For some unknowable reason, the philistines at Amazon Studios decided to torture America with the inimitable piece of schlock that is “Red, White & Royal Blue.” Among the worst movies ever made, Amazon is pushing it — hard — while critics and audiences lap it up. However, it is still worth watching — if only to understand the pathological obsession with victimhood that drives the modern left.
they’re not beating the rivals-to-lovers allegations. #RWRBMovie premieres august 11 on @PrimeVideo. pic.twitter.com/u6l3YhZIXx
— Red, White & Royal Blue on Prime (@RWRBonPrime) July 6, 2023
The plot is dreamed up by a group of mildly autistic teenage girls who watch too much yaoi. Against all odds, the affable, do-gooder son of the American president falls in love with the uptight and effeminate British Prince. The audience is dragged through a painful will-they/won’t-they as the two young men are forced to grapple with their identities in a society that just won’t accept them for who they are. Pause here for an extended eye roll.
Usually, when a movie blatantly caters to left-wing platitudes, critics fawn while audiences scoff. This is an unlikely outlier. With a 76 percent “fresh” rating on Rotten Tomatoes, critics know the film is terrible but understand they can’t say it outright without risking their careers. Instead, they cautiously suggest it is “undercooked,” “bland” and “shallow.” The common thread of the negative reviews is that the film should be even more substantively political. Yet with a 94 percent “fresh” rating, audiences seemed to enjoy it — showing just how much America’s sensibilities have evolved since the Obergefell decision in 2015. (RELATED: Looking Back At The War Movie The Left Never Wanted You To See)
This is surprising on both fronts. Politics aside, the film is just plain bad. The production value hovers between student films and Lifetime specials. The writing seems to be generated by Chat GPT but the acting is worse. The two male leads force their chemistry and it’s clear their prior work has been mostly direct-to-video teen dramas. Uma Thurman as the first woman president (with a Texas drawl, no less) is the film’s only redeeming factor, but it is still an embarrassing pit stop in an otherwise admirable career. It beggars belief how anyone could enjoy the film without reveling in its politics.
But perhaps that is the point — the film is more a political treatise than a cinematic experience. Typically films centered around the White House do not openly declare whether they follow a Republican or Democratic administration. Here we see a departure from that tradition. Thurman is a proud Democrat, representing a vision of progress for both the working class and minorities against privileged and bigoted Republicans. Buzzword-laden sermons proliferate, from electing “female-identifying candidates” to accepting “queer identities” and the role of “disinformation.” MSNBC hosts Rachel Maddow and Joy Reid have more lines in their cameo roles than most of the supporting characters (who were clearly cast with diversity in mind). An entire sub-plot is devoted to turning Texas blue.
It’s unclear how critics would imagine the film to be more politically substantive. It is not the director’s fault for making a “shallow” film; the ideological source material is shallow by nature. Reducing people down to their sexual preferences or skin color inherently lacks substance. The industry complained when gay couples were not represented in mainstream rom-com, but now that major studios are showing that gay couples can be just as shmaltzy as straight ones, LGBTQ activists resent the commercialization. When you are determined to be a victim of societal forces, nothing is ever good enough.
Herein lies the crux of the movie. The film is set in modern times, but the plot is driven wholly by the idea that these two young men must hide their identities and suppress their love because of the institutionalized prejudices of an unfair society. An American president can supposedly not win an election with a gay son; the monarchy cannot survive with a gay prince. But does anyone really believe this? It’s only a matter of time before the White House dresses Hunter Biden in drag just to buy back some good publicity.
What the movie shows is how the left can still convince themselves they’re the underdog, outsider, victim — even when they have all the levers of cultural and institutional power. As identity worship becomes the basis of civilizational progress, any institution or tradition that stands against one’s subjective sense of self becomes an enemy of humanity itself. Since the left is always pushing for more, they must always anticipate resistance. With this mindset, every political dispute becomes an existential battle against a subordinating force. It facilitates the victim complex, which then cyclically fulfills the psychological drive to continue the fight.
That the movie was made and marketed by a mainstream studio is proof in itself that this narrative is bunk. At first, the film’s ending might appear to reject the precept of perpetual victimhood. After the obligatory break-up, the couple reconciles as they realize society does in fact accept them. Crowds cheer as they kiss on the balcony of Buckingham Palace. But this speaks to the nature of people, not society. (RELATED: New Hollywood Blockbuster Actually Lets Men Be Men)
While some people will embrace “progress,” institutions remain uniformly backward and oppressive until forced to be otherwise. The Palace — the epitome of tradition and continuity — insists that Henry conforms to the role expected of him. As a Prince, he is expected to subordinate his desires to represent the Crown. Yet the true moral lesson of the film comes from Henry learning the virtue of rejecting these societal obligations and prioritizing his own “right to be happy.” The institution must conform to him, not the other way around. Through radical intransigence and insistence that “the world will know me for who I am,” the Palace is ultimately forced to conform to Henry’s “authentic self.” Destroying tradition is portrayed as the height of moral good.
With this, the movie perfectly captures the project of modern leftism. The “good” people must force all of society’s institutions and traditions to bend to their will. Everything is a tool to this end — even the crappiest rom-com that Hollywood has to offer.