10 Greatest Portrayals Of Monarchs In Movie History

2. Colin Firth - The King's Speech

King George VI was an unassuming man, and probably one of the most overlooked English monarchs in history. He's nestled between an older brother who shocked the world by abdicating to be with an American divorcee, and his daughter Elizabeth, who is an icon in her own right as the second longest reigning English monarch (she will need another year or so before she beats Queen Victoria). But King George VI, privately known as Albert, was a quiet, self-conscious individual, a man who never desired or indeed thought it possible to become king. It is this vulnerability, as well as his famous stutter, that Colin Firth manages to capture with his Oscar-winning performance in The King's Speech. The film depicts Albert in the time before he becomes king, when he is meeting with a speech therapist to overcome his stammer. All his worst fears become realized when he suddenly finds himself first in line to the throne, and Firth is so emotionally resonant that we the audience are nervous right along with him while he must deliver a speech to the nation announcing war on Germany.