The Story of Diana

Shown over a two-day period (August 9 and August 10, 2017) on network TV, Diana Spencer is fairly portrayed as a fairy tale princess of our modern day who made the best of her situation. While she fought back the best she could against the infidelities of Charles during her marriage, her manipulative ways and her own infidelities tarnished her reputation. If nothing else, she was a goodwill ambassador for the British monarchy and was influential for the projects she was most passionate about. And, she was a wonderful mother. Perhaps, that is the saddest part of her story, that she never got the chance to be the wonderful grandmother that she could have been had she lived.

I am neither a monarchist nor a republican. Mostly I don't even think about the royals, let alone have any particular interest in them. Yet after watching this excellent documentary almost by mistake (I put it on randomly while I was eating), I found myself hooked.

As documentaries go, it was one of the best I've seen - on any subject. Artfully edited, with unusually insightful, relevant, and intelligent contributions from the various talking heads (apart from Wayne Sleep who was a bit cringe-inducing), and impressively researched archive and photographic material that told the story of Diana's life more cohesively and coherently than I've ever seen done before.

Excellent narrative storytelling that sucked me in, and transported me back to those days in a way that few other documentaries have achieved. I went into it thinking I pretty much knew the entire story, having lived through it at the time, but by the end I felt newly enlightened and amazed at how much I'd not been aware of, either at the time or in the years since.

After watching this, I was suddenly keen to watch more documentaries about Diana and the other royals, and it says a lot that after three hours it left me wanting more. (The other documentaries that I watched were not nearly as good). Overall, I'm inclined to give this one top marks. I only docked it a star because of Wayne Sleep's contributions.

Part 1 was wonderful and tearful but it wasn't the story of Diana. It was more of 'The Story of Princess Diana'. We know nothing about her childhood except certain moments spoken by her brother.

Part 2: It's all about the stalking, shameless media and how it drove the Princess crazy and sad. This is more of the story of a Disgusting British media and the criminals of British islands aka 'Australian' media - the real murderers of Diana.

In Short, it's Not The Story of Diana. It's the story of her murderers - the Brit media, the Australian media and the flirty Charles & his pros mistress B*. Camilla.

Worth a watch though..

When she passed, I was a teenager, didn't know much about her except that she was a very famous and rebellious wife of Prince Charles. This series/documentary really opened up so many aspects of her life and threw light on her struggles in her marriage, and especially with the press. It's truly shocking to think she had to be put through so much pressure from the Palace and being watched every second by the media, made it even harder to not fail or make mistakes.

Her advantage was that, she knew how to manipulate the media and she did, until it got her killed. Such a sad ending to something that could have been a great human legacy. And to think that in modern times, the Palace and the media haven't learned from their mistakes and were doing the same thing to Meghan Markle is astonishing.

It makes perfect sense, now, why she would want to leave Britain and the "royal" (I hate calling them that) family. I didn't use to side with her and her decision to disrupt that family but watching this documentary made me understand her so much better. Smart girl...

A very well made doco about such an iconic figure. I was too young at the time to appreciate who she was when she died in 1997 but the archive footage, good narration and modern twist of this doco gave such valuable insight into who she was and what life is. This is also before The Crown re-generated so much interest in her in recent times. She was a beautiful soul and I felt through Charles Spencer and other sources they did their best to capture her essence. She will always be the People's princess.