MovieChat Forums > Rois et reine (2004) Discussion > Last few minutes - PLEASE

Last few minutes - PLEASE

posted 19 years ago by bturriff-1
18 replies | jump to latest

My Wife and I saw this movie but had a babysitting emergency that called us away during the last few minutes - can anyone tell me how it ended - we left towards the end of Ismael talking to Elias in the museum - but wasn't sure if there was some else that happened or if you learn more about Nora's letter from her father.

I have to say overall I did not care for this movie - I thought that Ismael's story was very charming and would have loved a movie about just his story, but the film was very long, the subtitles hard to read (think white letters often on over exposed white backgrounds), and I didn't care enough about NOra's character to really get into it - I admit I was intrigued by her father's last note to her - but it seemed to come out of nowhere. The film could have used an editor. Anyway - any help anyone has on the last few minutes would be appreciated.

[–] Chris Knipp 19 years ago

We are in agreement: indeed more editing was greatly needed. The word was that the director, who appears very pleased with himself -- he sat through the entire movie at the SF Film Festival and answered questions afterwards -- is considered to be a genius. That can be a disadvantage, since he may be under the impression that every thing that comes from his pen is pure gold. There was material for two or three movies in Kings and Queen. Sorry you had a babysitting emergency, but maybe it will come out on video and you can watch the end. As I recall Ishmael is seen in his cape again somewhere in his neighborhood acting crazy. The scene with the boy in the museum is a great idea, but too long; it should have been cut by about half. And then you would have seen the ending because it would have come 20 minutes earlier!

[–] jpkfilm 19 years ago

But what happens???

Frankly, I was totally bored, and left at the start of the 2nd "chapter". Now, I come home and read reviews in NYTimes, LATimes, etc that talk about a huge "reveal" from Nora towards the end, that makes you rethink everything you've seen. Could someone tell me what it is? I don't want to go back to watch the movie again, but I'm curious to know. Thanks.

[–] Zalman King of Nothing 19 years ago

*SPOILER ALERT*
Oh, were that it was only the last "few" minutes, but I think you missed about 3/4 of an hour. It wasn't much of a shock if you ask me: The big "reveal" was a flashback showing Pierre's "accident" (I suspected she had some kind of secret involvement in his demise). Nora and Pierre are at a bar and Pierre is bloviating about poetry to a bunch of his friends (something you could only do convincingly in a French movie). Nora, feeling neglected, wants to go home and Pierre lets her leave without him. He comes home at 3am without his keys. Nora breaks his balls before letting him in the door. Later, while he's sleeping, she comes up to him and whispers a bunch of stuff in his ear about how he's dead, he's in hell and she's his worst nightmare. This wakes him up and they have a huge argument. He says her self-centered attitude is driving him (and me) nuts, pulls a revolver out of a drawer and threatens to shoot himself with it, which he eventually does making him the luckiest character in the movie.

And to the original post in this thread-- that chat in the museum must have gone on for something like 10 minutes. The most pertinet piece of information in the conversation was that Ismail had decided against adopting Elias. Then Ismail brings Elias back to Nora. She takes him home and watches him draw out a family tree on a big piece of posterboard. Roll credits, the end.

I shoulda gone to see Star Wars instead.

Gee, that was really exciting. I bet you're a big Lee Marvin fan, aren't you?

[–] jon-370 19 years ago

For me the big "reveals" which made me perk up were 1) the bitterness of Ismail's rival which was behind his being commited, and 2) the bitterness of Nora's father, written in the pages which she tore out. I thought that if I knew something like these things were coming I might have been more interested in the film. And another thing - early on when I first saw Pierre I thought "oh this person is a trans-sexual". Perhaps the character was meant to be a trans-sexual. Okay, interesting. But - we're to believe this person *impregnated* Nora? This took me out of the film. Now, if it turns out that the actor (Joachim Salinger) was not indeed born female, then I'll feel foolish. But the small ears, overall boy-like face, & hands, hoarse voice, and absence of profile shots of Pierre's torso - all confirmed me in this early impression.

[–] jrglaves-smith 19 years ago

SPOILER(serious)
Surely Nora is dying.
a)References from Ismael about her constantly seeing a doctor
b)Ismael tells her son a sentimental poem about a mother's soul guarding her child from sharks (This is only nominally a reference to Pierre whom he never knew)
c) At the very end Nora says that Ismael and her son will outlive her.
This helps to explain a lot of Nora's desperate behaviour earlier in the film.

[–] aileenew 19 years ago

Really must have missed something then I didn't think she was dying, well not at the time of the action...we are all dying for sure... thought it was emotional game play...hum... I found the same though, the film wanted us to be in awe, too clever for it's own good, but still I watched, perhaps it was raining outside....I think I will watch it again, but not for a while as it is kind of hard work dontcha think?

Has this director made other films?

;-?

[–] neil57 19 years ago

Yes, "My Sex Life...Or How I Got Into an Argument" was very good and featured the lead actors of "Kings and Queen". I just ordered "Esther Kahn" on DVD which was shot in English.

[–] darkmalice 18 years ago

Nobody mentioned Ismael hooking up with the China Girl, at the end.

[–] tcsung 18 years ago

SPOILER ALERT

I think you missed something here. The scene you described between Nora and Pierre is played as if in a dream or on a stage, the mise en scene completely different from the rest of the movie. There is a reason for this. This is Nora's story of what happened, the one she tells her father. But he knows the truth, and so does she, and so do we. She actually shot him herself. This is why her fingerprints are on the gun and the drawer.

[–] Zalman King of Nothing 18 years ago

Been a long time since I wrote that post (or any post, for that matter). I'll accept your version of the scene (it certainly makes it more plausible, and she was a spoiled bitch), but this movie still left me cold. Maybe when it's showing on Sundance of IFC it'll reveal itself as the stunning masterpiece all the critics said it was. The thing I remember most about it was how annoying Nora was.

Now I think I'll go catch up with the Sopranos on demand.

Gee, that was really exciting. I bet you're a big Lee Marvin fan, aren't you?

[–] ok_note 17 years ago

ohhh....

wait, WHY? just cause she's an emotional train wreck?

[–] marblemadness-2 18 years ago

it seems that you require some sort of one-sided revelation giving from the film, like you can't be a proactive agent on your own, generating meaning from the tools you're given..."the most pertinent piece of information..."

you describe the film in plot points--this action is symptomatic of an attitude that might prevent you from enjoying certain kinds of film in general

just a thought

maybe you should stick to Star Wars, where Lucas abandons metaphor for hours of dead end space opera

[–] Zalman King of Nothing 18 years ago

you describe the film in plot points--this action is symptomatic of an attitude that might prevent you from enjoying certain kinds of film in general

*Ahem* The two posts I replied to asked what happened in the parts of the movie they missed when they had to leave early. If I'm not mistaken the board is named "Last few minutes - PLEASE".
Yes, I described plot points. Isn't that what you do when someone says "I missed that part, can you tell me what happened?" Is that being a "proactive agent"? I guess not, but that's not what was asked for.

Maybe you should consider the context the post is written in before blasting the writer in some sweeping generalization. The fact is the movie didn't thrill me and I thought Nora was insufferable. (On the other hand, consider Ismael; a classical musician who fashions hip-hop dance moves in his spare time. Well, that's a guy I'd rather hang out with for 150 minutes.) It wasn't the worst movie I saw last year but I was a little puzzled at all the cartwheels the critics were turning over it.

BTW, I saw Star Wars Ep. III the next week and I had "some sort of one-sided revelation"-- Hayden Christensen still has the charisma of a limp dishrag and Lucas has completely lost it. Foolish me, I read A.O. Scott's review in the Times and he said it was the best installment in the series since Empire. Boy, was he wrong. (Not to defend the movie, but when you say Lucas abandons metaphor, you might want to try reading Sith as a metaphor for the Iraq war.)

Sorry if my attempt at humor failed; I figured Star Wars fans aren't what you would usually expect to see at a 2 hour 20 minute French art movie in the middle of Greenwich Village (Even though I can hardly describe myself as a fan after Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones. More like I just wanted to satisfy my curiosity.) Rois et reine and Revenge of the Sith were the two movies that seemed intriguing that weekend and the one I ended up seeing was Rois et reine.

P.S. I shoulda used the spell check before I tried to write "pertinent". My bad.
Gee, that was really exciting. I bet you're a big Lee Marvin fan, aren't you?

[–] xenamora 18 years ago

And what was Nora's nasty rash in the last part of the film? A reaction to reading her father's devastating opinions about her?

[–] beatthe9ers 18 years ago

I think the stunning 'reveal' that is supposed to be in the film is Nora's line: "I've loved four men and killed two of them" (or close to that)indicating that she did, in fact, kill Pierre. I agree with the earlier poster that this did not come as much of a shock after seeing the way the scene of Pierres death was shot and the interaction with her father afterward.

The letter Nora's father wrote to her (or recorded in his journal) is the most interesting part of the film to me. Was he saying those things as part of a morphine induced craze or did he really mean them? At the time, it doesn't really jive with what we have seen so far about her, which in my mind brings up the idea of perspective. Her story is told to us from her point of view. As such, she is a sympathetic character. But at the end, what do we know about her? We know that she killed her lover and the father of her unborn child (and we don't really know why). We know from Ismaels lawyer that she left him 'penniless' after a seven year relationship. We know she is marrying a man that she likely doesn't love and that her son is not fond of, the only reason given for this marriage is that he is rich and 'works to satisfy my every desire'. She snorts heroine on the weekends. She kills (strong word) her father because she doesn't want to see him suffer, but there is no scene in which he asks her for help in that way (maybe there was and I missed it; it's a bit of a stretch on my part, I recognise, he was clearly dying and would have had to have been in terrible pain, my point is that his pain is only revealed to us through her, and she has been accused by her father of being rather monstrous, so it's possible her assisting in her fathers death is for more of her sake than his).

Anyway, my 2 cents. The 'reveal' isn't so much that a specific event was uncovered, but rather that the whole idea of the character and who she is and what she does may need to be rethought.

I wasn't blown away by the film, but I found it interesting and very watchable. I also agree that the Ismael/Elias scenes at the end went on a bit long, though the observation that being wrong every once in a while makes life more interesting is a good one.

[–] ok_note 17 years ago

lol, yeah i also liked the one about how Ismael has Elias had a rich soul because he hardly talked. And that whenever he got bored he could retreat into his secret garden and chat with his imagination. how cute and true.

[–] the sphynx 13 years ago

"she is marrying a man that she likely doesn't love"

There is no "likely" about it. She says she loved four men in her life and killed two of them, and the other two (her son and Ismael) are walking towards her. Ergo, she doesn't love her new husband--though she may be happy that he loves her enough to try to anticipate her every desire.

Oh, and it's heroin. Heroines are female heroes, not drugs that can be recreationally snorted on weekends. :)

[–] lamont-hard 11 years ago

I think one may love someone in the sense he is her savior in taking care of her needs. I also feel when she says she only loved four men in her life she may be implying in her past and not the present or will there be love with the husband in the future.