Being royalty isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. In Marie Kreutzer’s period biopic Corsage, the phenomenal Vicky Krieps plays lonely Empress Elisabeth of Austria. Nearing 40, Sissi, as she is lovingly called by some, has become quite unhappy with her place alongside husband Emperor Franz Joseph I (Florian Teichtmeister). But it’s her odd behavior that has the people closest to her worried.
“She scares me”, are the very first words in the film, uttered by one of her ladies-in-waiting. It’s unclear what she means. Is she terrified because Elisabeth is cruel? or is she scared FOR the Empress? Probably a bit of both. Or a lot of both. A fashion icon of the 19th-century, known for her stunning beauty and vanity, Elisabeth is a restless handful. Confined to the expectations of her position, resigned to the many rumors floating around about her and other men, Elisabeth becomes obsessed with the few things she can control, mostly to her own detriment.
If her life is to be a prison, then so be it. Corsage is a somber, but quietly defiant picture of a woman taking charge in the few ways she knows how. Her corset bound extraordinarily tight around her ever-shrinking waist, Elisabeth barely sustains herself with cups of beef broth and razor-thin slices of orange. If people were going to criticize every pound, then this would be her response. Her flirtations with men don’t go unnoticed, even by her son who wishes to avoid the family embarrassment before he heads to military training.
But Elisabeth finds true validation in the eyes of others, especially her admires. Her horse trainer, George “Bay” Middleton (Colin Morgan) being one of those, but when invited to her room presumably for a romantic rendezvous, she only wants to see herself reflected in his adoring face. “I love looking at you looking at me.”
Elisabeth is a sad, tragic figure, but Corsage is no life-to-death biopic. To be sure, the stench of death hangs over Elisabeth, who often jokes about and makes minor attempts at suicide. Those who know her actual fate know her demise was far out of her control. But the film, reserved though it may be, has a mischievous, playful edge. Elisabeth is perfectly aware of how her every deed will be looked upon, from her performative visits to wounded soldiers, to her bold (and vulgar) exits from her husband’s dinner parties. And that extends to the very-calculated, and public, scenes where she seems to be above all of this royal nonsense.
Krieps, employing much of the same tightly-wound control shown in her breakthrough Phantom Thread role, simply can’t be turned away from as the rebellious monarch fighting against…well, everything. Realizing that 40 is the life expectancy of a woman at the time, and that her life has amounted to being a bird trapped in a cage, what else is there to do but act out? Kreutzer closes out Corsage with an appropriately wild flight of fancy, an act of self-determination that does Elisabeth more justice than the truth certainly did.
Corsage is open in theaters now.
