On Christmas Eve 1877, Empress Elisabeth of Austria, once idolised for her beauty, turns 40; she now lives in a luxurious delirium of loneliness. Notionally cherished, but actually patronised, Elizabeth is mysterious and sensual, imperious and severe. She’s a woman of passions who endures icy distaste from the very formal Austrian court and the family of her unfaithful husband, the Hapsburg emperor Franz Joseph I, facing every day the struggle to fit into her corsage and be laced down to a terrifyingly small 18-inch waist. Vicky Krieps gives an exhilaratingly fierce and intriguing performance which won her Best Actress at the European Awards.
