Victoria and Albert [2 Discs]

Director: John Erman John Erman

Overview

"John Erman's 2001 epic love story Victoria & Albert comes to DVD in a two-disc set from A&E Entertainment. The film is presented with a standard full-frame transfer and Dolby Digital Stereo sound. Closed captions are accessible. Disc one includes cast filmographies for Victoria Hamilton, Jonathan Firth, Diana Rigg, and Jonathan Pryce. Disc two includes cast filmographies for Sir Peter Ustinov, David Suchet, and Sir Nigel Hawthorne."

Product Details

Release Date:	10/30/2001
UPC:	0733961703443
Original Release:	2001
Rating:	NR
Source:	A&E Home Video
Sound:	[stereo]
Language:	English
Time:	3:20:00
Sales rank:	38,286

Special Features

Cast biographies/filmographies; Interactive menus; Scene selection

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Victoria Hamilton	Victoria
Jonathan Firth	Albert
James Callis	Ernest
David Suchet	Stockmar
Diana Rigg	Lehzen
Patrick Malahide	Conroy
Peter Ustinov	William IV
Nigel Hawthorne	Melbourne
Roger Hammond	Duke of Coburg
Penelope Wilton	Duchess of Kent
Delena Kidd	Queen Adelaide
Kate Maberly	Princess Alice
Toby Jones	Edward Oxford
Jonathan Pryce	Actor
Richard Briers	Actor
Crispin Bonham-Carter	Actor

Technical Credits

John Goldsmith

John Erman	Director
David Cunliffe	Producer
John Goldsmith	Screenwriter

Editorial Reviews

After presenting highly acclaimed adaptations of fictional works such as Pride and Prejudice and Lorna Doone, A&E debuted this docudrama in 2001 -- and again earned favorable reviews. The production centers on the romance and marriage of the last of the English Hanover monarchs, Victoria (1819-1901), Queen of Great Britain and Ireland and empress of India, and her first cousin, Albert (1819-1861), prince-consort of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha in Germany. The script skillfully intertwines the main plot, the love affair of Victoria and Albert, with subplots about political and familial discord that threaten to undermine Victoria's ability to choose a husband and rule independently. Victoria Hamilton and Jonathan Firth are delightful as Victoria and Albert. Portraying the royal couple as reserved and dignified but with minds of their own, they animate the film with memorable scenes, in particular one in which they play a lively piano duet and another in which diffident Victoria proposes to diffident Albert. Peter Ustinov is superb as crotchety King William IV, who dotes on his appealing niece and heir presumptive, Victoria, and vilifies her overbearing shrew of a mother (Penelope Wilton). The dinner scene, in which attendants carry the ailing king through a receiving line, serves up an épée de combat of verbal thrusts and parries that foretell hard times ahead for young Victoria. Then the king has the decency to die to allow Victoria to assume the throne, discover herself, and work against her nefarious mother and the scheming Sir John Conroy (Patrick Malahide). The plot thickens into a robust soup when, after the wedding, Albert discovers he has no purpose, no duties, and throws a royal tantrum while Victoria's protective lady-in-waiting, Baroness Lehzen (Diana Rigg), smiles wryly. Nigel Hawthorne is wonderful as the queen's sympathetic prime minister, Lord Melbourne, who coaxes common sense and giggles from the young queen, and David Suchet is equally engaging as young Victoria's mentor, Baron Christian Friedrich Stockmar, M.D.