Based
on a rave review received privately from a fellow MoPo member, we rushed out to
see "The
Artist." Impressions (rather
than an essay):
*
Magnificent. A "cute" story
told with dazzling flair in around 90 minutes..
*
Lives up to and sometimes exceeds all of its critical hype.
*
Best directed film of 2011. (Michel Hazanavicius).
*
You would NOT know this was a French film unless you were told FIRST.
*
The two French leads, Jean Dujardin and Berenice Bejo (the director's true life
wife), deserve their nominations.
* Other
actors are English or American, e.g., James Cromwell, Penelope Ann Miller, John
Goodman, Malcolm McDowell, Missi Pyle.
* Dazzling 21st century tools
replicate old film clichés, e.g., multiple exposures, dissolves, twirling
newspapers, etc.;
* Aspect ratio is the original
square frame used during the silent era.
* Silent film ironically has the best adapted score of the year, heard in
BOOMING monaural SOUND.
*
Deceptively simple story is actually charmingly intricate; a superb
Oscar-nominated screenplay.
*
The Jack Russell Terrier steals every scene.
*
The film was shot entirely in Los Angeles.
*
Some sequences are NOT ENTIRELY silent.
*
"Put me over the top" (1 of 2): Bernard Herrmann's orchestral love theme from
Hitchcock's "Vertigo" heard in its ENTIRETY.
*
"Put me over the top" (2 of 2): An Astaire-Rogers-style tap dance scene with
full
rich sound.
* Superior pacing and emotion over "Hugo."
*
Writer-director Hazanavicius is only 44.* Superb ending.
*
If it doesn't win Best Picture, I'll be very disappointed.
*
Not sure if people under 30 will like it but I don't care. (They won't get the
"Vertigo" music either).
-d.
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