It's a dark view, but dark views, like sunny views, have to come from somewhere. Where is Lanthimos's dark sun? I don't know, but I'll definitely keep watching.

| Feb 27, 2020

Yorgos Lanthimos' dryly funny historical feature is all about power, and that means literally wearing the pants in a strange time.

| Mar 10, 2019

In the end, The Favourite is a haunting reminder of the limits of control.

| Feb 23, 2019

Pushes the idea of the capricious monarch through the far reaches of comedy and almost into tragedy. Colman embodies sublimely the punch-drunk confusion of a woman unsure whether she's child or adult, plaything or puppet-master.

| Jan 26, 2019

Weisz and Stone are both brilliantly witty and nimble, but Colman's performance is nothing short of sublime.

| Jan 24, 2019

This is The Crown like you've never seen it before.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Jan 3, 2019

It is savagely funny and often preposterous, with duck racing and ludicrous, vertiginous wigs and an astonishingly weird dance scene. Yet it is also involving and deeply moving with performances that are monumentally stellar.

| Jan 3, 2019

The Favourite gratifyingly proves that Lanthimos can put his mordantly idiosyncratic stamp on even the staidest of genres.

| Jan 1, 2019

Despite the nominally historical setting, this has none of the staid distance of a costume drama. On the contrary, it feels cruelly, deliciously contemporary...

| Original Score: 4/5 | Dec 30, 2018

Breaking: Olivia Colman is our new god.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Dec 30, 2018

The Favourite doesn't offer horrors to compare with Lanthimos's The Lobster or his The Killing of a Sacred Deer, but the creative misanthropy and orchestral cruelty are every bit as striking.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Dec 28, 2018

Colman, always brilliant, has never seemed more divine. If she's not nominated for an Oscar, I will cry.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Dec 26, 2018

Quite simply, an utter and hilarious delight.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Dec 26, 2018

Weird, dirty but accessible, The Favourite is a perfectly performed, thrillingly made period picture that morphs before your very eyes.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Dec 24, 2018

The Favourite is so assaultively entertaining that you keep wanting to go outside for fresh air.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Dec 24, 2018

As well as being [Lanthimos'] biggest production so far, this is by far his most pleasurable, with three Oscar-worthy performances.

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Dec 21, 2018

Deliciously witty, visually gorgeous and frequently unsettling in its melding of the comic and the chilling, The Favourite is one of the best films of the year.

| Original Score: 4.5/5 | Dec 21, 2018

Despite its period setting, The Favourite just might be Lanthimos's most trenchant and relevant work yet.

| Dec 21, 2018

There are no heroes in The Favourite; there are only sad creatures driven by their various needs. There is, however, a morbid morality to the proceedings, one in which decadence is its own punishment.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Dec 14, 2018

"The Favourite" is an uproarious send-up of the aloofness of royals, and comes alive thanks to its sterling ensemble cast (Nicholas Hoult is also worthy of note, playing a young British statesman) and Lanthimos' pristine direction.

| Original Score: A- | Dec 14, 2018