The Borgias 1.09
May. 23rd, 2011 11:03 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
selenakThe season finale, in which Rodrigo Borgia has the time of his life, Giovanni Sforza does not, and I can't believe it'll be 2012 before I see another season of this gorgeous show. I don't know whether I'll have the time to do a season overlooking "The Borgias, how I love them, let me count the ways" post, so here, quickly, the main reasons why I am so in love:
1) The characters, both writing and acting wise. You can sell me any number of historical liberties if you make me care about the characters. As
this post notes, it's a Neil Jordan trademark that he writes about messed up people, but he does so not from an outside perspective, but from inside, i.e. we're not invited to look at them and judge them from a distance but the narrative draws us into their own povs, and it makes you feel with them. Also, there wasn't one instance where I thought "why the hell did they cast actor X as character Y?"
2) The fact that while everyone comes to screen life and gets development, the character whose arc is the most compelling and whose development is the core of the narrative turns out to be... Lucrezia. Not Cesare, not Rodrigo (much I like and appreciate the characterisation of either), but Lucrezia.
3) Which brings me to: women! As in, not one or two with only a few lines and there to display their nude bodies, but four with in depth characterisation (Lucrezia, Giulia Farnese, Vannozza and Ursula), and two more are already introduced in short scenes who will be important in future seasons (Sancia and Caterina Sforza). One of the key relationships and unexpected delights of the first season was the one between Lucrezia and Giulia, which was treated as importantly by the show as any between male characters or between female and male characters.
4) Gorgeous cinematography. Just look at my icon. (That's the scene in which Lucrezia meets Giulia for the first time.)The show really makes the most of its Renaissance setting.
Now, onto a review of the last - sob! - episode of this season.
As I started the season with a review that makes a comparison with The Godfather, let me make another. One of the emotional tricks The Godfather and its sequel pulls off is that while the audience is entirely aware the characters are criminals, you still are rooting for them, not for the police to bring them down. Here, too, in theory one should root for Rodrigo's deposition. No matter his personal faith, he is a corrupt pope. He is guilty of everyting della Rovere accuses him of being guilty. But it's still not possible to be anything but absolutely delighted at the way he not only, after his daughter's advance work, is able to sway the French king to his side and get the better out of their deal but uses the situation to utterly and completely pwn his rebellious cardinals. (And, together, with his son, make humiliated mince meat of his useless son-in-law while he's at it.) I continue to adore the delicious layers of all of this: in the scenes between Rodrigo and Charles, they're both simultanously sincere and putting on a show, and they both know it. Charles may be sincerely impressed and awed by Rodrigo's status as pope and display of Christian humility, but he's not about to just donate his bloodless passing through Rome, he'll take the crown of Naples and a hostage, too, if you please. Simultanously, Rodrigo means what he says about the occasional tiredness of office but of course he wouldn't give it up for the world, and he means to profit from disaster all the way.
Similarly, while it's fun to see the Cardinals in sackcloth what he does there actually has a point beyond emotional payback; literal payback, as in, all those offices and benefits he had to hand out at the start of the season to become Pope? Are now profitably returned. And Jeremy Irons is just awesome in that scene. I also love Cesare's reaction shots. You can hear him think "at times like these, I remember why you're the greatest, Dad". Cesare doesn't have his father on a pedestal anymore, if he ever did, he's seen him make mistakes through the season, and he's aware Rodrigo uses his family, but not only does he love his father, he also respects the hell out of him. Which doesn't mean he's now back to pedestaling. Loved that exchange between him and Guiliano della Rovere and can't wait to see where it will lead next season.
Lucrezia shares the family flair for gestures; loved her handing her horse's reigns to the good Cardinal. And of course once the show gets to the big annulment trial she plays the role to the hilt, complete with maidenly modest hesitations, and you can tell she enjoys every minute of this particular payback. When Cesare and Micheletto showed up at Pesaro I was afraid the show would go for the ahistorical death of Giovanni S. after all, which, never mind history, would have felt like an anti climax after Lucrezia's own dealings with her husband, but no, we did get the annulment for impotence and non consummation, and the Borgia father and son team-up to make this as humiliating as possible for Sforza just evoked pure glee. You really believe this was far worse than murder for the man.
The show also dealt with the infans Romanus as I expected, i.e. going with the "Lucrezia's child" theory, and not only did this wrap up the Ursula storyline (since it's her nunnery Cesare brings Lucrezia to - Lucrezia did spend months in a nunnery around the annulment process which makes the pregnancy theory and her as the mother of the Borgia child so plausible, btw) but we get a wonderfully messed up family tableau at the end as the entire clan, Giulia included, gathers to celebrate the birth of Lucrezia's child. The tentative truce and bonding between Vannozza and Giulia felt just right, too, not too much but the right degree, as did Vannozza and Rodrigo sharing memories of the births of her own children.
Trivia:
- re: Naples, so are we to assume that in show reality, Alfonso used the bodies his father kept around for decoration plus a few new ones to fake a plague outbreak to scare the French or that it really was the plague? I suppose we'll find out next season.
- Given Cesare is going to spend some time in France a few years later, I appreciate the groundworks being laid here.
- I suppose his non-appearance means that Paolo was flogged to death by Giovanni Sforza. Well, as a Perotto avatar, he was doomed either way.
- loved the lack of jealousy between Lucrezia and Ursula. Again, Neil Jordan so wins at female-female relationships this season.
- when can I order the dvds?
1) The characters, both writing and acting wise. You can sell me any number of historical liberties if you make me care about the characters. As
this post notes, it's a Neil Jordan trademark that he writes about messed up people, but he does so not from an outside perspective, but from inside, i.e. we're not invited to look at them and judge them from a distance but the narrative draws us into their own povs, and it makes you feel with them. Also, there wasn't one instance where I thought "why the hell did they cast actor X as character Y?"
2) The fact that while everyone comes to screen life and gets development, the character whose arc is the most compelling and whose development is the core of the narrative turns out to be... Lucrezia. Not Cesare, not Rodrigo (much I like and appreciate the characterisation of either), but Lucrezia.
3) Which brings me to: women! As in, not one or two with only a few lines and there to display their nude bodies, but four with in depth characterisation (Lucrezia, Giulia Farnese, Vannozza and Ursula), and two more are already introduced in short scenes who will be important in future seasons (Sancia and Caterina Sforza). One of the key relationships and unexpected delights of the first season was the one between Lucrezia and Giulia, which was treated as importantly by the show as any between male characters or between female and male characters.
4) Gorgeous cinematography. Just look at my icon. (That's the scene in which Lucrezia meets Giulia for the first time.)The show really makes the most of its Renaissance setting.
Now, onto a review of the last - sob! - episode of this season.
As I started the season with a review that makes a comparison with The Godfather, let me make another. One of the emotional tricks The Godfather and its sequel pulls off is that while the audience is entirely aware the characters are criminals, you still are rooting for them, not for the police to bring them down. Here, too, in theory one should root for Rodrigo's deposition. No matter his personal faith, he is a corrupt pope. He is guilty of everyting della Rovere accuses him of being guilty. But it's still not possible to be anything but absolutely delighted at the way he not only, after his daughter's advance work, is able to sway the French king to his side and get the better out of their deal but uses the situation to utterly and completely pwn his rebellious cardinals. (And, together, with his son, make humiliated mince meat of his useless son-in-law while he's at it.) I continue to adore the delicious layers of all of this: in the scenes between Rodrigo and Charles, they're both simultanously sincere and putting on a show, and they both know it. Charles may be sincerely impressed and awed by Rodrigo's status as pope and display of Christian humility, but he's not about to just donate his bloodless passing through Rome, he'll take the crown of Naples and a hostage, too, if you please. Simultanously, Rodrigo means what he says about the occasional tiredness of office but of course he wouldn't give it up for the world, and he means to profit from disaster all the way.
Similarly, while it's fun to see the Cardinals in sackcloth what he does there actually has a point beyond emotional payback; literal payback, as in, all those offices and benefits he had to hand out at the start of the season to become Pope? Are now profitably returned. And Jeremy Irons is just awesome in that scene. I also love Cesare's reaction shots. You can hear him think "at times like these, I remember why you're the greatest, Dad". Cesare doesn't have his father on a pedestal anymore, if he ever did, he's seen him make mistakes through the season, and he's aware Rodrigo uses his family, but not only does he love his father, he also respects the hell out of him. Which doesn't mean he's now back to pedestaling. Loved that exchange between him and Guiliano della Rovere and can't wait to see where it will lead next season.
Lucrezia shares the family flair for gestures; loved her handing her horse's reigns to the good Cardinal. And of course once the show gets to the big annulment trial she plays the role to the hilt, complete with maidenly modest hesitations, and you can tell she enjoys every minute of this particular payback. When Cesare and Micheletto showed up at Pesaro I was afraid the show would go for the ahistorical death of Giovanni S. after all, which, never mind history, would have felt like an anti climax after Lucrezia's own dealings with her husband, but no, we did get the annulment for impotence and non consummation, and the Borgia father and son team-up to make this as humiliating as possible for Sforza just evoked pure glee. You really believe this was far worse than murder for the man.
The show also dealt with the infans Romanus as I expected, i.e. going with the "Lucrezia's child" theory, and not only did this wrap up the Ursula storyline (since it's her nunnery Cesare brings Lucrezia to - Lucrezia did spend months in a nunnery around the annulment process which makes the pregnancy theory and her as the mother of the Borgia child so plausible, btw) but we get a wonderfully messed up family tableau at the end as the entire clan, Giulia included, gathers to celebrate the birth of Lucrezia's child. The tentative truce and bonding between Vannozza and Giulia felt just right, too, not too much but the right degree, as did Vannozza and Rodrigo sharing memories of the births of her own children.
Trivia:
- re: Naples, so are we to assume that in show reality, Alfonso used the bodies his father kept around for decoration plus a few new ones to fake a plague outbreak to scare the French or that it really was the plague? I suppose we'll find out next season.
- Given Cesare is going to spend some time in France a few years later, I appreciate the groundworks being laid here.
- I suppose his non-appearance means that Paolo was flogged to death by Giovanni Sforza. Well, as a Perotto avatar, he was doomed either way.
- loved the lack of jealousy between Lucrezia and Ursula. Again, Neil Jordan so wins at female-female relationships this season.
- when can I order the dvds?
