“A startlingly original and beautiful pop reverie that comes very close to being transcendent.”

Carina Chocano, Los Angeles Times

From the moment the angular chords of Gang of Four’s ​“Natural’s Not in It” hit, you know Sofia Coppola’s take on the last queen of France won’t be colouring inside the lines of your average costume drama. Not so much misunderstood upon release as underappreciated for what it unapologetically is—a dreamy portrait of any-era girlhood alienation, Coppola’s forte—the writer-director’s follow-up to Lost in Translation has amassed a considerable cult of appreciation in the 20 years since its divisive Cannes debut. Aside from the faithful Versailles setting (itself a coup of unprecedented access), Coppola ditches the classroom syllabus in favour of a wildly postmodern approach that sees the cloistered child bride (Kirsten Dunst) navigating teendom—sex, fashion, friendship, angst—while under the scrutiny of a nation. Haute robes de cour and Converse sneakers, 18th-century classical and British postpunk: opulence and John Hughesian coming of age collide in Coppola’s anachronistic, irreverent biopic.

“The visual overload is both seductive and decadent, invoking Marie Antoinette’s candy-coloured perspective while at the same time commenting on her addiction to taste and fashion … In Coppola’s film, style is substance, a gesture that is entirely appropriate to her project and to the statement she wants to make.”

Pam Cook, Sight and Sound

“Every criticism I have read of this film would alter its fragile magic and reduce its romantic and tragic poignancy to the level of an instructional film … Coppola’s oblique and anachronistic point of view shifts the balance away from realism and into an act of empathy for a girl swept up by events that leave her without personal choices.”

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times
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