THE LOST KING (2022) ¢ ¢ ¢ 1/2
D: Stephen Frears
Sally Hawkins, Steve Coogan, Harry Lloyd,
Mark Addy, James Fleet, Julian Firth
An unlikely crowd-pleaser based 0n a true story about an unlikely archeological dig, starring Sally Hawkins as a mad Englishwoman on a personal quest to locate and recover the remains of Richard III. The surprise comes when she finds what she's looking for, under a car park in Leicester. It's a David-vs.-Goliath story, the plucky amateur up against the unscrupulous academics who scoff at her request for funding and then try to horn in on her work. (The bureaucrats and professors do not come off looking too good.) Hawkins gets some great closeups, and how can you not root for Sally Hawkins in a movie like this? Steve Coogan, who plays her estranged husband, produced and cowrote the script.
