Keira Knightley once again stars in a period piece with corsets, drawing rooms and the myriad of problems that beset rich English types in "The Duchess." Here, she plays Georgiana, the Duchess of Devonshire, wife of the unimaginably wealthy Duke of Devonshire (Ralph Fiennes.)
For reasons never entirely explained, Georgiana is the toast of London and the single epicenter of the fashion world. At one point, an announcer bellows that whatever the Duchess is wearing today, all others will wear tomorrow. And I thought, "Why?" That Knightley's wigs look more Marge Simpson or "Bride of Frankenstein" only hampers the problem. (But maybe I'm just being aguy here.)
The film's main drama lies in Georgiana's crushing heartbreak under the Duke's cold indifference, lack of passion and constant affairs. When Georgiana falls for a young candidate for parliament (Dominic Cooper, fresh off the ungodly "Mamma Mia!"), the marriage falls further into misery.
Georgiana is presented as what may be the first feminist, a woman who questions her placement in society as a mere trophy or animal to be bargained over and as a woman who dares to act in the same manner as an entitled male and take a lover on the side. Knightley is good, but it's Fiennes who is the star. His Duke certainly is repugnant, but he's also strangely tragic. The man has no idea what love, joy or morality is, and knows that he doesn't have the mental capacity to ever understand those traits. Fiennes ("Schindler's List") always is good at finding such threads in his villains, and he doesn't disappoint here. Oh, cool fact: Georgiana was the great (times a lot) grandma of Princess Di. Irony, eh? B
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