Marie Antoinette

 

In this movie I was expecting more about how the people also viewed Marie Antoinette, but instead I was able to see more of how Marie Antoinette's life was as a monarch through the lens of Coppola. I think what made Coppola seen as an auteur for this film was how she was able to focus on Marie Antoinette's personal life. We see that she is put into a huge role for her age and she mainly wants to live her life as a young adult which many of us can related to. I think the biggest take away from this film is that Marie Antoinette may have never wanted to have such great power in France according to Coppola and that she as a young woman could not have handled this kind of power at such a young age. We see that throughout history and in the movie she is seen as a villain by the french people as she starts to focus less and less on the people of France.  Just like in the movie we also see that "Maria Teresa... was quite concerned and saw her daughter as a disappointment." (De Angelis 5). Her own mother also believed that she was not fit to rule a monarchy of her own. Yet this goes back to the auteur style of Coppola, she wanted to show a different side of Antoinette by depicting her as an internally good person with little experience in being able to lead a country which is often overlooked in history.

During her rein as queen of France, Marie Antoinette as shown in the movie bought extravagantly to the point where it actually became a problem for the monarchy. All this money spent on clothes was shown throughout Coppola's movie, but not only did it show her rash spending it also was able to show off changes in the mood and progression of the situation in France during the time. Near the beginning of he rein, Antoinette started to wear clothes that "were playful and coquettish, ephemeral and unpredictable, alluring and modern." (Weber 5) We see this as she transitions to Dauphine of France after the early ceremony in the woods. What I like that Coppola did really well in the movie is portray how France slowly begins to fall apart by using lighting and colors in the scenes. In the scene linked above we can see that it is full of color and joy as Marie enjoys her birthday. France at this time is doing well and this is reflected by the scene at hand. However as the Movie progresses we slowly see Antoinette's clothes and her background start to become more gloomy and dark in color. This reflects how France is falling out of love with the monarchy and the french revolution is starting to take place.

Citations:

De Angelis, Lauren. “Marie Antoinette: Misunderstood Monarch? - La Salle University.” Digitalscommons.lasalle.edu, https://digitalcommons.lasalle.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1153&context=the_histories.

Weber, Caroline. Queen of Fashion: What Marie Antoinette Wore to the Revolution. Picador, 2007.