101 - perhaps the longest delay in film history.

Based
on a true story....

Much of “The King’s Speech” is true - based on the speech therapist’s notes and other writings. George VI was indeed thrust somewhat unprepared into the limelight at a crucial point in history when his brother abdicated in order to marry a divorcee. The film skirts nimbly round the rather ticklish points of Edward’s liking for a certain Herr Hitler and his previous playboy reputation. The portrayal of Churchill (the one piece of really bad casting in the film) also dodges round Winston’s support for Edward. But there’s little doubt that Logue’s intervention gave the country a functioning figurehead at a time when such a thing was desperately needed.

• Lionel Logue's diaries were discovered just nine weeks prior to principal photography. Quotations from them were worked into the film's screenplay.
• Helena Bonham Carter filmed this in tandem with the final Harry Potter film. She shot scenes for Potter at the weekends and fitted in the Queen during the week.
• To the great disgust of the actors and crew the film has been cut for the United States. To avoid getting an R rating the distributors removed the climactic scene where Bertie violently uses swear words to overcome his stammer. The film has been rendered meaningless but the money men just don’t give a f***. We do - and we’re showing the full version!