“Diana” claims to be a biographical film based on the last two years of Princess Diana’s life since the screenplay is inspired by Kate Snell’s book “Diana: Her Last Love.”
Although the film intrigues with the promise of inviting audiences into the intimacy of Diana’s life, it falls flat in execution and leaves viewers wondering if they had just seen a teenage romantic drama.
Diana, played by Naomi Watts (“The Impossible”), is introduced in the midst of a separation from her then husband, the Prince of Wales. While Watts works with what she is given, her character seems uncomfortably forced. The natural charm and wit is not apparent and the screenplay is simply a montage of one romantic drama cliché line after another.
Nonetheless, the biggest disappointment of the film was its trivial treatment of Diana’s humanitarian work. “Diana” focuses solely on the romantic interests of the Princess of Wales after her divorce to Prince Charles while disregarding her struggle to maintain contact with her two sons. Segmented into the dates and exotic locations of Diana’s travels, there are also countless scenes where Diana is depicted moping on the couch back in her palace because she probably broke up with her boyfriend… again.
While the goal is to depict her loneliness, it becomes a topic that exhausts itself, as well as the audience. Towards the end of the film, viewers are left shamefully relieved that she has arrived in Paris in 1997.
That all being said, the wardrobe department for the film clearly did its research on Princess Diana’s fashion, but this film is still worthy of a D.
thescene@theeagleonline.com
