Spotlight

Spotlight Date: 23-January-05
Spoiler Rating: Medium

Princess Caraboo (1994)

"Princess Caraboo" is the ideal candidate for a Spotlight because it's a little gem that slipped by audiences unnoticed. I was one of the few people who saw the film when it opened 10 years ago, and the charm it worked upon me then has not diminished with the passing of time. Mixing period drama with elements of "Being There" and "Pretty Woman" (though better than both), "Princess Caraboo" eludes the bounds of genre and defies simple classification. It is, more than anything, a well told fantasy made more wonderful by the fact that it's true.

The remarkable tale began in 1817, when a young woman was brought before the court of Almondsbury, Gloucestershire, on the charge of vagrancy. Her case was unusual in that she did not speak English and appeared by her manner and dress to be foreign. Because of her beauty and stately presence, the woman attracted the attention of a local lady, Mrs. Worrall, who took her home and became her patron. Over the next few weeks, with the assistance of various scholars and travelers, the Worralls determined that their guest was royalty from the South Pacific who had been abducted from her home and had jumped ship upon reaching England. The miraculous story of Princess Caraboo spread like wildfire, inflaming the imagination of society and placing its heroine under both adoring and critical scrutiny.

One of the delights of the movie lies in contemplating the innocence of bygone times, and filmmaker Michael Austin wisely invites the viewer to approach the story through the jaded eyes of a newspaper reporter (Stephen Rea) who first dismisses the princess (Phoebe Cates) as a fraud. As he watches her spin a web of enchantment over the Worralls (Wendy Hughes, Jim Broadbent) and their supercilious butler (Kevin Kline) by wearing a turban, chanting on rooftops, and appreciating the wonder of each new day, he comes to realize that if she's a fraud, she's a glorious one: the rare, lucky creature who successfully creates her own reality. He begins to root for her (even as he continues to investigate her origins) with an admiration that combines envy and love; and it would be a hardhearted viewer indeed who did not follow in his footsteps.

The question of whether the princess will be exposed as a fake gives each scene a dramatic immediacy, but most of the time what we see is what enthralls everyone who comes near her: an exquisitely lovely woman having the time of her life. (Cates is perfection here; from where I sit, it's too bad she chose motherhood over acting.) There is genuine power in the notion of exotic races and new beginnings, and it's easy to understand how the Worralls, their visitors, and even the Prince Regent could be inspired in diverse ways by the person who embodied these things. Princess Caraboo speaks to the ability of the imagination to free people from the injustice and drudgery of daily life. It's a historical Cinderella story in which everybody basks in magic before the clock strikes twelve, and it deserves to be sought out and appreciated.

Copyright © 2005 The Jujube (M. I. Kim). All rights reserved.