1862. English teacher Anna and her son Lois arrive with a ship to Bangkok, Siam, upon invitation of the King Mongkut who wants her to teach his children English and science, hoping to get the best of both worlds. Anna finds out that the King has 15 children who need an education. When an English staff thinks the King is a "barbarian", Anna persuades the King to invite the English to his palace for a cultured dinner, thereby showing them the opposite due to his good manners. One of the King's concubines, Tuptim, fell in love with a Burmese lad Tuptim. This upsets the King so much he wants to beat Tuptim, but grudgingly abandons the punishment when Anna is appalled. Anna wants to leave the palace, but stays when she hears that the King is dying in his bed.
Despite good critical reception, "The King and I" has not aged well with time, and does not improve the reputation of the term "stiff-kitschy musicals from the 50s". The memoirs of Anna Leonowens have an interesting basic premise, showing how the educated heroine is able to improve and refine the King, yet the movie loses that in the process of bland, unmemorable musical and dance numbers. A few good jokes do appear and manage to liven things up, such as when Anna removes the old map of Asia, showing an incorrect, oversized scale of Siam, and presents the correct world map, causing some kids to complain ("Why is Siam so small on this map?!") or when she has some exchanges with the King ("False lies!"). However, these good parts are far between, and thus they never get off the ground. Yul Brynner's performance is solid, yet his character needed "more juice" and better jokes to entrench himself better in people's memory: for one thing, his King is a person who tries to be an enlightened reformist, and is thus at least an interesting character to begin with. Several plots come and go (for instance, the subplot involving Tuptim's love for another man disappears just like that), making "The King and I" an easily watchable, yet not that engaging experience.
Grade:+
No comments:
Post a Comment