CinemaClock Ottawa

The story leaves you wondering, what is it about, everything moving so slowly like everyone was half asleep. Murray is good but his wife is undistinguishable from all the other women. The Royals really were not believable, they were a poor choice. No high or low points, an even slow meander through the little known life of Roosevelt.

Was afraid of the bad reviews... but excellent movie!

Interesting movie about FDR told by one of his mistresses. Not really the best movie if you want to know about FDR.

A great little movie, well acted and well scripted. Maybe one has to be English to appreaciate the nuances of the interplay between the Americans and the then young King and Queen of England. It was so funny on many occasions and I could not stop laughing. I was surprised to see a statement in the ending credits that some parts of the story were based on personal notes and diaries written by her, was found under the bed of Roosevelt's mistress after she died. The narration took a little bit of getting used to, but was not that intrusive. A great scene between the King and Roosevelt ocurred when the King apologised for stammering and Roosevelt put him at ease by saying nobody mentioned his own crippled legs, so why apologise for a stammer.

An easy watch. A little bit of history. Some good acting.

Salacious, smutty, not very interesting at all.

Disappointing story though decent performance by Murray as FDR and his scenes with the young King of England are the best in the film; but the female character played by Laura Linney is not very sympathetic and little use is made of Olivia Wilde as Eleanor who appears almost totally unsympathetic. The visit of the regents to the US (and Canada at the time) was historically and culturally important especially in light of the coming war and it was a sub-plot rather than the focus.

I never liked Bill Murray (his appearance reflects something I just dislike, I don't know what it is) Anyway, my opinion is that he was not the right choice to play the role. It should have been an actor whom everybody finds attractive and interesting, to make the character more likeable in spite of his shortcomings. Besides, it does not convince whether everything in the movie was true in real life. I hope there will be a remake sometime in the future with an actor who would really remind of President Roosevelt.

Bill Murray was wonderful in this... I loved the cinematography and the woman's perspective... excellent holiday entertainment... like a good book worth reading under the tree.

Roosevelt (Bill Murray) simply wonderful! Very credible. But... that's it! The choice of actors portraying the Royals is a total failure, both in character and especially in physical type. Gosh! There is film footage of that period available: it would have been easy to do a better casting job. Overall reasonably entertaining (for a Tuesday 1/2 price) but not really interesting from a historical point of view because of the distracting cinematography. However the letters themselves should provide a good read.

[ATTENTION: This review reveals content of the movie.]
This movie filled me with a certain amount of hope, even though it has Bill Murray in the title role as FDR. It turned out to be interesting, but neither good nor great. It makes demands that the audience should already be familiar with the story of George VI's visit to the U. S. in 1939 and the reason for that trip. It also expects one should be knowledgeable about FDR and his polio condition (which is often ignored and forgotten in the movie) I would be interested to know what material the producers and directors used to write their story. It is entirely possible that FDR had a relationship with his cousin that was more than friendly. It's fairly well known that Roosevelt loved women (and had many relationships outside of his marriage) The question is whether he could have had a physical one considering his polio which left him paralyzed from the waist down. Moreover this condition was permanent and had occurred many years before the events in the movie. In the end it was an interesting story and covered many themes. The problem was that none of the themes was covered adequately or even well. It's not surprising to me that the film was British, sadly the Americans do not have the historical chops to make such a story. My 2 cents!

An excellent movie, a wonderful story, great cinematography, great cast. It's surprising how most of the presidents have affairs and sooner or later those stories will not be secrets anymore. Loved this drama a lot, a must see.

A great story, taken from Daisy's (Franklin Roosvelt's cousin's) letters, that were found after her death. Very interesting, funny and a part of history. A great cast; Bill Murray does a great job. I'm surprised that this movie was made by the united kingdom instead of the Americans. Watch it, it's really interesting.

An absolute delight. When I saw Rex Reed's good review I was a bit afraid that he had given his chum a good review because they are neighbours, he hadn't. The movie was a delight from the get-go. Interestingly the story is told through the thoughts of a woman with whom Roosevelt had a long relationship. Murray was superb.

The ensemble acting performances were pretty good especially the humour between the First Family and the British Royals.

The period was exceptionally well-done, the characters seemed authentic. I thought Bill Murray did an exceptional job portraying Roosevelt and the Olivia Williams who played Eleanor was bang-on (from the biographies I've seen of her) This film is filed as a biography/drama/comedy on IMDB, but don't go to see Bill recall any of his SNL schtick. This is a light drama, a take on the pre-war visit of the King and Queen of England to America and the goings on above-stairs so to speak in the Hyde Park country house. If you love historical dramas and period films like I do, you'll like this film.

Loved it! Great light fare, but intelligent and funny. Excellent acting from the whole cast. A praise worthy movie!

I was hoping for history, what I got was a boring look at my belly-button american big miss. You can't invent a Masterpiece Theatre with Bill Murray, sorry very disappointing! Even the acting is bad let alone the script, only a few historical notes are ok. Don't bother to spend your hard earned money on this movie.

Beautiful cinematography, great acting, but about as exciting as watching paint dry.

Just more propaganda to make the rich look so wonderful... not worth the bother.

An interesting film on an interesting time and as one reviewer pointed out some nicely done parallels with Shakespeare's mid summer night's dream. But I think there was a lot more to it around great men and how others see them, some interesting history, the parallels with Kennedy and Clinton. The complex relationships he had. It was good I thought. Made me think after. I can see how people who don't like it feel about it and also I see in some of those reviews problems in accepting this portrayal of an american icon... which was in some respects the point. Bill Murray was very good. And they did a great job dressing the sets for the 1930's, felt very real.

Historical events, funny situations and witty scripts, great actors, great photography, what else can you ask from a movie? It was a great entertainement. Don't miss it.

Note: User reviews posted on this page are personal opinions of our readers. We are not responsible for their content.