Movie posters are, for the most part, consistently dreadful and look startlingly alike. So when something genuinely innovative comes along, well, hello, let’s celebrate that.
Let’s all turn our gaze upon the first poster for Pablo Larraín’s upcoming Spencer, starring Kristen Stewart as Princess Diana, which was unveiled on Wednesday to inject a heavy dose of high drama into your week.
While we’ve already seen convincing glimpses of Kristen as the People’s Princess, the poster gives us a taste of Larraín’s vision for the film, which drops down on a “critical weekend” in her life when she ultimately decides her marriage to Prince Charles is beyond repair.
In the poster, Kristen’s Diana is rendered in exquisite detail as if she were the subject of some 17th-century Dutch masterwork. Collapsing on herself, she conceals her face in her hands, which rest upon a highly ornate ball gown that envelops the entire bottom half of the poster.
“The marriage of Princess Diana and Prince Charles has long since grown cold,” the film’s description reads. “Though rumours of affairs and a divorce abound, peace is ordained for the Christmas festivities at the Queen’s Sandringham Estate. There’s eating and drinking, shooting and hunting. Diana knows the game. But this year, things will be profoundly different.”
Spencer is, of course, the latest in a long line of projects to explore the life and death of the Princess of Wales.
In the forthcoming seasons of Netflix’s The Crown, Elizabeth Debicki is taking the reins from Emma Corrin, who scored an Emmy nomination for her take on Diana.
But Kristen is already earning early buzz for her portrayal of the princess ahead of the film’s November release date. Footage of the star reportedly wowed attendees at CinemaCon on Wednesday, with Entertainment Weekly reporting that the actor handily captures the royal’s accent and various affectations.
Kristen previously admitted that capturing Diana’s particular way of speaking was “intimidating as hell” given just how familiar we are with her as a figure.
“The accent is intimidating as all hell because people know that voice, and it’s so, so distinct and particular,” she told InStyle magazine in October. “I’m working on it now and already have my dialect coach. In terms of research, I’ve gotten through two and a half biographies, and I’m finishing all the material before I actually go make the movie.”
“It’s one of the saddest stories to exist ever, and I don’t want to just play Diana — I want to know her implicitly,” she continued. “I haven’t been this excited about playing a part, by the way, in so long.”