Harockerce What a beautiful movie!

Merolliv I really wanted to like this movie. I feel terribly cynical trashing it, and that's why I'm giving it a middling 5. Actually, I'm giving it a 5 because there were some superb performances.

Matylda Swan It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties.

Isbel A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

petra_ste The Emperor's New Clothes is a droll high-concept comedy: Napoleon finds a look-alike to replace him in his exile in Saint Helena, but his attempts to retake the throne are thwarted by his blooming relationship with a pretty widow.The Emperor's New Clothes is pleasant fluff, elevated by a few canny scenes and by Ian Holm, a great actor we've seen in dozens of movies and yet every time disappears in the character, whether he is playing an ambulance-chaser lawyer or a traitorous android, a meek Hobbit or a royal physician. Here, for the third time in his career in the role of Bonaparte, Holm gives once again a note-perfect performance, mixing steel, pride and yearning for a second chance.The script's main flaw is not milking its premise to full extent - the scenario of the fake Napoleon (Holm again, hilarious), a self-absorbed fool replacing the exiled emperor and obviously loving every minute of the deception, is ripe with comedic potential but explored only in a few passing scenes.Filmed in the lovely Italian city of Turin - nicknamed "the little Paris" - as a stand-in for the French capital.6,5/10

tnhelliott First off I need to say that Ian Hom is amazing. To be able to play two different characters of two different persuasions and bearings is mind-blowing. This film is whimsical and fun and a very good "what if" of history. Parts of it are sad and parts are humorous and all of it is good. A human element is given to characters whom are known to history solely for their deeds and every character in the film has depth of field and a real personality. Many of the scenes are played out in textbook fashion with a beginning a middle and an end with rising and falling action and yet each scene propels the story line further and is a driving force to the film as a whole. My personal favorite moment in the film is the melon scene where Naploean as an exile in his own country still becomes a general of a an army of melon merchants. Sheer brilliance and very beautiful in its humanity. This film shows that although a person can't change whop they are, everyone can change direction and find love.

cjreilly As a Napoleon buff, I eagerly anticipate any new film on the great man, but I was a little worried about a "comedy" starring a British cast. I guess I was worried most of all that the film would jibe at Napoleon. And I never really thought Ian Holm (gifted actor that he no doubt is) could truly do the Emperor justice (ah how I long to see Pacino play the role...). All that said, I enjoyed the film a lot. It isn't a masterpiece by any stretch of the imagination, but it is humorous without "taking the mickey" out of the man. Highly recommended to Napoleon fans and film lovers alike.

drrap This gem of a film deserved a far wider release than it got --shame on Paramount for not daring to place this gem in theatres. In a year where "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" occupied some smalltheatres for months, I had to wait until October to see "TheEmperor's New Clothes," a far better movie and not at all limited toart-house appeal, as the studio seemed to think.Sir Ian Holm is brilliant, affecting, and engaging in his third turn asthe diminutive Emperor, and relative newcomer Iben Hjejle is aperfect foil as the sweet yet tough-skinned "Pumpkin." But whatmakes this film is not so much its wonderful cast and perfectperiod settings, it's the visual magic of Alan Taylor, who opens andcloses the film with the candlelit wonder of an antique MagicLantern. In that nineteenth-century version of visual narrative, greatmen rose from humble origins to "GLOIRE" in a few hand-paintedframes -- only, as Holm's Napoleon insists, "that's not how itended." It would be a crime to reveal how this film ends, but it'show it unfolds which makes it shine -- what, after all, is anEmperor? Is he a suit of clothes? An attitude? A pose? Holm'sdouble role as the emperor's doppelganger shines a new, comic,yet serious light into this more than twice-told tale.