Jeanne du Barry

But in a gorgeous period piece that is never boring, you can’t deny the entertainment value of Madame du Barry, one of the most captivating women since Madame Bovary, and all the more fascinating because she was real.

[T]he story's intriguing complexities are smoothed over, submerged, and deemed less interesting than the lovers' stunning surroundings.

The tableaux are stunning, the costumes surreal and truffle-rich, but the film doesn’t let period details obscure the scandalous love story at its royal center. A warm, scented bath of a movie.

Overlapping with Sofia Coppola’s “Marie Antoinette” but minus the mischievously anachronistic touches, it’s a finely wrought story of palace intrigue enriched by lush sets and decors.

Magnificent to behold but basically lacking a point, this period-rich historical epic seems uncertain about what it wants to say about its main character.

One might expect a film pairing these two actors would produce combustible results. But “Jeanne du Barry,” written, directed by and starring Maïwenn, is an ultimately snoozy historical period piece.

The locations, sets, visual effects, costumes and even several secondary characters…are remarkable, but all that glitters is not gold, it is decidedly excessive because in its essence it is a clumsy and exaggerated tragicomedy…[Full review in Spanish]

If there's one thing Maïwenn manages to do, it's to paint the atmosphere of the French court as a kind of involuntary parody…[Full review in Spanish]

If some the money invested in this expensive production had been used to hire a scriptwriter, perhaps the outcome would have been different. [Full review in Spanish]

Ultimately, it lands as an average portrayal of an extraordinary historical figure.