Film Review: The King's Speech

The Kings Speech directed by Tom Hooper

The King's Speech has been on my must watch list for a very long time, but I always decided against watching it right before a movie night. However, this film was interesting and funny, without a hint of violence or any sexual scenes.

Although, before you continue reading, I have to say there was a large collection of swearwords, used several times throughout the film. In fact, there was one scene when Lionel, the speech therapist says "Swear for all you're worth", which as expected, results in a varied collection of mild to moderate curse words. So, if you are looking for a film to share with your family, then I'd advise you keep looking. (I'd recommend 12-13+, but it does depend on how wide your /your teen's "vocabulary" and/or tolerance to swear words is.)



The story follows Prince George the IV, (Played excellently by Colin Firth) on his journey to becoming king.

The film starts with him as a prince, second in line to the throne (to his brother) and happy with that. He is an introvert, and prefers not to travel out of the comfort of his palace, seeing no need, other than to speak the occasional speech here and there. Unfortunately, when he does speak, he can hardly get the words out, due to a severe stammer.

After trying several batty speech therapists, and getting thoroughly disillusioned with the whole process, he decides to give up, and face the fact he cant get rid of it. But, his wife (Helena Bonham Carter) had other plans. She booked one last appointment with an Australian language therapist (played by Geoffrey Rush) and sends her grumpy husband off to meet him.

 Lionel Louge(The therapist) starts the session by making the prince recite a play with headphones on, to which the prince in question tries to back out of it, knowing there was no point trying. The appointment goes badly, to say the least, and soon after, George storms out, stopped only to be handed a recording of his progress by Lionel, before flinging himself down the lift and out into his cab.

However, later, out of sheer curiosity, he decided to play the record, just to see how bad he really was. Bracing himself for the worst, George turns up the sound, but to his confusion, there wasn't so much as a hint of a stammer in the speech at all!

I found the film interesting and bright, and rather easily accessible, due to the lack of complicated politics. Aside from the language, I'd recommend this to anyone wanting a different style of film than the average shoot-'em-up flicks.