Haunting look at the ‘People’s Princess’
The Princess (E, 106 mins) Directed by Ed Perkins Reviewed by James Croot ★★★★1⁄2
‘She’s been through the worst they can throw at her,’’ a royal commentator notes of the British’s press treatment of the woman born Diana Frances Spencer early on in this engrossing, enlightening and heartbreaking documentary.
‘‘All this telephoto lens business will stop now she’s part of the family.’’
As Ed Perkins’ adroitly assembled, sometimes shocking, often haunting tale spends the next hour-and-a-half proving, he couldn’t have been more wrong.
Between The Crown’s most recent series and Spencer, you may feel you’ve had enough depictions of the former pre-school assistant’s troubled time in the spotlight as a member of the British royal family, but this offers plenty of insightful and emotional moments.
Told Senna-style, using solely archival footage, this charts the highs and lows of the Princess of
Wales’ public and private life (which unfortunately ended up being the same thing), from her fairytale wedding to Prince Charles to their seemingly bitter estrangement and the endless pursuit of her by the paparazzi.
The movie is framed by footage – taken by some Australian tourists – of a phalanx of photographers camped outside her hotel on that fateful evening in Paris almost 25 years ago.
It demonstrates how a nation and the world fell in love with the young woman, described by some commentators as the best thing to happen to the monarchy in centuries. (It is said her visit to Australia in 1983 set back that nation’s burgeoning Republican movement decades).
It also shows how her very public trials and tribulations – and our obsession with them – resulted in the destruction of some of the magic of the British monarchy, and amplified her ongoing anguish and torment.
Among the highlights of this rich cornucopia of visual and aural treats is the pre-marriage interview with the still teenage Diana and Charles, in which she describes him as being ‘‘very encouraging’’ and he describes her as ‘‘great fun’’. It also covers the rise of the ‘‘Don’t Do It Di’’ badge, a watch party of the 1981 wedding (which includes the ironic sight of Camilla Parker-Bowles’ husband Andrew leading the Royal Carriage), a pregnancy announcement over a supermarket tannoy, footage from that infamous Panorama chat with Martin Bashir and the more cringeworthy utterances by Charles on the Camilla-gate tapes.
But although there are candid moments that truly delight – including Diana dancing with John
Travolta – the overall feeling you’re left with is one of sadness.
It shows how ‘‘the stuff of which fairytales are made’’, as the Archbishop marrying them, Robert Runcie, so effusively put it, transformed into an ongoing nightmare that culminated in a tragedy whose ripples are still felt today – a global generational focal point to rival JFK’s assassination almost 35 years earlier.
Regardless of whose side you were on, The Princess offers poignant, powerful viewing.
The Princess is screening now in select cinemas.