Inception was the most entertaining film, The Social Network was the most clever film, but if The King’s Speech wins Best Picture in a couple weeks, I won’t be surprised.  It’s one of those films where all the elements are top notch.  If I pitched you a movie about Facebook and a movie about the Duke of York in the 1930s, only one of those movies sounds instantly appealing.  But when of the films is about a Harvard educated genius, and the other is about a man with a terrible stutter who is deathly afraid of public speaking, which person do most of us find more relatable?

That’s one reason why The King’s Speech has picked up steam over awards season.  I’ll admit bias here since I had the worst stutter ever as pre-schooler, but well, I KNOW that problem. I recognized the defect (mental), the cause (some type of phobia), and even the fix (slow yourself down and collect your thoughts before talking).  While technically this is a period piece, what moves the plot along happens all the time in every society I imagine.  I’m not the first person to say this either, but as much as I like what the Eisenberg kid did in Social Network, for an actor to play stuttering so convincingly is very impressive (to me at least).  Trust me, to do stuttering in a non mocking way that’s not supposed to be funny is not as easy as it sounds.  Colin Firth is getting the credit he deserves in my opinion.

The ironic thing is, I still don’t know if I can say I ‘love’ this film.  I liked it, but it’s more of a respect thing for all the craftsmanship at work.  Maybe that says more about what films came out in the past 12 months.