ics and film academies like to reward, partly due to the physical transfor- mations of the lead actors, but partly because critics tend to love portrayals of real-life personalities. The Ameri- can Academy of Motion Picture Arts has shown its affinity for these kinds of roles on numerous occasions over the past 20 years, awarding Jamie Foxx for Ray, Marion Cotillard for La Vie en Rose, Reese Witherspoon for Walk the Line, Helen Mirren for The Queen, Meryl Streep for The Iron Lady and Daniel Day-Lewis for Lin- coln. However, the first film about the life of the Princess of Wales – 2013’s Diana – with Naomi Watts as the titular character, was an excep- tion to that rule. Pressure from the royal family led to the film undergo- ing major script changes during the production phase, which resulted in a rather poor film that didn’t provide space for its protagonist to present Diana in the way she was remem- bered by the people. The film expe- rienced a complete fiasco at the box office and received extremely nega- tive reviews. Multiple adaptations of certain segments of Diana’s life have been made since she first shot to fame in 1982, primarily in the form of made-for-television films, while sev- eral documentaries have also been made, including the standout Un- lawful Killing, which was banned in the UK after the producers said it
would require a record 87 cuts be- fore it could be certified for release. The film Diana played it safe, with the biggest complaint being that it over- looked all the key moments of her fi- nal days, including the car crash that isn’t even shown in the film. Seven years on, Netflix decided to take a bolder step with the fourth season of the series The Crown by fi- nally addressing some of the prob- lems that Diana had faced – bulimia, misunderstanding within the family and her husband's adultery that ulti- mately resulted in divorce. Young ac-
NOVEMBER IN THE SIGN OF LADY DI
Diana's eyes in a new version of an old story In the film Spencer, director Pablo Larrain approaches the princess's life by focusing on her personal considerations and emotional dilemmas, rather than on the accumulating of information and the
classic biographical adaptation approach F or lovers of stories about the British royals, and par- ticularly the tragically de- parted Lady Di, the film Spencer won’t be the last work to deal with the breakdown of her marriage to Prince Charles. Next November will see Netflix air the pe- nultimate, fifth season of The Crown, in which Diana's character will be por- trayed by Australian actress Elizabeth Debicki, known to audiences for her roles in the films Widows and Tenet. Biographical films have histori- cally proven to be creations that crit-
36 | Film » Film
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