“Three days. That’s it.“
Tell them I’m not well, because I do not recommend this movie if you suffer with anxiety or depression.
During her Christmas holidays with the royal family at the Sandringham estate in Norfolk, England, Diana Spencer, struggling with mental health problems, decides to end her decade-long marriage to Prince Charles.
Both haunting and elegant, Spencer brilliantly conveys all of Diana’s anguish in what would be one of the most important weekends to shape her future with the royal family.
I won’t be the first to reveal that Kristen Stewart is probably the last actress I would have chosen to play Diana. But she’s already garnering major awards buzz for her portrayal, and recently received the special Performer Tribute honor at the Gotham Awards. She’s coming for you, Academy. She IS Diana.
Even Princess Diana’s former bodyguard watched the film and said of Kristen Stewart’s performance: “Out of all the people who have played Diana over the past 10 years, she’s the closest to her. She managed to perfect her mannerisms.” Wow, right?
While based on real people and actual events, Steven Knight’s script imagines what might have happened during a weekend celebrating the Christmas festivities at the Queen’s Sandringham Estate. So while some argue the “did she really do that?” or “did that really happen?” …I think it’s important to remember the state of mind she was in, and the future she was running toward. You’d be a bit mental too, right?
“She has been deemed the most hunted person of our era. I think that our movie very much examines the jail break aspect of her life and her kind of sprinting swiftly towards having a life that was connected to her, an outer life, an exterior life that connected and was more in balance with her inner life.” Kristen Stewart via Collider
In an interview with The Guardian, director Pablo Larraín revealed that without his earlier biopic of Jackie Kennedy, Spencer probably wouldn’t exist.
“I don’t think I would have made Spencer without Jackie. One thing led to another. Both women that had to deal with the press and media in different ways, both women that were linked to very powerful families married to powerful men, and they were both women that find the way to create their own story and find their identity. But if Jackie’s a movie about grief and memory and legacy, I think Spencer is about identity and motherhood.”
Rather than celebrate her and her life, the film focuses are the darker notes of her mentality and how she was treated. It’s not necessarily an “eventful” movie, but it’s a great character study of someone we all know and love from a more realistic, less perfect perspective. Many are seeing this as a “disrespect” to her legacy; however, I think it crafts a point of view less looked upon.
It’s not as captivating as Jackie, but it’s damn near close. Kristen Stewart delivers possibly THE performance of the year, and for that…it’s worth watching.
On the Screen Reviews 