Review of Diana (2013) by Nelson N — 05 Oct 2013

For the first time in my life, I chose to see a film because the critics were so harsh in their judgement. In reaching a judgement, the opinion of my 19 and 15 year old daughters is highly relevant - they are too young to remember the actual events on which this film is based and know almost nothing of the final days that led to the tragedy of Diana's death. If I tell you my older daughter asked 'Who's Dodi Fayed?', you get the picture.

The fact that they could not understand why the critics have such a low opinion of the film speaks volumes about the quality of the film itself. They could see nothing in the film that was 'disrespectful' (as some critics have claimed). They - like me - saw a story of a young woman thrust into the kind of fame that nobody could deal with, and which ultimately led her into loneliness and put her in danger.

The script was not great, but I've seen worse scripts (and films) get more than 50% on this site. My daughters - like me - thought the cinematography was superb. Naomi Watts does herself credit in the lead role (attested to by the many clips my daughters picked out on YouTube to see 'if it really happened'). I found the direction a bit more like a 'made for TV afternoon film' than Hollywood's finest - competent, but uninspiring.

However, it is worth remembering the story that is being told here. Diana was not a superhero or action woman, she was a somewhat shy, but increasingly astute woman who used her fame to bring about positive social change. The film captures the leisurely nature of her life in between episodes where she is thrust into the public eye. It deals well with the subterfuge to which she resorts to have even the slightest chance of feeling normal. The doctor who became her lover late in her life tragically could not share her world, but - as my oldest daughter stated - 'the romance was more believable than in the Star Wars prequels'. It was possible to taste the genuine sadness that both Diana and Hasnat Khan experienced that they could not find a way to happiness.

On other levels, the film is more careful than brave. There is no criticism of the royal family beyond one comment that Diana was 'unlucky' with her family situation, and also that she wishes 'the palace' would let her see her children more. Sensibly, the film did not enter into any debate about how or why Diana died - simply fading to black after leaving the lift at the Ritz. It avoided speculating about anything remotely controversial.

Interestingly, a film that took such care to reproduce details of her TV interviews and press coverage was a bit sloppy when it came to the romance with Dodi Fayed (who comes across in the film as an incidental character, used only to make Hasnat Khan jealous). My wife noticed that real video footage from the Ritz's Paris shows Dodi with his arm around Diana in the lift shortly before their tragic departure, but this detail is omitted from the film. Also, I personally read inquest transcripts in which private letters and intimate gifts (e.g. her own father's cufflinks) were exchanged with Dodi. In this film, she is portrayed and totally obsessed with Hasnat Khan right up to the moment of her death. Dodi barely speaks, and is portrayed as the person who paid for her to have a holiday, and to join him on her yacht for no other reason than for her to get the press coverage she wanted to pressure Hasnat Kahn into giving her a call after they had broken up.

For me, this film shed new light on a dimension of Diana's life about which I knew too little. For that, the film makers deserve some credit. Certainly, I will go back to inquest transcripts someday to see whether Dr Khan featured in the evidence more than was portrayed in the press at the time. This will help to gauge the extent to which the director is editorialising.

Like my daughters, I can't see anything offensive in this film, but can - perhaps - understand why so many people object to it. Is it simply that many people did not know of this love affair and it came as a shock? Is it, perhaps, that this film makes clearer that any before it that Diana was close to marrying a Muslim (even to the point of visiting her potential husband's family and planning to move away from the UK with him)? Or it is that neither press nor public want their fantasy 'princess of hearts' to be anything less than perfect?

However it affects others, this film made me - and my daughters - more sympathetic to Diana. It should - in the long term - add to her legacy. She comes across as a woman coping relatively well with a series of disappointments in her private life, but who found - albeit briefly - at least one person who genuinely loved her, and who she loved. There is nothing disrespectful in making a film about that.