Marie Antoinette

Sally Potter's "Marie Antoinette" distills the queen's tempestuous rise and fall into a vivid tableau of opulence and rebellion. At fifteen, the Austrian archduchess arrives in France, her marriage to the shy Louis XVI a political union that transforms into a life of decadent excess and isolated privilege at Versailles. As the French Revolution brews, Marie Antoinette's lavish lifestyle and perceived disdain for the plight of the common folk fuel resentment and political intrigue, culminating in her tragic downfall. Potter's film is a sharp, visually sumptuous critique of power, frivolity, and the tumultuous eighteenth-century court life.