It came out of Telluride as a bona-fide awards contender, and “The King’s Speech” certainly didn’t hurt its standing with its Friday night gala in Toronto.
Not only did the film play to a rousing ovation at Roy Thomson Hall, but a climactic scene near the end was greeted with applause as well – testament to just how well director Tom Hooper has refashioned a straightforward, potentially clichéd story into something quirkier, funnier and more powerful than you might expect from what is essentially old-fashioned moviemaking.
On star Colin Firth’s 50th birthday, Hooper lauded his star for “an indestructible core of niceness,” which he told the audience Firth shares with England’s King George VI, the character he plays in the film. Geoffrey Rush costars as the unorthodox speech therapist who helped the new king overcome a stammer and command the nation on the eve of World War II.
Hooper also told the story of how screenwriter David Seidler hit upon the story decades ago, and asked the Royal Family for permission to write a film set in the stormy days when King George V died and the new king, Edward VIII, abdicated the throne in order to marry an American divorcee, Wallis Simpson. The Queen Mother (played in the film by Helena Bonham Carter) requested that it not be made during her lifetime, as the memories were still too painful.
“David said yes,” said Hooper. “But he didn’t realize that the Queen Mother was going to live to be 186.”
(In fact, she died in 2002, at the age of 101, whereupon Seidler got to work.)
The film may play a bit long in spots, and it’s not a daring or experimental work like others at the festival – but in many ways it embodies the kind of exemplary filmmaking that once would have instantly made it a top Oscar contender and even now make it a formidable Best Picture candidate. It is, for starters, light on its feet and surprisingly funny, with enough stylistic quirks – characters usually occupy the outer edges of the frame, not the center – to make it solid but not stolid.
And while Rush will likely be a serious Supporting Actor contender, Firth is a near lock for a nomination and a good bet for more than that. At a party that followed the gala screening, the actor talked to theWrap about the film’s climactic scene, in which the new king delivers an address to the nation at the start of World War II.
The scene watches the king and his therapist (speech and otherwise) as George makes it through a crucial moment in his reign without stammering, and it includes nearly all of the speech that George VI actually delivered.
“It’s slightly edited, but it was taken directly from his speech,” said Firth. “And recordings exist of that speech, so I was able to listen to it over and over.
