The Favourite

**The Favourite: Power, Ambition, and a Queen Who Wasn’t So Sweet**

Queen Anne of Great Britain rules with an iron fist, but her reign teeters between palace intrigue and failing health. Against this backdrop of silk and poison, two women—her cousin Sarah Churchill and the young Abigail Masham—wage a silent war to become her favorite. This is not a battle for love, but for influence: whoever controls the queen, controls the kingdom.

Yorgos Lanthimos doesn’t film a conventional period drama. There are no corsets or pompous dialogues here. The Greek director strips the palace of its gilded shine and turns it into a grimy chessboard, where courtiers crawl like pawns, ladies stab each other in the back, and the queen—played by Olivia Colman—swings between fragility and cruelty with a naturalness that stings. Colman doesn’t act: she inhabits the role, and that’s why her Oscar wasn’t just an award, but a recognition of a performance that takes your breath away in every scene.

The script, sharp as a kitchen knife, blends dark humor with moments of unexpected rawness. The mud fights between Abigail and Sarah aren’t metaphors: they’re real, grotesque brawls that reflect just how deeply power corrupts even those who swore to serve. The cinematography, cold and symmetrical, turns every frame into a living painting where the characters seem trapped in a game they can’t—or won’t—escape.

This isn’t a film for those seeking heroes. Here, everyone lies, everyone manipulates, and loyalty is just currency. But that’s precisely why it works: *The Favourite* doesn’t idealize the past—it shows it for what it was: a circus of ambition where the only rule is survival. And it does so without moralizing, without redemption, with a honesty that burns. That, and not the period dresses, is what makes it one of the best films of recent years.

Lanthimos turns the palace into a wrestling ring in corsets. Olivia Colman shines amid silk and spit. Brutal, hilarious, and dirtier than a tavern toilet.

" I’d rather be a monster than a ghost. — Queen Anne (Olivia Colman)

" Do you know what happens when you die? You rot, just like everything else. — Sarah Churchill (Rachel Weisz)