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I want you to live, and live well. In the beginning of this movie, you are told by John Wilmot, the Earl of Rochester, that you will not like him. That the gentlemen will be envious and the ladies will be repelled. This movie is based on the real John Wilmot, a 17th Century poet, who led a life of drinking, sex, drinking, theater, and more sex. He is quite the cynic, but for some reason, I was drawn to his character. He was morally corupt, but he was free. He was the original "don't give a f**k" kinda guy. In this movie, he is helping a woman, an actress, become a BETTER actress, and you can tell that when he tells her "The theatre is my drug, and my illness is so far advanced that my physic must be of the highest quality. " he means it with every bone in his body, with every fiber of his being. He begins to teach this woman, Elizabeth Barry, and soon starts having a love affair with her. Mind you, he's married, but as the movie goes along you can tell he's not a man that should be tied down. He was not meant for the married life. This becomes evident when him and his wife are getting a portrait done, and he begins to go on telling her how (and I can't remember word for word, so this is just a summation of what he said) "wouldn't it be funny if instead of getting my picture painted with you, I had a monkey sitting next to me, and in his hand he held a poem, as if to read it, and I were crowning him with Laurels." This gives the impression that John was a kind of fancy Frat Boy. As the movie goes on, John gets played by Elizabeth, and suffers from syphilis. Him and his wife get a divorce after that whole monkey business. Now, onto the other plot, King Charles II has called upon John to write him a play to entertain a French Royal, for John is a writer and this is what he does. Writes plays and Poems. As much of a lowlife as John is, King Charles seems to have faith in him, even saying to him "Elizabeth had her Shakespeare. You could be mine." So, John goes about writing this play, and since he is such a sexual deviant, there are lots of sexually perverse scenes, and the king banishes him from his court. Soon John gets sick, and as he worsens he goes to profess his love to Elizabeth, even telling her " I never wanted you for a mistress, Lizzy. I wanted you for my wife." But very nonchalantly, she basically tells him to screw off, since she is fast becoming a rising star (mind you, from the help of him teaching her) and even says to him "I will not swap my certain glory for your undependable love." As time goes on, the King is searching for him and when he finds him, he states "I thought about putting you in the tower. I even considered putting your head on a spike. But I decided on something worse. I'm going to ignore you. I will no longer encourage any hope in my breast for you. I am condemning you to be you for the rest of your life." That is one of my favorite scenes. This is the rise and the fall of this man. And as much as you are to hate him, it would surely pain you to watch someone fall so hard. He finally does something good, for once, at the end of the movie. But I'm not going to tell you what that is. Just watch it. I enjoyed this movie very much. The ending monolouge, the last lines, are fantastic. Johnny Depp was great, but I also enjoyed John Malkovich as King Charles II. My favorite line in this movie though, for some reason, when he comes back to London from being off with his wife, and he's going to meet his old friends again, his friend lets him know he had written a play about him and Johns reaction is "Oh, written a new play has he? All those afternoons pretending to slope of and roger his mistress, like a decent chap, he was lurking in his rooms poking away at a play. That is disgusting, George." It's just a great movie, there is a lot I didn't mention, but I suggest you see it. Some people will love it, some people will hate it, and I'm sure old John Wilmot wouldn't have it any other way :) email this review to a friend
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