A bright, clever, whimsical portrait of a lonely young girl whose vivid imagination turns out to be tailor-made for chess-playing, "Long Live the Queen" is satisfying family fare that simultaneously serves as a painless primer to the rules of the game.
The Netherlands' official selection for best foreign-language film Oscar consideration, the contemporary yarn was screened at the recent Nortel Palm Springs International Film Festival.
Young Sara (feistily played by Tiba Tossijn) is at an inquisitive age when a caring mother and grandfather aren't enough to satisfy her curiosity about the father she never knew. Meanwhile, her underachieving academic ways haven't exactly endeared Sara to her classmates or her impatient teacher (Rudolf Lucieer).
Everything changes with the arrival of Victor (Rene Nijman), a New Kid in the class whose father has just opened a vintage toy shop. There, Sara becomes drawn to an elaborate chess set with fancifully carved pieces that take on a life of their own in her highly developed imagination. Spurred on by a story about a fairy-tale queen who devises a game to prevent her bored husband from going off to war, Sara is transported back to an enchanted world of noble pawns and zigzagging knights.
Back in the real world, she decides to put her newfound knowledge to the test and enters a chess tournament (despite a pronounced lack of encouragement from her teacher and her mother) and, in the process, emerges victorious on a number of personal fronts.
Beautifully performed and creatively executed, the 1996 Golden Calf Best Film winner (the Dutch Oscar equivalent) covers a lot of classic children's literature terrain in some inventive repackaging thanks to writer-director Esme Lammers.
Among the familiar faces, Monique van de ("The Man Inside") plays a particularly spirited white queen, while Derek de Lint ("The Unbearable Lightness of Being"), generates a kind warmth as an international chess champ who proves to play a considerable part in young Sara's life.
Production values are similarly bright and colorful and cause one wonder what Lammers could have done with backgammon.
LONG LIVE THE QUEEN
First Floor Features
Director-screenwriter:Esme Lammers
Producers:Laurens Geels, Dick Maas
Director of photography:Marc Felperlaan
Editors:Marc Glynne, Hans van Dongen
Art direction:Jelier & Schaaf
Costume designer:Linda Bogerts
Music:Paul van Brugge
Color
Cast:
Sara:Tiba Tossijn
White queen:Monique van de Ven
Bob Hooke:Derek de Lint
White king:Jack Wouterse
Sara's mother:Lisa de Rooy
Sara's grandfather:Pieter Lutz
Teacher:Rudolf Lucieer
Victor:Rene Nijman
Running time -- 115 minutes
No MPAA rating...
The Netherlands' official selection for best foreign-language film Oscar consideration, the contemporary yarn was screened at the recent Nortel Palm Springs International Film Festival.
Young Sara (feistily played by Tiba Tossijn) is at an inquisitive age when a caring mother and grandfather aren't enough to satisfy her curiosity about the father she never knew. Meanwhile, her underachieving academic ways haven't exactly endeared Sara to her classmates or her impatient teacher (Rudolf Lucieer).
Everything changes with the arrival of Victor (Rene Nijman), a New Kid in the class whose father has just opened a vintage toy shop. There, Sara becomes drawn to an elaborate chess set with fancifully carved pieces that take on a life of their own in her highly developed imagination. Spurred on by a story about a fairy-tale queen who devises a game to prevent her bored husband from going off to war, Sara is transported back to an enchanted world of noble pawns and zigzagging knights.
Back in the real world, she decides to put her newfound knowledge to the test and enters a chess tournament (despite a pronounced lack of encouragement from her teacher and her mother) and, in the process, emerges victorious on a number of personal fronts.
Beautifully performed and creatively executed, the 1996 Golden Calf Best Film winner (the Dutch Oscar equivalent) covers a lot of classic children's literature terrain in some inventive repackaging thanks to writer-director Esme Lammers.
Among the familiar faces, Monique van de ("The Man Inside") plays a particularly spirited white queen, while Derek de Lint ("The Unbearable Lightness of Being"), generates a kind warmth as an international chess champ who proves to play a considerable part in young Sara's life.
Production values are similarly bright and colorful and cause one wonder what Lammers could have done with backgammon.
LONG LIVE THE QUEEN
First Floor Features
Director-screenwriter:Esme Lammers
Producers:Laurens Geels, Dick Maas
Director of photography:Marc Felperlaan
Editors:Marc Glynne, Hans van Dongen
Art direction:Jelier & Schaaf
Costume designer:Linda Bogerts
Music:Paul van Brugge
Color
Cast:
Sara:Tiba Tossijn
White queen:Monique van de Ven
Bob Hooke:Derek de Lint
White king:Jack Wouterse
Sara's mother:Lisa de Rooy
Sara's grandfather:Pieter Lutz
Teacher:Rudolf Lucieer
Victor:Rene Nijman
Running time -- 115 minutes
No MPAA rating...
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