03/09/2021 - VENICE 2021: Pablo Larraín delivers a wacky, engaging, refreshing story about a woman who, unlike a certain royal spouse from the 16th century, decides to save her own neck

All hail Pablo Larraín, once again dedicating himself to looking at the woman behind the internationally renowned icon. His latest film Spencer [+see also:
trailer
film profile], making its stylish arrival in the main competition of the Venice Film Festival, shares obvious similarities with Jackie [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile], as Spencer is also a portrayal of a woman under scrutiny and on the verge of something — be it a breakdown, a rebirth, or both — and learning to exist on her own terms and without a recognisable man by her side. But this one is perhaps a bit more hopeful, a story of emancipation as much as it is one of debilitating pressure, of the kind that sends you running into the night in a ballgown.

He certainly didn’t care about making things easy, for himself or for his actress — in a world obsessed with The Crown, Diana has never really left the public consciousness. Then again, he at least did not have to explain anything, as the reality of that “crowded” marriage is familiar even to those with next to no interest in ongoing royal dramas. In Larraín’s film, Diana just wants to survive Christmas. But the holidays at the Queen’s Sandringham Estate in 1991 have nothing to do with fun and everything to do with planning and respecting the schedule. There is a bit of an Upstairs, Downstairs situation going on, although Diana can’t really count on too many allies in either one of these worlds. Her husband arrives early while she is late, which already says it all to the group of people preparing the festivities. Let the games begin. 

Kristen Stewart, who is still underrated as an actress for reasons unknown, is very good here. Fragile, she takes on Diana’s famously feathered hairdo as well as bouts of erratic behaviour, yet another “mad woman” cracking under pressure, observed and literally weighed at one point (as is apparently tradition). In this environment, closing doors doesn’t help since everyone hears and sees everything anyway. Mystery is something that is very often mentioned when it comes to Stewart, who went from a precocious kid in Panic Room to teenage dream in the Twilight saga, braving her own kind of media storms and emerging as a truly fascinating performer. She fits Diana well, but there is something very childish about her too, and not just in her giggle. She stumbles around to a jazzy soundtrack, hides away in the bathroom, wakes her kids up at night to play with them. Her youth, once valued, now comes in the way of protocol, that much is clear. But it also makes her impossible to control or to break. 

Larraín’s decision to keep things simple pays off — these are just a few days in a few, although arguably very spacious rooms. Rooms that are always too cold for Diana, who can’t even keep the drapes properly shut, as though she were already pretty much prepped to be buried alive. What makes it all so fresh is the way the film eschews a lot of historical details and goes into full breakdown mode instead, with an introduction stating that it is, in fact, “a fable from a true tragedy.” In one scene, the gaslit Diana pretty much talks to the unfortunate Anne Boleyn, herself once kept captive in these freezing rooms, and still trying to save her own neck. In this fable, it’s not about the royal wedding — it’s about keeping the princess alive. 

Spencer was staged by Komplizen Film, Shoebox Films and Fabula in association with FilmNation, Neon and Topic Studios. It was produced by Juan de Dios Larraín, Jonas Doenbach, Paul Webster, as well as the director, Janine Jackowski and Maren Ade.