The Prince and Me

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source: The Prince and Me

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"The Prince and Me" is a 'fairy-tale' romantic comedy. I tend to like romantic comedies, but only if they allow me to fall for its charms. A primary ingredient in romantic comedies, is likable characters. I should be able to see myself in the girl, and like the guy the same way she does. This film fails. In fact, these might not be characters at all. I think they are just cardboard cut-outs of good looking actors. The plot has a Danish prince Edvard leaving his royal life to attend an American University in Wisconsin. Why Wisconsin, you ask? Because he saw a girls gone wild commercial set there. Enough said. Then he meets Paige, a pre-med student. Apparently, the dominant characteristics of a would-be doctor is to be pretty and make sarcastic comments. The current state of medical education is bad enough, why fill it with nonsense like this? And why demoralize the Denmark royalty? This is when films are supposed to choose fictional conditions. What follows the story is a set of cliché jokes about university life, rich snobs, and small-town farm life. None of which are funny or romantic. Pretty near impossible to make a romantic comedy out of that.

I had no expectations when I rented this for my daughter, but am admittedly a Stiles fan. I got hooked, I think because Stiles and Mably are collectively captivating actors - they really connected - and because the filmmakers went to great lengths to make this movie visually lush. The attempt to flesh out the fantasy a little more realistically also made it more interesting - what IF x really happened . . . then what WOULD she do? how WOULD people respond, and so on, instead of just sacrificing interesting smaller detail for shallow formulaic sequences like most of these movies do. Spoiler Warning (next two paragraphs) - only references to (not excerpts from) maker's commentaries/interviews: The special collector's edition's special features includes being able to watch the whole film again with the director's comments and so much of what she has to say enhances the film. She makes me proud of women's filmmaker's efforts, especially in the production of popular films, with female central characters, aimed at younger viewers. I hope people hear what she has to say and let their children see this and draw their own conclusions. The makers also illustrate what incredible obstacles have to be constantly overcome to make a film both in the U.S. and overseas. I have great respect for the comments by Danes & other Europeans about this film - those should rise to the top. American cultural hegemony and the havoc it wreaks just has to be gradually torn asunder . . . American artists portraying non-American's should solicit active and significant participation from those in the group being portrayed - this would go a long way toward having a broader and more accurate lense. It should be added that the filmmakers DID at least go to the effort to film a lot of the film in Europe, to learn about European royalty, to respect Architectural traditions . . . it sounds like they could have done a much more accurate job in terms of Danish society, royalty and government, but I think this effort was a step in the right direction toward a somewhat less Ameri-centric American-made popular film. This movie's makers should get credit mostly for making something earnestly charismatic that is also an important "baby step" in more socially valuable mainstream film.

I am very honored; that an American producer would make a film about the actual fairy tale that took place in Denmark that year (it actual took place over a few years). But I don't think the writer/producers made their homework of what in fact Denmark is all about. Therefore I have made a list with a few of these mistakes: 1) I am aware of that it might not be suitable to use the actual names of the present royal Danish family, but I think you should know that the queen's name is Queen Margrethe 2., her husband: Prince Henrik, and the two sons: Crown Prince Frederik an Prince Joachim. Further more, the regent of Denmark is Queen Margrethe 2. and not a king. 2) In the beginning of the film, the Crown Prince is shown as a playboy. The Danish Crown Prince is certainly not, or has ever been, a playboy. The Danish Crown Prince is a gentleman and has always been very aware of his responsibility. He has, among other things, graduated from Harvard and has been in a corps in Denmark similar to the US Navy Seals. 3) In the film Crown Prince Edward and Paige get engaged really fast, probably because this is a film and there isn't much time. But in real life the Danish Crown Prince and the Australian ms. Mary Donaldson (now a princess) knew each other for about 3 years before they got engaged, which is much more likely when such a big decision is made; and of course, the future princess had to learn Danish and how to be a princess first. 4) There is also a problem with the Danish royal family's place in the Danish society. The royal family of Denmark must NOT meddle in politics. The only thing the Danish regent does, is to sign the laws. She can refuse to do so, but I don't think she would be a regent much longer if she did. These were a few corrections to the film, and there is more where it comes from. Despite these, I think it was a really good film, although the true fairy tale is much better. But, of course, if a real fairy tale shouldn't take place in Hans Christian Andersen's homeland, where should it? To conclude shortly: Once upon a time there was a Danish prince called Frederik. Frederik was very lonely, because he couldn't find the right girl to stand by his side as the future queen of Denmark. In spite of this he fulfilled the duties a Crown Prince had, and became well educated, traveled across the ice cap on a dog sleigh and became a member of the Danish Frogman Corps (just like the US Navy Seals), he became a god example and a Crown Prince, Denmark could be proud of. The only problem was: he hadn't found the right woman yet. Well, the Danish prince was very into sports, so he went to the Olympics in Australia in the year 2000. One evening he and a friend went to a little bar, to get a beer. Here he met an incredible woman called Mary Donaldson, only she didn't know that he was someone special. She first found out later, when the two of them already had fallen deeply in love. See this was a true fairy tale. (I just borrowed a few words from H. C. Andersen) The story doesn't end here. But the rest, you can find out for yourself. ;-)

Give it ten seconds and you can see the deliberate setups coming from a mile away on a clear blue day. Edvard, the pompous, good-for-nothing (but good looking!) prince of Denmark (and, no, he ain't no Hamlet, even if he can quote the Bard like a kind of Shakespearean Pez dispenser) and Page, the driven, egoistic super-brain, coming together out of all proportion to logic. Are we surprised? Of course not, for that is what this tedious and numb yawner is all about. Actually, it's a self-conscious and deliberate vehicle for the otherwise plastic Stiles, who seems to have become a pet of pubescent teenage girls in suburban cineplexes the world over. Why not play her nominal skills out by inserting her into one of cinema's most retreaded tropes, the commoner falls madly in love with the King/Queen/Prince/Princess/fill in the blank of a royal here. Oh, please, who cares? Why is it so supposedly so "magical" when the bourgeouisie get to frollick with the blue bloods? Because bonded servants wait on you hand-and-foot and apparently have no other function other than to wait upon your behest? Beautiful dresses, stately, ornate, cavernous rooms and, of course, a girl's best friend, diamonds diamonds diamonds! Come on. How relentlessly stupid. Ah, but the catch is that young Page is not content to be a mere wallflower-in-waiting for her accomplished king-slash-hubbie. So, she turns tail from her date as Queen Dane and heads back to her real life. The ending, without giving it away entirely is really rather lame and seemingly inconsequential. This brings into question the whole pacing of the movie, which focuses mostly on Page's side of the picture--Wisconsin, cows, Edvard as fish out of water, etc.--vs. the other side of the pond where scant attention is given to her whirlwind romance and acceptance of marriage to the hunky multi-lingualist Edvard. I didn't really buy it. It felt hopelessly tacked on and made the ending feel... tacked on too. Do they even think about these things when they're cutting these things up in the editing room and doing focus groups?

"The Prince & Me" is likely to be skewered by critics for being entirely predictable. Meet Paige. Pre-med student who has ambitions of seeing the world with Doctors Without Borders. Meet Edvard. Danish crown prince who wants to go to America, Wisconsin particularly, because he sees one of those "Girls of Wisconsin" videos. He enrolls at Paige's school as an exchange student named "Eddie". He's incognito because he wants to avoid the papparazzi. Do you think he'll get along with Paige at first? Think they'll fall for each other? Think the fairytale romance won't blossom? If you doubt any of this, then you A) have been living under a rock B) have never seen a romantic comedy in your life. "The Prince & Me", which I was dragged off to see by my girlfriend, *is* that predictable. There's hardly a plot twist in sight. Everything happens according to the book. Girl meets prince in disguise. Girl falls for prince. Prince reveals identity. Girl gets mad. Girl realizes she loves prince. Goes off to neverland to marry prince. Etc., etc. But I figured if I could stay awake through this movie (and I did) it had to have some merit. And it does. The "Danish" royal family in this film is a thinly-veiled parody of the British royals. The old queen with the aversion to her kin marrying commoners, the playboy prince...you get the point. This part of the film adds a touch of realism to the proceedings. I kind of liked that. I've seen royalty portrayed in other movies that I've been forced to watch (eg. King Ralph, Princess Diaries) and they couldn't have been more off the mark. There's some genuinely amusing (but not laugh-out loud) moments in the film too. I won't spoil them for you here. But if you're a guy, and your girlfriend is begging you to see this, you might want to give it a chance. 7/10

The Prince and Me is a sweet little fairytale, but unfortunately it was totally ruined for me, because it took place in Denmark. When I first heard about it I thought: 'Cool, a movie taking place in Denmark!', but I really wished they had made up a country or at least had do some research, because there is SO many mistakes, which almost EVERY Dane can se is a mistake. Normally mistakes in movies doesn't bother me, but in this one there is just TO many for me to distract from them. First of all every crown prince in Denmark for the last 500 years has been called either Christian or Frederik (it is a tradition in Denmark). The nearest heirs to the throne has Frederik or Christian as one of their names, so they would become King Christian or King Frederik. 2nd: the king and prince has nothing to say in stat matters, like they do in the movie. 3rd: the Danish royal family doesn't wear the crown at all. The way you seen Edward being crown, that hasn't happened in Denmark since 18-somthing. There is a LOT of other mistakes, but I won't get into them here. The coolest thing about the movie is all the famous Danish Edward mentions, when he is at Paige's house, because they are actually Danish. If you watch this movie think about it as a fairytale story and that Denmark is a made up country, because then it is a good movie. If you want to know stuff about Denmark the you will NOT learn it from this movie, because that chance are that the thing you think is true actually isn't.