"It's grotesque!

"No, it's Versailles.

The exchange encapsulates the very essence of the famous spectacle in which Johnny Depp is seen as the white-powdered King Louis XV and Maïwenn in the lead role as the courtesan Jeanne du Barry. If you have a penchant for absurd palace intrigues with intricate rule-based hypocrisy, and décor that looks like a macaron pastry shop dipped in gold, "Jeanne du Barry" is a party.

If you have a penchant for absurd palace intrigues with intricate rule-based hypocrisy, and décor that looks like a macaron pastry shop dipped in gold, "Jeanne du Barry" is a party.

It begins with a fairy-tale narration that describes how the illegitimate child Jeanne becomes Louis XV's official mistress. Pastoral motifs with a central perspective show the beautiful young woman with her head on top and her nose in a book, making her way into the finer salons. Mom is there as a pimp.

The multi-talented Maïwenn (who, among other things, had a child with Luc Besson at the age of 16, played a blue alien in "The Fifth Element" and was praised in Cannes for his film "Polisse") gives Jeanne agency and humor, making her more than a calculating fortune seeker. She laughs at the bizarre rituals: elaborate curtsies, the king's morning toilet, and the rule that the king's mistress must be a married noblewoman.

Johnny Depp's king is a laconic and tired fellow. It is not in the indolence that he excels, rather in energetic pompousness. Here he mostly stays out of the way to make room for Maïwenn's interpretation of a colourful and norm-breaking woman.

Despite du Barry's exceptional life story, it is difficult to get involved in the castle's intrigues, the absurd pettiness that creates bottomless misfortune in a sumptuous environment. The wicked princesses aren't just mean, they're also really ugly. They get their new sister-in-law Marie Antoinette to freeze out the beautiful and unpretentious Jeanne and suddenly the fairy tale is as simple as Cinderella.

The film wants to tell the story from the perspective of the mocked harlot, yet it feels like even this radical idea is dazzled by the gold of Versailles and gets lost in the salons.