The Madness of King George Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.5
Extras		0.0
Overall		4.0

The Madness of King George Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Svet Atanasov January 12, 2018

Winner of Oscar Award for Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Nicholas Hytner' "The Madness of King George" (1994) arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of independent distributors Olive Films. There are no bonus features on this release. In English, with optional English SDH subtitles for the main feature. Region-A "locked".

The madman

The general consensus is that Nicholas Hytner’s film offers a very credible summation of the important events that define King George’s historical image. If you spend some time reading older critical writings on it you will find out that a few suggest that perhaps there are some crucial details that the film either brushes over or completely ignores, but my take on this sort of criticism is that when such notorious public figures are discussed ‘important’ omissions are inevitable. Why? Because aside from authentic documents that can be used as legit reference sources all else involves some degree of interpretation, which means that opinions on what is or isn’t important will vary. (Remember, there is a lot of information about King George’s reign that is not factual but derived from various deconstructions of less than optimal recollections and descriptions).

The film opens up sometime during the year 1788 as King George (Nigel Hawthorne) begins to experience the first symptoms of the unknown illness that will allow his opponents to target his sanity. The deterioration process that becomes the focus of attention provides a healthy dose of laughs, but there is a bigger and much more important picture that emerges with it. Indeed, at the same time a number of calculated moves are made to permanently isolate Queen Charlotte (Helen Mirren) and together with a group of double-crossing hacks the Prince of Wales (Rupert Everett) initiates a campaign to take over as a regent. There are of course sizeable ripple effects that quickly begin to reshape the balance of powers between those who believe that King George is not as ill as speculated and those who are convinced that he is and can no longer govern. It is at this point that Queen Charlotte, Prime Minister Pitt (Julian Wadham) and one of the King George’s trusted assistants (Rupert Graves) secretly invite the eccentric Dr. Willis (Ian Holm) to prove that he is indeed the leading authority on… well, whatever it is that forces rational people to act irrationally. The expert immediately goes to work, but hardly anyone sees the logic behind his unorthodox treatment regimen.

Hawthorne is so captivating as the suffering King George that it soon begins to feel like the historical information is actually secondary. The odd outbursts and ramblings look completely legit and combined with the very dry sense of humor that gives the material its structure this film quickly evolves into quite a spectacle.

In the background there are all sorts of political games managed by the same privileged tribe of hypocrites that all these years later continue to sell the exact same lies to those who are naive enough to believe that they represent their interests. The makeup and wigs might have disappeared, but the lies have certainly remained the same.

The film was adapted from Alan Bennett’s play “The Madness of George III”. According to various reputable sources, Bennett agreed to have it filmed only after it was confirmed that Hawthorne was a lock to play King George.

The Madness of King George Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Presented in its original aspect ratio of 1.85:1, encoded with MPEG-4 AVC and granted a 1080p transfer, Nicholas Hytner's The Madness of King George arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Olive Films.

The release is sourced from an older but very good master. Even on a very large screen the images hold really well and there are no traces of digital tinkering that could spoil your viewing experience. Indeed, close-ups and larger panoramic shots boast good to very good depth while clarity is consistently pleasing. The color scheme also supports a nice range of proper primaries and healthy nuances, though ideally both can be slightly better saturated. Image stability is excellent. My one and only minor criticism pertains to the presence of some tiny burns and white specks that pop up a few times which could have been fixed (you can see examples in screencapture #10). Overall, however, this is a very nice organic presentation of the film. My score is 4.25/5.00. (Note: This is a Region-A "locked" Blu-ray release. Therefore, you must have a native Region-A or Region-Free player in order to access its content).

The Madness of King George Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There is only one standard audio track on this Blu-ray release: English DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0. Optional English SDH subtitles are provided for the main feature.

The audio may not have been recently remastered, but the current lossless track is actually very convincing. I actually liked it so much that I am not at all convinced that a new remastering job would provide any sizeable improvements. Even in terms of balance, where most older tracks tend to have some room for optimizations, the current track performs really well.

The Madness of King George Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Unfortunately, there are no bonus features to be found on this Blu-ray release.

The Madness of King George Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

There are a lot of big-time actors in this film, but it is hard to imagine that without Nigel Hawthorne it would have been even half as good as it turned out to be. Hawthorne's performance truly deserves all of the praise that it has gathered during the years and he probably should have won an Oscar for it. Olive Films' recent release of The Madness of King George is sourced from an older but very nice master. However, there are no bonus features on it. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.