Based on a true story, “The Lost King” is a layered work that mixes different ideas and moves the historical narrative with a fascinating tone.
Richard III or King Richard is the last medieval British king and one of the most controversial kings of England. William Shakespeare wrote the play Richard III based on this character’s life in 1593. Historians believe that Shakespeare’s story and his descriptions of King Richard are full of bias, because he presented Richard as a bloodthirsty, selfish and ugly character, qualities that have never been substantiated throughout history. Richard III was from the Plantagene dynasty and the House of Yorks, who was killed by Henry VII of Lancaster at the end of the British civil wars known as the Battle of the Roses.
After the death of the last King of York, the Tudor dynasty came to power, and the body of Richard III remained hidden from view for several centuries, until in 2012, the historian Philippa Langley, based on a historical account, led an archaeological team to discover the remains of Richard III. Society of Richard III fans, recruited. Finally, the missing king was found in a public parking lot. Now, this film deals with the efforts of Philippa Langley, the path of discovery of the body and the conditions of excavation of the Gray Friars Church, the burial place of Richard III, which was destroyed in the 16th century.
In the continuation of the review, some parts of the film will be revealed
Sally Hawkins, who plays the role of Philippa Langley in this film, is a middle-aged woman suffering from chronic fatigue and failure in her personal and professional life. He takes his young son to the theater to see Shakespeare’s Richard III and becomes fascinated with the character of the lost king. Philippa then joins the Ricardian Society, reads many books about Richard III, and uses her intuition and feelings to search for clues to find the king’s tomb. As said, The Lost King is a film based on real events, although fictional elements will be present in the film to advance the narrative. Richard III appears in front of Philippa’s eyes after the night of the play, and these two people stay by each other’s side until the end of the excavations.
This film is a metaphorical work, a play that in its immediate sense seeks to find Richard III and in its distant sense seeks a good state for Philippa.
Shakespeare’s Richard III is a discriminatory text in which this historical figure is highly prejudiced. When King Richard is busy delivering one of his dialogues, a storm arises in Philippa’s psyche, an identification that is to change the historical course of the film’s universe. Layered ideas with strong subtext. It is from this plan that everything begins for us, Philippa and Richard III, and the historical story of the lost king finds a new path for itself, a path that passes through the world of the human psyche and a graveless king is supposed to be found by a distraught and disillusioned human.
In The Lost King, we are faced with two ideas. Two intertwined ideas, each of which completes the other, and in the absence of each other, the film becomes a dry and boring work. The mysterious story of Richard’s life and Philippa’s depression are intertwined in this narrative so that the film moves forward with a unique world. As we have seen, Philippa was judged by her employer and left despite her efforts in the workplace, Richard III is also an unknown character that some historians do not have a positive opinion about. On the night of the play, Philippa thinks that she is King Richard herself, and that it is her nature to defend that wholeness. In fact, this film is a metaphorical work, a play that in its immediate sense seeks to find Richard III, and in its remote sense, seeks a good state for Philippa. When this character screams, King Richard was not a hunchback, he was not a murderer, he was not evil, he was actually defending his identity and character.
If we want to enter the film The Lost King through a psychological lens, we will see a character who needs to be found, a person who is trying to make others understand his worth. Philippa must tap into her subconscious and search the labyrinth of her psyche for the blows that killed her. This is where the subtle metaphor of the film takes shape and flows. Archeology and the extraction of medieval English history from the heart of what is now a public parking lot actually complete the film’s ironic puzzle. An interpretation of Philippa’s character therapy. A delve into his psyche that is similar to excavating the life of Richard III.
The Lost King does not delve too much into historical issues and such knots, preferring to focus more on the trauma that Philippa’s character suffered.
Any attempt to find Richard III on Philippa’s part is actually another meaning of this character’s attempt to find herself. This film uses a historical event and creates a character similar to King Richard to reach a psychological story. The Lost King does not delve into such historical issues and knots, preferring to focus more on the trauma that Philippa’s character suffered. Now we go a little further and completely match our focus point to Philippa’s character. A character whose psychological biological experience became the driving force for starting the plot of the film.
If we skip the idea of Philippa’s character creation and get to her layers, we see that the psychological issues of this character are not as reliable as they should be with the story and all of them show themselves in a basic one-liner. In other words, the psychological issues raised have not taken on a dramatic and deep image. Philippa suffers from nervous shocks, life is not worth it, her job situation is more annoying than all this. These events, which Pirang ignores very casually, change the course of history in The Lost King, but how much does the film value these vital issues? And to what extent have the problems of this character progressed for us? Here, the audience reaches a meaningful void towards the hero of the story and sometimes sees him as a stranger to himself.
On the other hand, Pirang doesn’t pay much attention to the metaphor he created, and the meaningful connection that should be made between Philippa’s problems and Richard III’s problems is not formed. Why is Philippa so eager to prove King Richard’s innocence and find his body? The answer to this “why” is one of the important dramatic pillars of the film, which both creates a powerful tension in the narrative and is an answer for the audience who wants to know why Philippa, among all these marginalized historical figures, seeks to find Richard III? The answer to these questions, like the image of the character idea of the hero of the story, limps in the context of the film and remains on the surface. The audience has to go a long way to match the similarities between these two characters and fulfill the duties of the filmmaker.
The controlled tone is a notable element of The Lost King. A tone that knows the balance between humor and seriousness
The controlled tone is a notable element of The Lost King. A tone that knows the balance between humor and seriousness and arranges conditions so that the empty spaces of the work are not visible. Since an imaginary element is used in the real world, the film has a lot of potential to become a pure satire, but this does not happen, and the filmmaker tries to create a world relatively is serious
The idea of the film is a bold idea, matching one life with another. Intertwining history and psychological characteristics to regenerate multiple lives. But as it was said, concretizing these ideas and paying them, they don’t reach the attractiveness of the initial two-liners of the plan.
