Film Review - Spencer (12)

 It seems that they're circling just me. Not you, just me.

Spencer is the new film from Pablo Larrain, the Chilean director who's made an international name for himself by telling stories of iconic 20th century female figures. In his 2016 film Jackie, Natalie Portman portrayed tragic Jackie Kennedy in the hours and days directly following the assassination of her husband President John F. Kennedy. This time it's Kirstin Stewart, aka her from all the Twilight films, in the role of Diana, Princess of Wales, the one-time Diana Spencer. If you think The Crown has a monopoly on what can interestingly be said about Diana's time as a member of the British Royal Family, think again...

The story - described at the film's beginning as 'A Fable Based on a True Tragedy' - takes place in December 1991, as the Royals congregate at the Sandringham Estate to celebrate the festive season. There's a military-style operation in progress by staff to run the place, and Prince Charles is chiefly preoccupied with preparing elder son William for the Boxing Day grouse shoot. But for Diana, sweeping up the drive alone in her convertible, it promises to be a three-day endurance test. Ten years into her marriage with Charles, she's the object of perpetual media scrutiny, painfully aware that there's a third party in the marriage, and stifled to the point of suffocation. Christmas with the relatives has never seemed such a grim prospect.

It's useful to know going in that Larrain's film is a kind of dark-edged fantasy, rather than one purporting to show what might really have happened to its protagonist. Like Jackie, this is a psychological portrait of a women in extremis, but it's significantly more abstract than the 2016 film; the other royals have a cold and mostly background presence like they're a permanent tableau, the precision with which food is prepared and served is nothing short of oppressive, and Timothy Spall's senior attendant is more a portent of doom than a three-dimensional character. Add to that a series of visions that link Diana with another oppressed royal of old, and the story becomes a Christmas nightmare as unsettling as any Ebenezer Scrooge ever had.

With a grand European hotel doubling at Sandringham, the locations look truly sumptuous, and Larrain shoots them on your actual old-school film rather than digitally, often in soft-focus, like a twee period romance. Thing is, it's not a romance. It's an oppressive drama concerning the fraying of a trapped woman's psyche, and the festive trappings only make the atmosphere more cloyingly oppressive. With Diana so much on her own, hand-held cameras frequently in her face, it's a study in loneliness and paranoia. The film finds numerous ways of getting us inside the protagonist's head, none more effective than the soundscape - headed up by a superb but frequently grating original score by Jonny Greenwood of Radiohead. Whether the melancholy of classical strings or the discord of abstract jazz, it puts you in the headspace of someone who just wants to scream and rip curtains and run the length of the Christmas dinner table. String quartets and church organs swell so loud that you want to take them out with an axe.

At the heart of it all is Stewart's performance, already lauded with talk of Oscar nominations. Such talk is earned. Like her Twilight co-star Robert Pattinson, Steward has come a long way since the sexy-vampire days, and she's nothing short of astonishing here. It's one thing to capture the voice and mannerisms of a media icon with technical precision (which she does). It's quite another to convey inner turmoil and fragility convincingly, when the close-up scrutiny of the camera allows for no fakery whatsoever. As Diana the Princess, and as an ordinary human in extraordinary circumstances and at a low ebb, she's never short of 100% convincing. Other performances impress - Poldark's Jack Farthing gets to show some humanity as Charles, while Sally Hawkins and the normally edgy Sean Harris are both good as empathetic members of the royal staff - but this is Stewart's show like Jackie belonged to Portman, and she nails it to the Sandringham floorboards.

For all its virtues - which include all the superior production and costume design you'd imagine - Spencer is not a Friday evening popcorn watch. Go in expecting the conventional drama of The Crown, and you'll end up like the elderly lady at my screening who turned to her friend during closing credits and said, 'Well that was a bit strange.' It is strange, and frustrating, and deliberately slow-paced. It's also genuinely troubling, and not just because of how it deals with the more self-destructive elements of the troubled Princess. But it's also beautiful, terrifically crafted, and deeply empathetic towards its damaged subject - a woman who just wants to be herself again. 

Gut Reaction: The Friday factor meant this took its time to reel me in - but it ultimately made me care about Diana Spencer, almost grind my teeth, and at one point actively flinch.

Memorable Moment: An eccentric but touching party game with Wills and Harry.

Ed's Verdict: 9/10. Spencer is art - not the dull, fusty kind, but something much more imaginative and subversive. It's terrific, personal filmmaking, and Kirsten Stewart delivers one of the performances of the year.