Noutions Good movie, but best of all time? Hardly . . .

FuzzyTagz If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

SanEat A film with more than the usual spoiler issues. Talking about it in any detail feels akin to handing you a gift-wrapped present and saying, "I hope you like it -- It's a thriller about a diabolical secret experiment."

Isbel A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

Kirpianuscus At the first sigh, a real fairy tale. pledge against rasism and political dark/dirty details changing lifes. and a lovely homage for Africa. short - a seductive, well crafted film, impressive scene by scene , seductive for story and details and dramatism and the noble fight oof a couple for normality in their life and country. its basic virtue - to be a proof of a period more than two people. and to remind. a long and hard fight.

Neil Welch Seretse Khama, studying law in England as preparation for assuming his role as hereditary tribal chief in 1947 Bechuanaland, falls in love and marries a white English woman. This causes massive diplomatic problems, leading to the British government exiling him from his own country.This is a fairly straightforward dramatisation of a true story, set in post-war England and Africa. At a time when racial prejudice was still rife, mixed marriages were frowned upon generally and, given Khama's regal status in Bechuanaland (now Botswana), his marriage to a white commoner was unfavourably received in his own country. Yet this was almost insignificant next to the British reaction, where Ruth was more or less ordered by the government not to marry Seretse. And Ruth's father disowned her.The romance angle is more or less underplayed here. David Oyelowo and Rosamund Pike have sufficient chemistry for us to believe they are marrying for love, even though this seems to be entirely on the basis of two or three dances and Seretse having a punch-up with some racist thugs.And when they arrive in Africa they encounter more of the same, only in reverse. This leads to a schism between Seretse and his uncle which, in turns, provides grounds for the British government (Bechuanaland was a British protectorate at the time) to exile him.The film is very good at evoking the 1950-ish era, especially in England, and the sense of time and location work effectively.Oyelowo and Pike do well as the fraught lovers, Tom Felton continues to impress in character parts, and Jack Davenport is brilliant as a supremely confident civil servant. Nicholas Lyndhurst is very un-Rodney-ish as Ruth's father.Very often, this sort of film is so concerned with the significance of the points it is making that it forgets to be entertaining (Idris Elba's Mandela movie comes to mind). But director Amma Asante follows up her previous movie Belle with a film which has something important to say, and which says it in an engaging, and sometimes moving, way.This left me feeling uplifted even though it, very conspicuously, did not leave me feeling proud to be British.

popcorninhell In a word, A United Kingdom is handsome. To loan it another, it's also stately; handsome and stately, stately and handsome. Both words immediately conjure memories of Enchanted April (1991) or anything adapted from a Jane Austen novel. The kind of movie with people walking down hallways and through courtyards looking flustered. Handsome and stately; But is it important?Director Amma Asante and screenwriter Guy Hibbert seem to think so, pitting the film's protagonists against Winston Churchill while evoking memories of no less than Nelson Mandela. Of course it has good reason to; A United Kingdom is not a work of fiction but rather an inspiring true story of an African king and a British subject who chooses to be his queen. The story of Seretse Khama (D. Oyelowo) and the lovely Ruth Williams (Pike) starts like most great romances do, with the intense locking of eyes and a world of obstacles lying in waiting. The two court and marry within the first act and make their way to Bechuanaland (now Botswana) where trouble takes the form of familial tensions and geo-political intrigue. Can their love survive the ever-mounting pressures of the British Crown and neighboring Apartheid period South Africa? Or will the marriage crumble like the infrastructure of what was then the poorest country on Earth.That very question, the limits of their undying love, forms the nucleus of A United Kingdom, the implications of which wrap the story like pink colored cellophane. The events of the film span a decade and during all that time, what we mostly get is the same sanitized story beats as a Disney Princess movie. Not much in the way of global politics or economics and nothing but what you'd expect as far as period appropriate racism. It's all done so safely; so demure and limited by superficial pomp.The irony of course is director Amma Asante seems to really care about these sorts of true-life stories. Her last film Belle (2013), worked within the confines of a stuffy period piece, to call attention to an obscure life at the nexus of racism and aristocracy. But while that movie had the luxury of gifting its audience something new into familiar wrapping, A United Kingdom can't really break free from its own limitations. We've seen this all before the only difference is the specter of Apartheid isn't personified by a severe man twirling his mustache.The British Empire however is personified in Jack Davenport and Tom Felton. Both play British functionaries whose sole job is to pull our two lovebirds apart, and boy do they ever relish their roles. Jack Davenport specifically is at pinnacle Larry Grey; his debonair smugness is so deliciously Anglo that birds would mistake his upturned nose for a littoral cave. Likewise Felton is the epitome of priggishness, a muscle he has toned and perfected with every Harry Potter (2001- 2011) installment. While I'm a little sad that franchise has relegated him to play weaksauce villains for the rest of his life, there's a consolation in knowing there are worse fates for child actors turned adult.As for Rosamund Pike and David Oyelowo, they both do splendidly; though is there any doubt that they wouldn't? Both are gifted actors and both do what is required of them which mostly consist of holding hands and looking like the weight of the world is on their shoulders.So A United Kingdom may not ultimately be an important movie. Yet its heart is unarguably in the right place. It manages to tell a lovely real-life Cinderella story with accomplished actors doing their best to do their historical analogs justice. The faults lay with the direction and tone of the film which certainly isn't enough to mar the film. Yet considering how safe it ultimately ends up feeling, I doubt the film is doing the legacy of the Khama's any favors.

alb-26920 This was an amazing story of what happened! They did a fantastic job filming this and showing the story. I loved how they showed the scenery and the beautiful land that this took place in as well as the unjust done to this family and their people. I loved seeing the people come together and welcome, protect and thank a woman whom they did not want originally. This is a beautiful story of how love overcomes injustice, racism and political manipulation.