Spencer (2021)

Score: 4.5 / 5

Pablo Larrain again dives deep into the psyche of a popular, tragic woman from real life in his latest fantasy-biopic Spencer. Much as with his previous film Jackie, this one takes several liberties with historical record; yet while some may hang up on these points, I find that they only increase the drama and our understanding of the real woman at the same time. You don't really get to know someone -- such as Princess Diana -- over the course of a single fraught Christmas holiday, so it is wise of the filmmakers to pack in as much drama as they are able. Yet this movie is by no means plot-driven or even plot-heavy. It works hard, rather, to situate our perspective within Diana's, forcing us to feel her state of mind and experience her pain rather than keep up with names and titles and situational strife.

Identifying itself as "a fable from a true tragedy," the film takes place over three days in December 1991, starting on Christmas Eve as the royal family prepares to spend the holidays at Sandringham House in Norfolk. As the staff clean the estate and prepare food (a la Downton Abbey in traditional, militaristic fashion), the family arrives with one exception. Diana, driving herself around the countryside, seems distracted and unwilling to arrive at the house until she runs into her friend, the head chef. She notes that her family's house is the abandoned neighboring estate, wondering absently how she could have been lost on these roads. In just this opening sequence, Larrain and writer Steven Knight quickly set up most of the conflicts the movie will explore: the disconnect between regimented perfection in royal affairs and Diana's own brand of style, the parts Diana has lost of herself in being grafted to royalty, and the unsustainable demands of expectation placed on her.

Kristen Stewart gives the best performance yet of her career as the title character, the title itself enhancing the film's exploration of Diana's life in terms of past and present. She mentions her family repeatedly as something separate from her current life, noting her former surname as a point of pride and joy. When she arrives at Sandringham, she is reunited with her two sons William and Harry, and Stewart immediately gives us the photogenic loveliness we all remember. Her transformation is profound, not only physically -- though her hair is absolutely perfect -- but vocally; her gestures, heavily lidded eyes, the musical lilt of her daydreamy phrases, everything feels at once endlessly researched and spontaneously organic. It's a haunting portrayal of a story that itself haunts our cultural recollections, perhaps because it never really felt like a complete story. Thankfully, Spencer does not try to dig into the tragedy of Diana's untimely death and the conspiracies around it; the tragedy this film attempts to humanize is that of her internal life away from the cameras.

Unfortunately, detractors of Stewart may not find much here to appreciate. While Stewart is a solid performer, no questions there, her ability to act is largely on par with her previous work. Which is to say, some people connect with it and some choose not to. This was, for me, her most grounded and realistic work yet, and that's largely because of the odd relationship both Stewart and Diana fostered, in their own ways, with the paparazzi. The similarities felt raw and emotional, so I was able to suspend my resistance and let Larrain's vision sweep me away into a film that, beyond Stewart, would never quite manage to work due to its focus. But that is to say nothing of its production design, which brilliantly transports us into the early '90s, or its gorgeous cinematography (all on film, not digital) by Claire Mathon (Portrait of a Lady on Fire) will surely be studied in classrooms. And then there's the haunting music by Jonny Greenwood of Radiohead (There Will Be Blood, The Master, Phantom Thread) that grows increasingly shrill and dissonant as Diana's mental state unravels.

So focused are we on Diana's perspective that most other characters have precious little screen time. Her sons and her dresser Maggie (Sally Hawkins) probably have the most, but this is seemingly because they are the closest emotionally to her. Her husband Prince Charles (Jack Farthing) is a cruel, monstrous presence whose verbal abuse to Diana reaches a heartrending climax in a game room as we see her silent physical reaction to his words. Thankfully, we know it wasn't long after this historical time period that they decided to end their union. He's not the only problem, though, as the household master, a former military officer played by an imposing Timothy Spall, is keeping a close watch on Diana. He has her curtains sewn to stop her from being seen by trespassing photographers; he follows her to the kitchen at night for a late snack; he places a book about Anne Boleyn in her room.

And here we must mention the dream sequences of this movie, in which we experience thick metaphors in dialogue and ethereal imagery collide. Anne Boleyn's ghostly presence seems a little heavy-handed, but it is effective in drawing our attention to the crucial attention royals pay to tradition and history, as it connects Diana with the doomed queen in that both had an adulterous husband seeking her permanent removal. Diana may seem to have it all, but the opulence is still a cage. An early scene that best sets up the ambiguous dreams features Diana ripping off her pearl necklace (given to her by her husband) and then eating the pearls with her pea soup, cracking her teeth and running out of the dining hall under the cold eyes of Queen Elizabeth II. It can all be interpreted in various ways, but the sensations of pain -- both literal and imagined -- are inescapable for her as well as for us. A favorite moment of the film takes place late (actually, in what might be its character climax), when Diana rebelliously visits her childhood home and then has a dizzying sequence of dancing in golden halls in several of her most famous real-life gowns. She looks happy and absent at the same time, a nearly perfect way for this film to remind us of the beauty and tragedy of fame, wealth, family, and the boundaries between personal and public life in the present and in future legacy.