LouHomey
From my favorite movies..
TeenzTen
An action-packed slog
Hulkeasexo
it is the rare 'crazy' movie that actually has something to say.
climbingivy
Wallis and Edward was a fascinating excursion into the history of Edward the VIII and Wallis Warfield Simpson Windsor.It was refreshing to see a version that did not make Wallis out to be the meanest woman in the world.There is a reviewer who I totally disagree with that blames Wallis for the downfall of Edward the man and as king until he abdicated.None of us will ever know whether Wallis really adored Edward the way he adored Wallis.Edward was absolutely in love with Wallis the American who was a twice divorced woman.Oh my how can that be?Edward did not want to be king to begin with.He was disinterested in the monarchy as a whole I believe because Edward did not have a good example to follow because his parents were jerks.His father George V was an ogre and his mother did not help matters at all.They should not have been parents and I feel the same way about Prince Charles,Prince Philip and Queen Elizabeth.Princess Diana suffered horribly because of Prince Charles,Camilla and the entire royal family who are just downright mean people.I have heard that Edward and Wallis were Nazi sympathizers and that is probably true.That is unfortunate.But as far as Edward the man and as king deciding that he wanted to marry Wallis,I personally think he had a right to as long as he did not make her queen.The "Morgnatic" way would have solved that problem.Terrific movie for lovers of royal history.
ryansternmd
I was disappointed in this film and pleased that I rented it before I bought it. I caught the goof where Winston Churchill addresses the Prince of Wales as "Your Majesty" at the Jubilee ball, which for me was a red flag that the writers were not familiar with royal protocol and therefore probably anti-Roaylists. I was also disappointed when the investigations into Wallis Simpson were discussed (it was appropriate to investigate her past if she was the lover of the Prince of Wales) that at that point, nor anywhere else in the film, did they bring up the pro-Nazi connections between Wallis Simpson and the German elite. This is not speculation but historical fact: I have seen the photographs of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor as state guests in Germany greeted by Nazi elite. The rest may be rumor, but this was not and it was absent. Rather than portray Wallis Simpson as a social climbing adulteress, they portray her as a loving wife introduced to the Court of St. James by her husband and wooed by the Prince of Wales. No explanation is given why a Baltimore businessman would be a guest at a royal function. However, when Wallis accepts an invitation to spend a quiet weekend alone with the Prince of Wales, she willingly enters what is obviously a set up for seduction. Then later in the film, she is portrayed as shocked when her husband confesses a long time affair and asks for a divorce. Later,Edward defends her in her two divorces as being the victim. How is a woman who has committed adultery the victim in a divorce ending a wedding of convenience as hinted at several times in the script? This was not an unbiased film portraying the facts of the Wallis Simpson affair, but a romanticized fiction of a true love story of two people (although both are committing adultery as a man courting a married woman). If "The King's Speech" is a better researched, historically more accurate film, then Edward was an irresponsible, self centered, self indulgent man with little respect for the institution of the royal family. In "Wallis and Simpson", Edward is portrayed as a kind, loving, honest man who wanted to modernize the institution of monarchy. I can not believe that one is fiction and the other accurate while at the same time that the true character of Edward lay somewhere in between. Even if you feel that "The King's Speech" was unfair to Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson, they were both guilty of adultery and by law Edward VIII could not marry Wallis Simpson and be king. Yet, the script of this film misleads us into thinking that Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth (the late Queen Mother) were cold and calculating in trying to separate Edward VIII from the love of his life. When Edward tells Wallis that she is the Duchess of Windsor, but not an HRH, Wallis makes a quip that she is sure that Queen Mary and Elizabeth had something to do with it. How would an American divorcée married to the former king be entitled to the the title HRH? Princess Diana lost this formal address when she and Charles divorced, though she remained Princess Diana, the Princess of Wales. In all, there were so many of these omissions, errors and glosses over character flaws that I believe that the writers wanted a love story with a sad ending rather than a historical film depicting the affair that brought Britain to crisis in 1936. My final opinion that this made for television Canadian film is what is seems: a soap opera love story and not a historical film. I will stick to "The King's Speech" as a historical, researched film depicting the Wallis Simpson affair and the abdication of Edward VIII to marry a woman that British law precluded as acceptable wife for the king.
jotix100
As biopic films go, this one has taken a lot of liberties in order to produce an entertainment that will be appreciated by people that didn't know many of the details which surrounded the abdication of the heir of the English throne in the 1930s. Written by Sarah Williams and directed by without much excitement by Dave Moore, we are given an account of what went on behind the scenes in one of the most remarkable stories of the last century.Edward, who would have been the king of England after the death of his father, has to do some reckoning about whether to give up the reins to the empire in order to marry the woman who conquered his heart. This was one of the most romantic episodes involving a royal house in Europe in the last century. Duty, honor, something that is a natural for the monarchy of that country, was a burden Edward was not ready to accept because it excluded the twice-divorced Wallis Simpson, who he fell in love with and put him at odds with his family and the English establishment, something unheard of in those days.The result was his abdication and a life without his family, who protocol dictated to stay away from him after the scandal. Edward and Wallis lived the jet set life of the few privileged people of the times after he resigned the right to be crowned king. The film only deals with the events that led to that break.Joely Richardson shows an uncanny resemblance to Wallis Simpson, a woman with her own style who made headlines and who appeared to have lived a fulfilled life next to the man who gave up everything for her. Stephen Campbell Moore is seen as Edward. Mr. Campbell Moore makes a good impression as this somewhat rash young man who couldn't care anything about the power his position would have meant for him. He was an unselfish man who threw everything away for love.Mr. Moore got interesting performances from the supporting cast, especially Richard Johnson, as Stanley Baldwin, the man who opposed the marriage from the start. David Calder is seen as Winston Churchill, who proved to be a true friend to the troubled monarch. The excellent Margaret Tyzak, who has little to do, appears as a proud Queen Mary.This film, although far from accurate, shows a page of history from the not too distant past in which we are shown a different situation of the royal family of England, something that in today's standards wouldn't have occurred at all.
Philby-3
Viewers with an interest in British history might wish to note that since the first Hanoverian came to the British throne (George I in 1714) it has been occupied by dimwits. These dimwits have fallen into two classes – those like Victoria, George V, George VI and the present incumbent, who saw themselves as the slaves of duty and therefore as ceremonial heads of state did little or no harm, and those like George IV, Edward VII and Edward VIII who kicked over the traces, but did less damage than one might have expected. The 1936 abdication crisis was a crisis only for those who believe in monarchy, in this country a minority of about 25%, according to the 1999 Republic referendum. The story has been told several times before on TV – is there anything new about this 2005 ITV version, apart from the Baltic locations?.Well, the publicity says there's more of Wallis's side of the story here, but I can't say that's obvious, apart from there being a bit more of Wallis' Aunt Bessie (Miriam Margolyes). Edward is portrayed as the seducer (in a candlelight chalet in winter) but Wallis (nicely played by Joely Richardson) doesn't exactly play hard to get. She had rivals for the post of prince's mistress (Lady Furness and Mrs Ward) whom she easily defeats. At the end she was left with the baby, or at least the immature prince, a duchess without honour exiled to France. Stephen Campbell Moore is about 10 years too young for Edward but his puppy-like demeanour is appropriate. The triviality of the Windsors is shown by the fact that it wasn't the loss of the Crown that irked them so much as the establishment's refusal to give Wallis the title "Her Royal Highness". Diana, of course, had exactly the same beef, but then she was demoted on her divorce. Camilla (for the moment) is a mere duchess, but is also "HRH". Winston Churchill, robustly played here by David Calder, was a principal supporter of Edward just because he was a prince, but then Winston was a rather romantic old Tory.Nazi sympathies were not uncommon in the British upper classes prior to World War 2 ("those Nazi chappies certainly know how to make the trains run on time") but if an invasion of Britain by Germany had been successful (and it was a close–run thing), Edward, given his sympathies would have been the front-runner for puppet King. Edward was an undistinguished governor of the Bahamas between 1940 and 1945 but the main reason for that appointment was to keep him out of the reach of the Nazis. (Down under we got his younger brother, Prince Henry, who was even dumber than Edward, as GG (1942-1945), but a bit better behaved). After that he and Wallis spent the remaining 27 years of their marriage in very comfortable and well-deserved obscurity in Paris. One is left with the feeling we got lucky.This production has a nice sheen to it and the 30s' era is well evoked. There are some other good performances, particularly 80 year old veteran Richard Johnston as Wallis' nemesis, prime minister Baldwin, and Julian Wadham as Edward's not exactly loyal private secretary Fitzhardinge.
