Diana Direction: Actors: Rating:

Aspectacularly misjudged biopic about the late Princess of Wales, Diana spans the tumultuous last two years of her life, leading up to the tragic car crash in which she died. Adapted from the contentious 2000 book by Kate Snell, the atrocious script is infinitely quotable, dropping as it does clunker after clunker.

Her troubled, headline-making marriage to Prince Charles is barely alluded to, while her two young sons are glimpsed only once, in long shot.

Instead, the focus is on Di’s post-royalty relationship with a British-pakistani heart surgeon (Andrews). After the good doctor rules out marriage, the heart-broken Diana has a fling with Egyptian tycoon Dodi Fayed (Cas Anwar). Hoping to make the surgeon jealous, she even manipulates the paparazzi into publishing photographs of Fayed and her together.

The film becomes increasingly preposterous the more it tries to adhere to historical events. Diversions depicting Diana’s globetrotting humanitarian work — the landmines photo-op in Angola, the Aids-related fundraising in Sydney — border on camp.

The direction by Oliver Hirshbiegel (Downfall) is so scattershot and devoid of snap that viewing his hagiographic treatment is more of a chore than a pleasure.

In the role originally slated for Jessica Chastain, the normally bankable Naomi Watts is lacklustre. As her conflicted paramour, Naveen Andrews fits the bill adequately.

A sudsy look back at Britain’s unhappy People’s Princess, Diana is a royal mess.