There’s been a lot of fuming and whinging about the “specialty” box office in the trade, as it’s not recovering as well as one might have thought given vaccines and a plentiful amount of new releases. Some places, like Deadline, are attributing that to a reluctance on the part of the “specialty” box office’s main audience — old folks — being cautious about returning to theaters, even post-vaccination, and it’s a fear we understand. Yet, if there’s one thing that might pull Grandma and Grandpa out of their recliners and away from binging another season of Property Brothers, it’s a movie about the Royals, and thankfully Pablo Lorrain has answered the call. Here’s your first look at his new film, Spencer, featuring Kristen Stewart as Princess Diana, which Neon released earlier on Thursday. It looks stately, melancholy, and stylish — which is to say that it rhymes well with Jackie, his previous film about the trials and tribulations of a famous, politically connected woman as she faces down a tragedy.
Peep it:
Here’s a synopsis:
“The marriage of Princess Diana and Prince Charles has long since grown cold. Though rumors 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 an imagining of what might have happened during those few fateful days.”
Spencer will hit theaters on November 5, which is a pretty funny date to be releasing a movie about the Royals. Speaking of which, do you think Steven Knight, the film’s writer, was bummed when he found out that the title Spencer Confidential was taken? We’re just hoping that whatever late-film twist is given to us here is as galaxy-brained as the one in Serenity.