The Affair of the Necklace (2001)

They're are so many things wrong with this picture that it will be hard to list them all. Story is about a woman named Jeanne St. Remy de Valois (Hilary Swank) whose parents were killed as traitors to the French regime and now as an adult will do anything to get her family name and household back. She decides along with her lover Retaux de Vilette (Simon Baker) and the man she had married for convenience Nicolas De La Motte (Adrien Brody) would scheme a plan to convince the Cardinal Louis de Rohan (Jonathan Pryce) to purchase a very expensive necklace and give it to Marie-Antoinette (Joely Richardson). Jeanne forged letters from Marie-Antoinette to give the Cardinal for him to think that a relationship had been rekindled via mail. Jeanne keeps the necklace and uses it to purchase her home. First off, this film is miscast. Swank is a very good actress and I believe to be a more brave and daring one then some of the actress's in Hollywood that get paid millions and millions of dollars. She's a real talent but the film needed someone to evoke a more jaded personality. Jeanne is portrayed as some sort of martyr that we are suppose to feel sorry for. This was probably more of director Charles Shyer's fault than Swank. Shyer has directed nothing but light comedy before and this was his first entry into serious drama and I'm not convinced that he understood the story. Brody isn't bad and he seems to be genuinely having fun in his role. And in case you didn't notice, all the main actors are either English or American and most of them don't even attempt some sort of accent. Its suppose to be France and they didn't hire one prominent French actor. I guess if the French want to get back at us they could remake "The Grapes of Wrath" with an all French cast! And its hard to tell what kind of accent that Christopher Walken was doing in the film. Hell, its hard to tell what accent he does in American films! The film looks good though. The sets and locations are authentic looking and the construction of a good looking film was there. Unfortunately, the rest of the film is not well thought out. Wrong director, wrong actors and the wrong focus point of the story.

Fmovies: A great story was wasted by the trivialization of the real account of the theft of the necklace, based on a fictionalized mistreatment of Jeanne Remy de Valois. The woman was a fabulous schemer whose sense of entitlement is world-class. It would have been a great story if the writer had used the real one, instead of the weak screenplay composed using scant facts. The role of the fake Countess La Motte is a scenery chewer worthy of Faye Dunaway in her heydey and I would have loved to have seen Tim Curry assay the Cardinal Rohan character which is equal parts scoundrel and fool. The only victim in the real story is Marie Antoinette, in whose name the scheme is initiated, but who never had any part in the necklace theft - in fact turned it down three times when offered it by the foolhardy jewelers who designed it for the more audacious Madame du Barry, Marie Antoinette's godfather-in-law's mistress. The real interplay of ego and privilege ending in utter tragedy had all the stuff of a fascinating and lively movie. This wasn't it.

The Affair of the Necklace is a film that has some qualities but only adds more layers of falsehoods to a story that is already fraught with them. This film is trying to make Jeanne de la Motte into an unjustly destitute noble heroine along the lines of Thomas Hardy's Tess of the d'Urbervilles. Nothing could be further from the truth. She was a thief and a whore. Here are a few documented facts:

Jeanne's father was not dispossessed by the King's men; he pretty well did that to himself as a village drunkard and professional poacher. He married a servant girl who later became a prostitute. He was not a political agitator. Jeanne was actually generously pensioned by the King for being a true descendant of Henry II. She was introduced to Rohan by one of her many benefactors. She became his lover on her second visit. Cardinal Rohan, by the way, was not 'cardinal of all France', but Grand Almoner (or 'court cardinal'), a privilege he lost after the trial. Jeanne did not meet Rétaux as a court gigolo during one of her many fake fainting spells in court (three in all); he was a companion of arms and debauchery of her husband, who did not have a jealous bone in his body. At the conclusion of the trial, Cagliostro was also exiled from France by Parliament. After escaping from France, Jeanne did not retire to semi-gentility, lecturing English society matrons on her edifying adventures. She wrote pornographic memoirs in many volumes regaling the populace with further aspersions on the Queen's character, while her husband, back in France, made a very decent living getting paid by the Rohan family not to write his memoirs. She did in England what she had always done in France: she whored. She fell out the second-floor window of a London house of ill repute, to her death.

Other things bother me: The necklace itself is a rather slim, cut-rate and unattractive version of the documented original. Marie Antoinette was not tall, spindly, stoop-shouldered and bustless, no matter how effective Joely Richardson's performance is otherwise. Most of the source music heard in this film was never heard within several country miles of the French court, namely Vivaldi, Haendel, Mozart and various English baroque composers (Saints preserve us!). The ditty 'Plaisir d'amour' (misspelled in the end titles) was never part of a stage presentation. The film's main titles and theatrical trailer are disgraced by a nondescript and rather hair-raising piece sung by Alanis Morrissette, which sounds to all the world like an African mass sung in Gaelic (What were they thinking?!).

In the film's defence, it was shot in Versailles, it does show amazing detail, occasional accuracy, spurts of brilliance and a vigorous rhythm. Furthermore, it never stoops to the detailed depictions of bodily functions and gory acts of sadistic violence that have become the hallmark of recent euro-trash pseudo-historical epics (La Reine Margot, Elizabeth, Farinelli, Le Roi danse, Vatel, Ridicule, to name a few). It is infinitely more historically accurate than, say, Gladiator, but that's not saying much.

My favourite quote about this film comes from Rick Groen in Toronto's Globe and Mail who wrote: 'If life, as Keats suggests, is a 'mansion of many apartments', then this plot is its wrecking ball.'

The Affair of the Necklace fmovies. I have to disagree with just about every critic in the world. I completely love this movie. (No spoilers that wouldn't come from a preview or the back of the movie box included)

True, there is constant voice-over narriation. But this based-on-a-true-story-scandal movie involves a complicated plot. Without the help of one of our tried-and-true secondary characters. The historical characters, though obviously given modern color, are convincingly portrayed. Hilary Swank gives innocent looks as she lies shamelessly. As the plot thickens, so does the number of fun players. Christopher Walken seems to relish in his part of mystical cheater. Adrian Brody seems to really enjoy playing the philandering jerk, banging back whiskey and happily flirting with all young actresses (street-walkers) he sees. Jonathan Pryce actually made me fear him as the corrupt cardinal. Impressive from the man I last saw as the kindly father in Pirates of the Carribean.

The most lovable character, by far, is Retaux. The cheerful court-wise gigilo mutters some of the funniest lines in the movie, and runs a full gamut of emotions, from flirtatious to distraught.

Joely Richardson plays a WONDERFUL ultimately doomed by history queen. Her sweet naievety combined with indifferent ignorance paints a reasonably possible image of the French monarchy at the time.

Oh sure, the movie's not totally perfect. Really, there are two things that bothered me. (1) The all over the place accents. But I'm willing to forgive it. After all, the movie's set in France. They're not speaking French, so they're not going to fool me into thinking they're French anyway. (2) The sunglasses worn by Joely Richardson and Christopher Walken. Quite forgivable, but still made my eyebrows raise.

On the whole this movie exceeded my expectations tenfold. The great costumes, powerful music, and tense time period give the actors a playground where it's next to impossible to fall flat. But not a one of them would have anyway.

This storylike true story had already been filmed by Marcel Lherbier in 1946,with Vivianne Romance -famous for her bitchy parts-,a more than adequate comtesse de la Motte.

This is the first mistake of this "remake":Hilary Swank portrays a genuine heroine,whose properties have been stolen by an unfair monarchy,whose father was some kind of Robin Hood who protected the poor against the cruelty of times.She appears most of the time as a victim,a noble adventuress,with a romantic love affair with her sidekick,but it's the ending in London that takes the biscuit,when she reads her memoirs to old posh sobbing ladies "oh poor thing!oh poor dear!" Les "memoires de madame de la Motte" -which were published in France during the revolution are obnoxious,trash stuff..Historian Jean Chalon quotes this line in that notorious book "the voluptuous princess -she's speaking of Marie-Antoinette- was waiting for me in her bed ,and I must say she took advantage of her husband's absence..."Actually Marie-Antoinette never met madame de la Motte and the scene under the snow when the queen accuses la comtesse of ruining the monarchy is pure fiction.

The scenarists are as naive as the cardinal de Rohan,and as the people of Paris in 1786,who thought Madame de la Motte's punishment was unfair.La Motte wouldn't stay long in la Salpetriere anyway,and some say she was helped to escape.As for cardinal de Rohan ,he was far from being a saint,but he was naiveté itself.how could he believe that Marie Antoinette ,who had always despised her and never spoke to him,could use him as an emissary?

The film is entertaining and a lot of scenes are more historically accurate -such as the grove of Venus and the trial:that's was the queen's mistake:the king did not need the parlament to judge somebody-. Walken is ideally cast as comte de Cagliostro ,as Brody as Nicolas de la Motte.But the Queen's execution (1793) comes at the most awkward moment ,and La Motte was dead (in 1791) when it occurred anyway.The scenarists suggest her death might have been a crime :never an earnest French historian made a hint at that.At the time,the royal family had more important problems to solve .

The scenarists say that the affair of the necklace was the direct cause for the French revolution,which is a narrow-minded view.It might have been the straw that broke the camel's back but the reasons were much more complex and the students should take a better look at it.

The movie does not tell that after his exile,Rohan was restored to favor during the revolution ,became part of the Etats-Généraux" in 1789 ,and died in Germany in 1803,the last of the dramatis personae

This was a movie I had always had a slight interest in seeing and never gotten around to it, then I eventually forced myself to rent it and I must say I really did enjoy it. For all the history buffs this is not a movie for them, but if you really just sit down and watch without analyzing every detail it is very enjoyable. The plot is very interesting and interwoven and for the most part the cast does an excellent job. My only exception was unfortunately Hilary Swank. I have always loved Hilary Swank, but she didn't seem to have a clear understanding of what she wanted to portray with Jeanne. Jonathan Pryce was absolutely fantastic as the cardinal. He conveyed a danger that was very subtle yet frightening at the same time. The costumes were amazing, and I was very happy to see some scenes actually shot in "The Hall of Mirrors." Charles Shyer didn't blow me away with his directing style and some shots seemed uneven and out of place, but it was in no way distracting. Overall, it's a movie that doesn't necessarily require you to think very much, but it is still enjoyable. I'd recommend it for a lazy afternoon next chance you get.