A right royal Christmas
Royalty - and all it represents - is a bizarre concept. It's fascinating and appalling, timeless and outdated, endlessly entertaining and supremely dull. As evidenced by the sagas involving the duchess/actor Meghan Markle and her deceased, would-have-been mother-in-law Diana, Princess of Wales, it's also a world with its fair share of toxic characters and storylines.
Such is the subject of Chilean director Pablo Larran's theatrical, surreal, genre-blending Spencer, a fictionalized account of the weekend at the royal family's Sandringham estate when Diana (Kristen Stewart) decided to seek a divorce from Prince Charles (Jack Farthing), complete with binging, purging, hallucinations and an ice-cold husband. Your family dinner can't possibly be worse than Christmas with the British monarchy.
As he did with Jackie (2016) - which chronicled Jackie Kennedy's life in the wake of JFK's murder in 1963 - Larran inserts an impeccably dressed, tragic woman into one well-appointed room after another as a way to examine her state of mind. The difference with Spencer is that the central character's defining incident hasn't happened yet.
Spencer is manifestly difficult to watch: it's slow and Stewart's performance - despite considerable awards buzz - is too mannered to have real impact. That said, Larran's creative mix of drama, tragic romance and gothic horror paints a vivid picture of what many believe Diana was subjected to as a member of The Firm. Her isolated existence unfolds amid grand, ornate salons and rolling hunting grounds, while her conversations are either coded power plays or paranoid asides to herself. It's a biopic unlike most, and Larran and writer Steven Knight (Peaky Blinders) must be applauded for their creativity, and indeed their audacity. Spencer is a love-it or hate-it affair; there is no in-between.
Conversely, English director Matthew Vaughn's The King's Man has nothing to do with the House of Windsor (which gets a passing nod); and aside from an endlessly absorbing, historical period setting, the film is pure fantasy. But as a story about the first "private intelligence agency" founded after World War I, it's a prime example of a body or object given legitimacy by virtue of its vaguely royal moniker, as well as the accompanying trappings of sophistication and gentility.
The budding franchise's third outing (and first spin-off) is the requisite origin story. Following distinguished service during the Boer War in South Africa, in which his wife was collateral damage, Orlando Oxford (Ralph Fiennes) retreats to his estate in England, keeping to the sidelines until Archduke Franz Ferdinand's assassination plants the seeds of war. Orlando is keeping his son Conrad (Harris Dickinson) on the sidelines too, but a shady (and obvious) Scottish puppet master playing Europe like his own personal chessboard pulls Orlando back into active duty, along with his aides, Shola (Djimon Hounsou) and Polly (Gemma Arterton).
Like Spencer, The King's Man drags somewhat; a dramatic, 1917-esque stretch mid-film, meanwhile, strips it of the comedy status associated with the mainline Kingsman films - which is just as well, given Vaughn's penchant for juvenile humor. But it's an entertaining enough diversion for those who avoid New Year's Eve at all costs. Fiennes proves to be an engaging action hero; Tom Hollander is clearly having fun playing George V, Tsar Nicholas and Kaiser Wilhelm; and Rhys Ifans dives into Rasputin with gusto. Try not to sing Boney M on the way home.
