Hyde Park on Hudson

This true story of a secret love affair between Franklin Roosevelt and his distant cousin has a lot of potential, but it fails to deliver.  There is no real point to this generic-looking period piece, set during the first-ever visit by the King and Queen of England to the United States, and although Bill Murray portrays Roosevelt adroitly, the writing is not there to support the performance, and the few scenes that manage to be interesting are woefully predictable.

The contrast between the aloof royals and the patrician yet populist President could have been amusing, but it falls flat, and the love story between FDR and his cousin Daisy is surpassingly dull; the character is written so one-dimensionally that even the gifted Laura Linney can't do anything with her.  This squandered potential is surprising, since the film is based on Daisy's actual letters and diaries. Yet the endless voice-over narration that tells the story isn't taken directly from Daisy's actual letters. If the film had used the real woman’s own words, the almost-always incorrect choice of voice-over narration would at least have made sense, but alas, Daisy's character is boring and stilted, and so is this movie.