The King's Daughter

Just look at that cast: Pierce Brosnan, magnificent as an all powerful yet decadent king, William Hurt, great as always as the king's cardinal, Kaya Scodelario, beautiful as ever, Pablo Schreiber as the villain, Rachel Griffiths in a tiny role, even Fan Bingbing as... the non talking CGI creature?! And it's a fairy tale about Louis XIV's France, shot at Versailles, featuring a mermaid! How can you get this wrong?

And wrong they got it. A complete mess where the only redeeming quality is the acting and interaction of Brosnan and Hurt. It's not unwatchable, but a clear failure. And I get it, really. It's not easy to basically do a Disney film (mermaid, pirates, princesses, pompous figures in fancy clothes) in 2015, especially on a budget and with your parent company delaying the release for seven years. But they could have tried harder, made it a two parter, given the characters time to grow and for the viewers to get attached to them. Instead it feels like a bed time story read by a tired parent who just wants to go to sleep.

There is escapism with fantasy and then there are fantasies that just go into the realm of the ridiculous, this....is the second.

Pierce Brosnan was just not good in this, I literally found myself squinting at the screen at how bad he was. There are other actors involved that are good actors that do a decent job with what they are given, but truly...even with MY imagination, I just couldn't stomach this movie. I felt let down...badly, let down.

This story just never seemed to know what it wanted to be. The main lead female was just...lost, the story meandered, the acting was well...camp at best, with a few good characters thrown in here and there. But for the most part, I found the story fairly irredeemable.

The sad thing is, in the book the lead female character is quite strong, here she's...wishy-washy, and I hate wishy-washy.

I have no idea what took so long to release this movie, but I suspect there were people going "you spent how much on this piece of flaming **ap!?"

Again, there are actors within this that I like, but had Disney gotten ahold of it and done it well...it would have been so much better. Why? Because there would have actually been a decent story-line with direction.

Basically, it's watchable. But the film is a bit slow and cold. Although the plot is simple, it's still doing fine. But if they could make it more interesting, it'd be better.

BTW, I'm so surprised to know that this one was filmed in 2014. That's a very long delay.

William Hurt was a great actor so it's a shame that this was probably his last film.

If you want to see him flex his acting chops , see Body Heat,The Big Chill or Mr Brooks.

A great actor who hopefully be remembered for better things than this movie.

RIP William Hurt.

For review of the plot, read other reviews...

The costuming is AWFUL. Late 17th to early 18th century French court was visually *stunning*. Extant clothes from the time are brightly colored, with huge skirts and layers of ruffles. This was a time of huge silk imports and fantastical wigs.

What do we get in this movie?

2010s high fashion on a shoestring budget. The colors are there, but the silhouette is nowhere to be found. Pencil skirts, no one wearing sleeves. Ugh.

Mirror Mirror did better 18th century dresses, and that's a fairytale.

Frankly, the lack of costuming knowledge makes this movie unwatchable.