Girl King (The)

Christina, Queen of Sweden, is one of the most interesting, abstract and decadent characters in royal history...

This clumsy depiction of her life manages to skirt many of the important and defining issues that sculpted her brief and befuddled reign...involving the viewer in none. Apart from one scene...where the Queen wants to address a crowd of thirsty villagers...they just want free beer.

Christina, here, is a strapping lass...headstrong and inflexible. Dressed in manly clothes, on the surface, she is the stereotypical lesbian. But, there was much more to Christina...evidence suggests she may have been intersex, she may have been transgender...she may have been many things...but, this film manages to sweep those concerns under the carpet by basically saying that she was an unconsummated lesbian.

She was raised as a boy...surely, the nature/nurture argument could have been given a bit more leverage!

On the whole, the acting encompasses the full range of the lower echelons of the craft...from the extravagant to the wooden. Kaurismäki lost control - not only with the script - but, with his performers too.

There are too many accents, languages and odd translations...rendering it a convoluted mess...with a result that refuses to go deeper than a millimetre below the surface.

To say she died a virgin is an inaccuracy...there is no evidence. It does suggest that virginity can only be lost...heterosexually. That, in itself, is a nonsense...as - indeed - this film is.

Trailer...