The Queen of Versailles
With the epic dimensions of a Shakespearean tragedy, The Queen of Versailles follows billionaires Jackie and David
Director: Lauren Greenfield
Starring: David Siegel, Jackie Siegel
A succulently entertaining movie that invites you to splash around in the dreams and follies of folks so rich they're the 1 percent of the 1 percent. It's like a champagne bath laced with arsenic.
An indelible portrait of an American family at its most blithely macabre.
The Queen of Versailles turns out to be a portrait -- appalling, absorbing and improbably affecting -- of how, even within a system seemingly designed to ensure that the rich get richer, sometimes the rich get poorer.
Queen of Versailles is still worthwhile, not because it questions all-American entitlement but because it prompts us to think hard about what, exactly, we believe we're entitled to.
Greenfield's refusal to pass judgment on the Siegels lends her subjects and their marriage unexpected complexity and depth - especially Jackie, a true force of nature.
Best Documentary
Boston Society of Film Critics Awards (2012)
Brisbane International Film Festival (2012)
Best Documentary Feature
Broadcast Film Critics Association Awards (2013)
Best Documentary
Chicago Film Critics Association Awards (2012)
Best Documentary
Chlotrudis Awards (2013)