What went wrong? What a disaster. How on Earth could this have happened? It’s probably in poor taste to liken the critical and commercial calamity that is the film Diana to the fatal August 1997 crash that caused her death. But the fact remains that while no one has died a result of this film, this remains a total disaster in almost every other respect.
The film focuses on the last two years of Diana’s life, during which she spent much of her time in a relationship with the surgeon Hasnat Khan (Naveen Andrews). This in itself seems a rather narrow and unexciting period of Diana’s life to focus on. She is, after all, best known for marrying Prince Charles and siring two sons (one of whom will, presumably at some point this century, become King William V) before their marriage broke down. Naomi Watts is easily a versatile enough actress to play Diana from her late teen years onwards and the ground was already paved by Stephen Frears’ 2006 film The Queen. Why waste an opportunity to do a Diana biopic in full?
However, as very quickly becomes clear, the movie’s narrow focus is the least of its problems. Diana turns out to be incredibly stilted with almost every scene agonisingly dull and awkward, hampered by unconvincing and awkward dialogue much of which, to quote the onscreen People’s Princess herself, is “22 carat bollocks.
“Love is a garden says Diana’s lover Khan at one point, “If you can’t smell the garden, don’t come into the garden of love. Now, in fairness, he is quoting from a medieval text here and I’m guessing the real Khan did come out with this sort of thing occasionally (and perhaps still does).The problem is that it sounds ridiculous on screen. Much of Diana’s dialogue is awful too. “Yes, I’ve been a mad bitch, yes, I’ve been a stalker, yes, I do a crap Liverpool accent, she reveals of her attempts to pursue Khan. She also comes across as something of a drip, talking to herself in the mirror and droning on obsessively about the dreams she has, in which she is falling. Dreams which are, in fact, common to almost everyone, not just doomed princesses. At another moment she boasts how everyone in the UK has a mobile phone (very much not the case when she is supposed to be speaking in 1995) and later appears not to know what the Labour Party is.
Ultimately, Diana died in an accident and any attempt to find an explanation for her demise in her last two years, which doesn’t at least ask, “Why didn’t she put her seatbelt on? is to some extent doomed to failure.
Actress Naomi Watts looks totally shell shocked on the accompanying interview. She has undoubtedly suffered as a result of the film, which was mauled by everyone except the notoriously Diana-obsessed Daily Express in the UK and which didn’t even get a cinema release in the US. But, in fairness she tries her best. However, this remains a terrible comedown for both her and Hirscbiegel, director of the brilliant Downfall.
Overall Verdict: The film isn’t too soon. It’s just too awful.
Special Features:
Cast Interviews With Actors Naomi Watts, Naveen Andrews, Douglas Hodge. Charles Edwards
Reviewer: Chris Hallam