Really difficult to care about super-rich people maybe having to pay a little tax. Not worth watching. Feels like it belongs in a box set with Natalie Portman doing Jackie and Naomi Watts doing Diana - all of them utterly mediocre.

I really wanted to like this film, and scanned my mind for another actress who would be able to play Grace. Other than, Naomi Watts, all I came up with was Kidman. Watts and Kidman seem to do a tag team sort of thing with portrayals like this one; they seem to take turns playing fluttery ice queens with a Secret Sorrow. But Kidman never convinced me as Grace, never could seem to hold onto her accent correctly, and lacked some of the anger and spice that I hear Grace had in good measure. And may I say that it was odd to see a Miss Congeniality-style training montage in this film? The film kept doing this thing where it would switch to sweeping hyper-closeups of Kidman's face, well, parts of it, as she emoted slightly. Very irritating and I kept saying "What are you trying to convey, Director? What?" The script stretched credulity in almost every scene. But the final straw for me was the meandering, self-serving speech the film's Grace presented at the Red Cross Ball, a speech which we are led to believe averted a war between France and Monaco. Really? It was laughable and poorly presented and summed up the entire film for me: a beautiful disappointment that made me yearn for a glimpse of the real Grace and her charm and beauty. I just might watch Rear Window to cleanse my palate.

After 6 years of marriage to prince Rainier of Monaco (Ray for friends), Grace (Gracie for friends) starts to feel frisky and even more so when Hitch (Hitchcock for you and me) offers her the role of Marnie.However, Ray is less than thrilled at the idea of Gracie going back to work and to Hollywood. Her part of the deal was to be Monaco's first housewife and stay home with the kids. Ray is grumpy by nature and also because the annoying De Gaulle wants him to pay taxes, otherwise Ray's tiny principality will be annexed by France.Killing two birds with a stone, not only Gracie decides to start learning French (after 6 years in the country she could hardly say a word) but also she averts the annexation, thanks to a very long (albeit quite boring and predictable) speech delivered at the Red Cross ball. Can you image what a mighty tragedy could have been if Monaco was annexed to France? A crisis likely to cause WW III. But luckily Gracie diverted all that, thanks to her style and beauty. Even if I was expecting very little, I would have appreciated a bit about Gracie introducing her Hollywood friends to the ways of Monaco's gambling and partying, as a source of revenue for the principality. But that would have been way too controversial. However, it was grotesque to see Monaco, a shard of land famous as a tax haven and gambling resort treated with so much deference, as its existence and that of the ruling house of Grimaldi should be preserved for ever...Obviously I watched this on TV and I would recommend the experience if once in a while you enjoy watching a thoroughly bad movie.

Usually, when I watch a film, when it is clearly not my cup of tea, I switch off. The only reason this film gets a three out of ten rating is because, it truly is, mesmerizingly awful. You won't be able to look away, because: 1. There are some seriously good actors here, Tim Roth and Derek Jacobi, Geraldine Summerville, Robert Lyndsay and Nicole Kidman. So watching them all doing their best as it all goes from bad to worse is like watching a car crash. It must have looked so much more compelling in the script yes? 2. The half hearted attempt to make the film as a homage to films that Grace Kelly starred in. (See the nod and the wink when Nicole's Grace drives down the hill - 'To Catch a Thief') There is also the film stock used which is also reminiscent at particular moments of 1950s films. Also, the over wrought music score.3. By the final penultimate scene when the character 'Grace' (sorry, but it just seems so rude to refer to this creation as Grace Kelly) makes a frankly mawkish and very average speech......you will be dumbstruck.......clearly, we, as the audience, are being poked and nudged to 'feel' great emotion over this moment, as if 'Grace' is making a speech on a par with Martin Luther King's 'I have a dream' speech! Oh dear oh dear.4. The entire narrative premise is dodgy - no matter how the script tries to hide it, this is basically a tale of a very wealthy principality, a tax haven no less, 'fighting the evil Republic' so they can maintain that position.It is one of those films where you know you are supposed to be cheer leading for the main character, but it all comes across - to me anyway - as extremely forced. Having watched a few documentaries over the years about Grace Kelly, she sounds like a complex, down to earth woman, not the wispy character we see here.Make your own mind up ladies and gentlemen, do give it a go, because as I say, it is mesmerizing, just not in the way the film makers hoped.