Funny, strange, confrontational and subversive, this is one of the most interesting experiences you'll have at the cinema this year.

Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

Louis Mountbatten is appointed Viceroy of India to shepherd through India's independence: he will be the last Viceroy after 300 years of British government. However, the Muslim population of India wants the simultaneous creation of Pakistan, splitting India, and Mountbatten hasn't been told everything agreed by the British establishment prior to his appointment. Meanwhile, a young Hindu man in the Viceroy's household loves a young Muslim woman...This film tells two stories simultaneously: the story of independence and the accompanying partition of India, and the rather soapy accompanying romance of Jeet and Aalia. I assume that they are fictitious in the manner of Titanic's Jack and Rose, sympathetic characters to hang your audience identification on, so as to give the events more impact.The film is nicely presented, with production value on display all over the place. OK, so perhaps the crowd scenes aren't quite as extensive as they were in Gandhi, but the location work and set design is still very impressive.And we have a quality cast, too, with Hugh Bonneville looking and sounding nothing like Mountbatten, but providing a pleasing screen presence. Gillian Anderson as his wife gets much closer to the accent one expects. And the rest of the cast is solid, too - first division, reliable English thesps, with some names among the Indian cast members who are recognisable to Western filmgoers.It is interesting, especially if you are not well-informed about this period in Indian (and British) history, and very slickly put on screen, but it is just the tiniest bit dull. The romance sub-plot does hold the interest but if, as I suggest it may be, it is fictitious, that perhaps reduces the credibility of the film as a whole.I'm glad I watched this, but I don't anticipate watching it again.

While the movie dealt with the disaster that was the handover of India to it's people and the carnage of partition, the story centered its attention on the ridiculously palatial British Viceroy's House, the farcical pomposity of the British who conducted their business there and the countless number of Indian servants whose behavior and attitudes which reflected those of the Indian population at large.As Churchill said, "History is written by the victors," and thus British colonialism in general, and people such as the Mountbattens in particular, have long been blindly glorified and exculpated. At least this movie helps to expose Mountbatten as the fatuous tool of the politicians that he was, chosen for his gullibility and his obsession with inflating his reputation. His wife and daughter come across as being the sympathetic, but clueless ego-centric do-gooders that they were.The rush to hand over India, as one servant in the movie aptly stated, was because the British didn't want to be accountable for the inevitable carnage. As we were informed at the end of the film, countless millions were displaced and one million died, with the blame conveniently shifted onto independent India. This moment in Indian history, the obvious focus of the movie, and the resultant blood shed, as horrific as it was, would pale in comparison with an honest assessment of the death, destruction, enslavement and exploitation visited on India during the previous centuries of British rule. Shashi Tharoor recently claimed that Britain was responsible for the deaths of 35 million Indians. The accuracy of his numerical claim is irrelevant, but it does provide a contextual comparison.The family of the film's director, Gurinder Chadha, suffered from the partition debacle and from the irresponsible colonial rulers. Possibly the time has come for history to be portrayed by its victims, rather than the supposed victors. Gurinder Chadha has been accused of bias in her film's portrayal of Muhammad Ali Jinnah and Indian Muslims.

I have read many books and seen the events of 1947 first hand. But Gurinder Chadha brings new facts about Churchill and Partitioned Map of India drawn in 1945. Hasting Ismay role in giving secret files to Radcliffe was unknown to me.Also Mounbatten finding out the 1945 Files was something I did not know. Thanks to Prince Charles for guiding Gurinder Chadha and great job done where she put her SOUL into this movie. I saw it last night on rented DVD thru Netflix.

Viceroy's House does only an adequate job of explaining the complexities of the Parition of India at its Independence, in 1947. Nevertheless it succeeds in being a quite entertaining movie, largely due to the inclusion of a fictional star-crossed love affair, played by two very attractive actors, which serves to illustrate the strong tensions that arouse between Muslims and Hindus. Hugh Bonneville who plays Lord Mountbatten, sent to accomplish the Independence, is always an easy, charming presence on screen, but lacks, in my mind, both the physical grandeur of Mountbatten and his commanding presence. Gillian Anderson is wonderful, however, as his glamorous, highly-accomplished and liberal thinking wife. (The role of their daughter adds nothing to the film and seems an afterthought.) Yet the exotic sights of India in the 40s makes for much visual pleasure, and the bare bones presentation of the history of the era is sufficiently educational to make this a recommended film.