From highness to lowness

Set over three days during the Christmas holidays in 1991, Spencer portrays Princess Diana's decision to end her marriage to Prince Charles. The film, directed by Pablo Larraín, written by Steven Knight, and released in U.S. theaters in late 2021, focuses on her existential crisis as Diana (played by Kristen Stewart) grapples with the constraints and expectations placed upon her by the royal family. The cast also includes Jack Farthing as Charles, Prince of Wales, Sally Hawkins as Maggie, Timothy Spall as Major Alistair Gregory, and Sean Harris as Darren.

To listen to a recording of our CineVerse group discussion of Spencer, conducted in mid-July, click here.

Spencer offers a more intimate and speculative look at Diana's life, focusing on a brief yet impactful period using a blend of factual and fictionalized elements. This is, right up front, called “a fable from a true tragedy,” and should be interpreted as such. Spencer is not intended as a bullseye-accurate biopic; it’s more of a reimagining of the not-so-secret consternation that Princess Di reportedly experienced before separating from Charles—much like director Andrew Dominik presented an alternate take on Marilyn Monroe and her inner turmoil in the 2022 film Blonde.

In sometimes unsubtle ways, Spencer veers into metaphoric flights of fantasy, as evidenced by several dream and imagination sequences that are not to be taken literally. Examples include Diana breaking her pearls during dinner and chewing on one of them, which doesn’t actually happen; a shot in which we see a self-inflicted cut that quickly disappears; and the princess embracing in a desperate hug who we think is Maggie only to learn that it’s a different servant.

Often, the filmmakers use obvious on-the-nose visuals to make thematic statements. Cases in point: Diana’s obsession with the old scarecrow, itself a symbol of loneliness and abandonment; quickly alternating shots of her walking in Ann Boleyn’s clothing and her own attire; her dropping of the billiard ball in front of Charles; and her donning of an OPP hat (short for “other people’s property”).

The score by Radiohead’s Johhny Greenwood, with its unnerving jazzy movements and screechy strings, creates an effective aural landscape of brooding uncertainty and rising tension.

The movie ends somewhat surprisingly on an upbeat note, as we see Diana temporarily abscond with her children and enjoy a getaway moment punctuated by a cheesy but appropriate pop song and greasy fried chicken. Instead of continuing to hammer us with ominous foreshadowing of her inevitable death or doubling down on depressing moments, Spencer concludes with a reminder that the late princess deserves to be remembered as a more rounded human being who was decidedly different from the royalty she married into.

It’s hard to overlook the “woman held prisoner in a gilded cage” trope, which constitutes most of the thematic weight of the film. Diana lives a life graced with unparalleled wealth and privilege, but suffers an existential crisis of captivity, claustrophobia, and lack of agency—feeling unloved, lonely, and stifled. But Spencer is also a treatise on rebellion against authority, tradition, and expectation. The princess is constantly seeking escape from the rigid restrictions and conventions of the royal family, and she repeatedly breaks the rules surrounding schedules, boundaries, regal etiquette, and decorum.

The picture also suggests that, although Diana would appear to be powerless, her nonconformity and small acts of agency represent a concerning threat to the nobility’s established order. New Republic critic Jo Livingstone wrote: “By letting Diana misbehave in such picturesque fashion, Larraín makes the idea of “princessiness” a source of alarming power…Always dissatisfied, like the princess who was so sensitive to a pea under her mattresses. A beautiful outsider, like Cinderella. A subversive princess who threatens the crown through her blood claim on her sons, like Mary, Queen of Scots. A girl who finds her own strength from within, and bucks convention’s chains, like Elsa from Frozen. In a director’s statement distributed among the press notes, Larraín writes that Spencer is “an upside-down fairytale.”

Another key takeaway? The burdening weight of history and ritual. Diana loathes the suffocating atmosphere of the royal estate, its timeworn customs, and the dark past of its bygone inhabitants, especially Ann Boleyn—a haunting figure of foreshadowing who was also abandoned by her husband and, as will happen to Diana in a few years, was violently killed. Diana says to her boys: “Here, there is no future, and past and present are the same thing.”

Spencer also reinforces the importance of finding joy in life’s simple pleasures. The princess is happiest when simply spending time playing or bonding with her two young sons or indulging in recreations that would be frowned upon by her upper-crust in-laws, including confiding in a beloved servant, feeling nostalgic about her childhood, driving for pleasure without a security detail, singing along loudly to pop music, or enjoying fast food.

Similar works

• Diana
• The Queen
• Blonde
• Elizabeth
• The Favourite
• Repulsion
• Melancholia

Other films by Pablo Larrain

• No
• The Club
• Neruda
• Jackie
• Ema