Marie Antoinette (2023)

Matt Roush says...

 The ill-fated French queen keeps her head, at least so far, in this tongue-in-rouged-cheek period biography, focusing on the Austrian teenager’s introduction to a hostile Versailles court when she’s wed for political reasons to the diffident young Dauphin, later King Louis XVI. It’s shrug at first sight between Marie (a splendidly saucy Emilia Schüle) and Louis (gawky Louis Cunningham), who flees in sexual panic every time he happens across his bride. The premiere is enlivened by James Purefoy’s wry performance as Louis’ lusty grandfather, Louis “Papa Roi” XV, and Gaia Weiss as the king’s possessive mistress, the fabled Madame Du Barry. The Favourite’s Deborah Davis writes the stylized series, which adopts a powerfully feminist sensibility amid jarringly modern vernacular. (Was “Wham, bam, thank you ma’am” part of anyone’s vocabulary back then?)

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