Spencer

Grade: D

In 2016, director Pablo Larraín helmed the Jackie Kennedy biopic Jackie, which earned Natalie Portman an Oscar nomination. I liked Jackie. It had a nice score, and Portman was wonderful. It was refreshing to see a different take on the biopic genre. It wasn’t a rote, by-the-numbers march through all the main details of her life, as we almost hear the filmmakers check them off the list. There were no captions at the end, that spoon-feed us the bullet points of what ends up happening to everyone.

Larraín is back exploring the same kind of territory with Spencer, which chronicles three days in the life of Princess Diana: Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, and Boxing Day – 1991. This isn’t a straight-up biopic, but a snapshot of a specific time period. Unfortunately, another thing the movie has in common with a picture is it doesn’t change. The first time I paused the film, I was delighted to see that we were 50 minutes into it already, but surprised to be that far in, because it felt like nothing had happened.

Being royalty often looks so glamorous and decadent. Every song’s like gold teeth, Grey Goose, tripping in the bathroom. Spencer shows us the other side of the coin – how it can make one feel restrained and trapped. The walls almost literally have ears – as servants/etc are always listening and monitoring. Not to mention the press and paparazzi. I felt the same way watching this movie. It begins on a dull note and succeeds in going absolutely nowhere. I have grown extremely tired of the fake-out where we see a character do something unusual or dangerous – like jump off a cliff, intentionally break something, or throw themselves down a flight of stairs – only to have it cut back to where they just were, to let us know: only kidding! That was just a fantasy.

I came very close to turning on the subtitles. Practically every line from the entire cast is spoken in whispered, quick, frenetic bursts. Academy Award Best Actress nominee Kristen Stewart kinda sorta looks like Princess Diana in the odd sporadic wide shot, but that has more to do with the wig and the costumes. It made me yearn to see Diana (2013), starring Naomi Watts. I’d always thought that casting was a master stroke. The best part of Stewart’s performance is her accent, which I admit is one of the more consistent, spot-on dialects you’re likely to see in a movie. Stewart so frequently plays brooding, annoyed, and joyless, to the point where if she finally does get around to smiling, it’s an amazing catharsis. Sometimes the role calls for it, like for Bella Swan in the Twilight series, and I liked her in Still Alice. I guess you could say a movie like Spencer is appropriate for it as well.

The film lingers in the doldrums of the scrutiny and toll life as a princess takes on one’s mental health, and stays there, and repeats itself, and repeats itself, and repeats itself. One of the last scenes – where she and her sons drive off into the sunset in her convertible, while blasting Mike + The Mechanics’ “All I Need Is a Miracle” – is a fun scene of relief. It feels like something from another movie, but at this point, anything coming from a film other than Spencer is a plus. Spencer is available to stream on Hulu, which means you’re free to turn it off whenever you want, so you can go outside and watch grass grow.

Grade: D