Fridae

The best part of historical drama The Duchess is the playful lesbian-like scene between the Duchess and her best friend, Bess. The Duchess had so far only gone to bed with her cold and dispassionate husband, the Duke, and does not know how fulfilling sex can be. Bess tells her, "Intercourse is not just about offspring. In fact, it can be rather pleasurable." She proceeds to plant soft, sweet kisses on the Duchess back.

The Duchess is played by the beautiful Kiera Knightley, and Bess is played by the full-figured siren Hayley Atwell (Brideshead Revisited). So we'll be damned if we didn't recommended this to our lesbian readers.

Directed by Saul Dibb, The Duchess is loosely based on the life of Georgina Spencer, the Duchess of Devonshire, who lived at the turn of the 18 th century. Her direct descendants include Princess Diana, born Lady Diana Spencer.

Like Lady Di, the Duchess also led a controversial life. She was renowned for being ahead of her time. She was beautiful, fashionable, opinionated and strong-willed, and often spoke up for women's rights. Despite being trapped in a marriage of convenience with the Duke of Devonshire (Ralph Fiennes), she kept her spirits up, held her head high and had an affair outside of her marriage.

Unfortunately, neither the movie nor the actress lives up to this Lady's legend. The movie is too conventional for its own good. The script is unremarkable, offering bland lines like, "Change is upon us! We shall not go back to the old ways!" Kiera Knightley is lovely and talented. But she cannot give a powerhouse performance that, say, a younger Meryl Streep or Glenn Close would have delivered.

To sum up, The Duchess is a watchable movie, but it falls short of being great. Still, for lesbian viewers, the presence of two beautiful actresses in one movie about one legendary lady is a sufficient treat in itself.