Review: Diana

Detailing the supposed love affair between Princess Diana (Naomi Watts) and Pakistani-born heart surgeon Hasnat Khan (Naveen Andrews), during the last two years of Diana’s life where she had been separated from Prince Charles.

 

What should’ve been an absolute cracker is only pretty good at best, I’m afraid. Director Oliver Hirschbiegel (the rather extraordinary “Downfall”, about the last days of Adolf Hitler) and writer Stephen Jeffreys (“The Libertine”), working from the book by Kate Snell have taken a fascinating subject in the final years of Princess Diana’s life…and chosen to focus on the least interesting aspects. They eschew the Diana and Dodi love affair for the rumour that she only cavorted with Dodi al Fayed because her true love, heart surgeon Hasnat Khan couldn’t hack it in the public eye and left her completely heartbroken. Apparently Diana arranged for the paparazzi to take happy snaps of her and Dodi to make Hasnat jealous. I’m not going to suggest that there’s zero truth to all of this, but far less people know about this Hasnat fella than Dodi, and the stronger image of Di was that she shied away from publicity, not courted it. So even though there may be aspects of both of those things that are true, I just didn’t entirely buy this Diana-Hasnat relationship as being her true love. I mean, it’s not like any of us really know the truth, is it? So it comes down to what you believe, and I ultimately didn’t buy this situation (I also didn’t believe in the character of Diana’s confidante, played by Geraldine James. It felt invented for cinematic purposes). Those more familiar with this Hasnat fella might buy into it a bit more, but I had honestly never heard of him, and the central romance as I said didn’t work for me. The wigs, the slightly stalker-ish behaviour exhibited by Diana, just didn’t ring true, even if it really did happen. You have to make me believe it.

 

What doesn’t help is that the film presents Hasnat as the most boring human being on the planet. I get that maybe Diana was looking for a nice, normal guy, but Hasnat is portrayed as so thanklessly dull that I simply didn’t care about their relationship. I also didn’t believe for a second that these two belonged together. It’s blatantly obvious that Hasnat wasn’t cut out for being suitor to a celebrity. It’s not that they couldn’t make it work, it’s that they shouldn’t have even tried. She’s too public (albeit shy), he’s too private, so why am I following the story of two people who should never have gotten together to begin with? I just don’t get why we’re seeing this and not the Di & Dodi story. That’s where the real interest lies.

 

The amazing thing is that the film is still somewhat interesting and entertaining in spite of all this. In fact, despite lead actress Naomi Watts herself calling the film ‘a sinking ship’, it’s a lot better than I had been led to believe. Perhaps there’s an inherent fascination with Diana as a character, and indeed the film works well as a character study, even if it fails as a great romance. The weirdest thing? The section of the film in which the Diana/Hasnat relationship is the focal point is still the most interesting section of the film in spite of itself. The relationship may be a fizzer, but it’s in this first two thirds that you really get to know Diana as a character. As a study in the loneliness of Royal (or ex-Royal) life, the film is pretty well spot-on. The latter stages dealing with the tabloids and the theory that she hooked up with Dodi just to make Hasnat jealous are far less interesting. ‘The People’s Princess’ may have been somewhat manufactured, but our connection to Di was somewhat real. We thought could sense how unhappy she was, how uncomfortable she was at times. She wasn’t really one of us (Like it or not, Fergie has always been more of a commoner than Diana), but we still sympathised with her. The romance might not work for me, but it’s obvious that Jeffreys (or perhaps Snell) has really gotten into who she was and what it must’ve been like for her, pure speculation or not. This is a portrait of a deeply unhappy, restless woman, and I believed it (I also fully believed that one of Diana’s favourite TV shows was “Coronation Street”. Dunno why, I just do). The string of lovers Di apparently had might sound scandalous, and indeed became tabloid fodder, but no matter how many lovers she might’ve had, it’s still believable and obvious that she was incredibly lonely at certain times in her life. Relationships would not have been easy to maintain. I actually feel somewhat ashamed that I have more sympathy for her now than I did as a teenager when she was still alive.

 

The film also absolutely nails Di’s occasionally off-script behaviour. I remember that being true of her at the time. She didn’t always act as a Royal or ex-Royal was supposed to. She was a human being, for starters. And even when she courted the media, I believe it was mostly for the purpose of highlighting her social causes, though this film also posits that she used the paparazzi for ulterior motives as well (I doubt that she courted publicity in the way celebutants do today, though). Whatever her flaws, she was an undoubtedly compassionate woman. Fergie may have been a commoner, but Diana had the common touch (I don’t think either lady was really cut out to be royalty, to be honest). As a presentation of Diana’s mindset around this unhappy time in her life, the film works. I wish the film showed more of her as a mum, but obviously that was never gonna happen. Meanwhile, the film doesn’t dwell on the notion that Diana was having thoughts about her own mortality around the time of her death, but the idea is there nonetheless in and around the edges.

 

Naomi Watts may not be a fan of the film, but in my opinion she gives an excellent performance in it that she probably should’ve been Oscar-nominated for. Like Michelle Williams in “My Week With Marilyn”, she looks both like the person and herself, which is to say that she looks enough like Diana already that minimal hair and makeup was likely needed. She gets the somewhat shy posture and demeanour of Diana down pat. At times the act is uncanny, especially in one TV interview scene that nearly had me doing a double-take. She’s a bloody good actress in the right part, and this one fits her like a glove. Watts has a warmth about her here that Diana herself seemed to have, and she gets the soft-spoken quality to her voice, too. If there’s a reason to see this film, Watts is 99% the reason to see this film. Naveen Andrews is perfectly fine in support, it’s just unfortunate that he’s playing the most singularly uninteresting love interest in a motion picture in the year 2013.

 

If you can get past the rather unconvincing romantic aspect to this biopic, you’ll find an undeniably interesting and convincing portrait of an extremely lonely and restless woman who although flawed, was an undeniably good person who left us far too soon. Watts is terrific, the film less so, but certainly underrated.

 

Rating: B-