A muted Marie Antoinette, Corsage stars Vicky Krieps as Empress Elisabeth of Austria, circa 1877. Having just turned 40, the constraints of her position—the literal ones, as in the restricting bodice referred to in the title, and the societal ones, as a woman—have pushed Elisabeth to a breaking point, where she begins to rebel in increasingly agitated ways. Krieps doesn’t play this for pity. Wearing an implacable smile (she’s a Mona Lisa actress, always leaving a bit of mystery even when you think you’ve got her characters pegged), Krieps gives us an incredibly complicated, often unlikable woman. Her Elisabeth is capable of compassion—especially as a patron to an asylum for those deemed mentally insane—but also cruelty toward her servants, friends, and family. Even in her visits to that asylum, you sense a woman who is at once at war with and entranced by the idea of being adored. (“Last time I was here you told me I was beautiful,” she pathetically tells one patient.) The Marie Antoinette vibes come from writer-director Marie Kreutzer’s anachronistic choices, from moments when period characters play stringed versions of contemporary songs (“As Tears Go By,” “Help Me Make It Through the Night”) to the scene in which Elisabeth dramatically departs a dining room with a pronounced middle finger. The anachronisms might also extend to Monika Buttinger’s costumes, which in any case are stunning (and worn by Krieps with the same authority as those in Phantom Thread). In that asylum visit, she sports a matching hat, fan, and dress whose violet hues wildly pop against the dingy plaster walls. Later, she wears another dress with ostrich feathers along the bustline and broad stripes running vertically down her torso. Both suggest an empress not content with traditional attire, but someone rebelling in her fashion choices as well. Overall, Corsage doesn’t reinvent the royal-as-trapped-canary subgenre (it also glorifies Elisabeth’s ultimate fate in a slightly uncomfortable way), but the film style and attitude, much like Krieps’ empress, make a scene.
(12/19/2022)
