I’ve had the opportunity to talk to several people who have been reading my praises for The King’s Speech, and each one has asked me, “What exactly is it that you see in this story?” No doubt they can feel my enthusiasm floating off of each blog post, but perhaps I haven’t communicated all that I felt from this movie…a great story of triumph!

As I watched the Oscars last night, I truly felt the presence of love as Colin thanked Olivia for being in his life…not unlike Sandra Bullock’s heartfelt tribute the year before to her husband at the time, Jesse James, which I believe was as real as anything regardless of what happened afterward – that moment was true. Natalie Portman, in love with love growing in her belly, also swept the big awards this year.

I asked Mark, “Have you ever noticed how people who are in love seem to leap to greater heights?” Perhaps I put two seemingly random connection points together, but it made me think about my own life and how when Mark and I first met everything seemed to bloom … it seemed like nothing would not grow in that energy. I had never known unconditional love like that before…it buoyed my spirit (I’ll share more thoughts on this and how love grows deeper over time in another post).

Great love…that’s what I see when I watch The King’s Speech. I see a man who stutters who has great love for his children, his wife, his country, but he does not yet have that great love for himself. Enter two others who bring heavy-duty mirrors to show him the love he is…to assist him in reclaiming his voice. Lionel (his speech therapist and friend) brings tough love and the unrelenting challenge of pushing the would-be King to be all that he already is. Elizabeth, the Duke’s wife, will not give up on love or on her husband. Her love holds space for the love the Duke already is to grow. In her Presence, he can bloom…and that is just like what I see in these actors…they bloom, grow more vibrant in the swirl of love. The King found his voice and acceptance (a.k.a. love) for himself through love – both friendship and deep romantic love as well as the love of his children. In so many ways, it is the most perfect example of ‘love conquers all.’

The saying, “Behind every great man is a woman no one knows,” and every other version of it seems to say that a great man is great and the woman is unknown, but the truth is without the woman, the man likely would not have been great. And so I see this, too, in The King’s Speech. In our day and age, there are as many men standing behind a woman, loving them…seeing them. Both necessary, equally as critical to the whole. Click on the image below to go to a great clip of “Elizabeth” in this stunning movie!