The last time we met Princess Margrethe in Royalteen, it was in an interesting detour from the story of her brother Prince Kalle (and his non-Royal girlfriend Lena). However, in Royalteen: Princess Margrethe, the leads of the first installment are pushed into the periphery. This is an interesting approach to sequels, with the focus shifting from one character to another. The benefit is the already existing sense of familiarity with the world, and the opportunity is being able to take the narrative in a different direction. This sequel begins right where we left the first. It is Prom night, and Margrethe has overdosed on drugs and fallen unconscious. I know what you are thinking—it’s like the Royal Family of Norway just can’t catch a break.
Director: Ingvild Soderlind
Cast: Elli Rhiannon Muller Osbourne, Sammy Germaine Wadi, Amalie Sporsheim, Filip Bargee Ramberg
Language: Norwegian
Streaming on: Netflix
Much like Royalteen, the sequel too deals with detachment issues, the pressures of being in the spotlight, and the perils of being a symbol rather than living as a person. Margrethe (Elli Rhiannon Muller Osbourne) struggles to deal with her multiple roles of being a princess, a high-schooler, a friend, a lover, a sister, and a daughter. Even as she tries to forget her trainwreck of a prom night, she has to deal with a scandalous video getting into the wrong hands. Even as she tries to connect with a new-found crush, she has to deal with the severity of his rejection. In between, she loses her friend. Despite being the Princess, she is not allowed into pubs and gets rejected by one more guy. Throw in a secret life for one of the parents and an ill-timed lash-out. It's one problem after another, and these feel like flashes of her life rather than a cohesive narrative. Perhaps that’s why it’s hard to connect with Margrethe—just like we don’t connect with the subject of newspaper articles.
The writing simply doesn’t allow these characters to rise above the cliches of the genre. Like every second high-school coming-of-age film, the stakes in this film too never get high. The fights meet with convenient resolutions, with things falling into place magically. It is almost like the writers decided to stack one problem after another for the first two acts and decided to just erase it all in the last. It’s a tough job to humanise those suffering from first-world problems—let alone those from the Royal family—and this film only makes us feel a sense of derision about her problems. It’s like they have a small rock, and they want us to believe it’s Sverd i fjell instead.
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