The Affair of the Necklace
From Biocrawler, the free encyclopedia.
The Affair of the Necklace is a 2001 film directed by Charles Shyer and starring Hilary Swank, Jonathan Pryce, Simon Baker, Adrien Brody, and Joely Richardson.
It was a lavish costume drama based on a scandal in the final days of the French monarchy, when Marie Antoinette's reputation was trashed by a confidence trickster, who absconded with a lavish diamond necklace which she had purchased using the Queen's name but without her knowledge. See Affair of the diamond necklace for details.
Richardson expressed sympathy with Marie Antoinette's undeserved fate, something which she tried to convey in the film. However, it was a critical failure: "an endless illustrated Harlequin paperback of mawkish backstory and corset-popping purple prose", according to Jessica Winter in The Village Voice, though Richardson's performance was listed among the "incidental pleasures" of the film by Roger Ebert and described as a "sly, commanding performance that reflects a marvelous understanding of this notorious character" by Salon.com.
The film was nominated for an Academy Award for Costume Design.
External links
- The Affair of the Necklace (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0242252/) at the Internet Movie Database
