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Your Highness
| Released |
13 April 2011 |
| Director |
David Gordon Green |
Starring
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Danny McBride, James Franco, Natalie Portman, Zooey Deschanel, Damian Lewis, Toby Jones, Charles Dance, Justin Theroux |
| Writer(s) |
Danny McBride, Ben Best |
| Producer(s) |
Scott Stuber |
| Origin |
United States |
| Running Time |
102 minutes |
| Genre |
Comedy |
| Rating |
16 |
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Lord of the Dudes.
Your Highness opens with a parody of Lord of the Rings (swirling smoke, mock epic music, chanting in a strange language), but this shouldn’t be left to set the tone for the rest of the film. Your Highness is actually much more than a simple spoof of the fantasy genre, it’s an entertaining fantasy-comedy in its own right, maybe not a classic but definitely capable of providing a couple of hours entertainment.
The film has the most basic of plots, barely worth elaborating on. Danny Mc Bride stars as Prince Thadeous, the incompetent younger brother of dashing, heroic prince Fabious (James Franco), who must set out on a quest together to rescue Franco’s bride to be, who has been kidnapped by an evil wizard. It’s a standard quest movie meets buddy comedy, and it’s obvious that the actual plot isn’t really that important. It is mostly obvious and clichéd, viewers aren’t going to be surprised when the best friend turns bad or when Natalie Portman reveals the sensitive soul under her hard warrior's exterior– but a strong plot was never really the point.
The heroes questing to save the girl has been done so many times before that Your Highness probably couldn’t take itself too seriously even if it wanted to, and it certainly doesn’t. It is crude, vulgar, and goes way over the top, but that’s actually what works about it. Your Highness mostly just goes for laughs, and the cast are all clearly having fun with this.
By not taking any of this seriously, the cast all give genuinely amusing performances. Mc Bride really hams it up, playing a Blackadder-like spoiled Prince. Franco complements this well as the heroic older brother, while both Natalie Portman and Zooey Deschanel get a lot of mileage out of their short time on screen, moving well beyond simple stereotypical damsel in distress roles. Justin Theroux is less convincing as the villain, and fails to be either menacing or comical.
While some scenes are downright awkward (the visit to the Yoda-like Wise Wizard is just awful) Your Highness mostly works quite well. The dialogue is snappy and clever, Franco and Mc Bride make a good double act, and even though the plot is completely bonkers it zips along so quickly that you won’t pay too much attention to it anyway. It is pure mindless entertainment, providing a few genuine laughs while never taking itself too seriously.
- Bernard O’Rourke |
