The Lost King
Short description
Philippa Langley is an amateur historian who becomes convinced that the remains of King Richard III, missing for more than five centuries, lie beneath a Leicester car park. Her conviction meets resistance and indifference: her family struggles to understand her fixation, and the academic world regards her with scepticism as she pursues the search. The film follows her attempt to challenge the established experts and prove her theory right. It is based on a true story.
Stephen Frears directed the film, the twenty-third of twenty-three features he has directed in chronological order, following Victoria & Abdul. Steve Coogan and Jeff Pope wrote the screenplay, and Coogan produced alongside Christine Langan and Dan Winch. Sally Hawkins plays Philippa Langley, with Coogan as John Langley, Harry Lloyd as Richard III and Pete, Mark Addy as Richard Buckley, James Fleet as John Ashdown-Hill and Lee Ingleby as Richard Taylor. The credited cast numbers 38 and the credited crew 69.
Released in October 2022, the film is a British-French production from Ingenious Media, BBC Film, Pathé and Creative Scotland, running 108 minutes. Its worldwide box office stands at about 1 million USD, a modest return. On IMDb it holds 6.7/10 from 11,000 votes, and on TMDB 6.5/10 from 200 votes, indicating a generally favourable but not enthusiastic audience response. A critics' rating of 6.5/10 from 127 reviews places it close to the audience scores.
What's left behind the scenes
- The remains of Richard III were discovered at a depth of approximately 60 cm, indicating he was buried in haste. Examination of the skull bones revealed that the monarch was likely killed by a blow from a long, sharp object (possibly a halberd or something similar) to the back of the head.
- In the film, Philippa Langley deduced the location of Richard III's remains almost single-handedly, acting solely on clues from the monarch's biography. In reality, things were somewhat different, and there are at least two biographies of Richard III.
- Shortly before the film's release in British cinemas, several people directly involved in the excavations gave interviews to the British press (specifically, The Guardian and the Daily Mail), where they expressed doubts about the events depicted in the film and the script, which, according to them, significantly exaggerated and overly romanticized the role of writer Philippa Langley (Sally Hawkins) in the discovery of the remains of Richard III. As a result, Steve Coogan (one of the film's producers, screenwriters, and actors) gave an interview to the BBC in which he defended the film's storyline and accused the University of Leicester of simple envy, an attempt to discredit Langley and the role she played in the discovery.
- In the scene of Richard III's reburial, Philippa Langley herself is shown among those present.
- The body of Richard III was discovered during the filming of the miniseries "The White Queen" about Edward IV (1442-1483), brother of Richard III, and Elizabeth Woodville (1437-1492).
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