| Overall Grade: |
A |
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| Story: |
A |
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| Acting: |
A+ |
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| Direction: |
A |
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| Visuals: |
A+ |
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A serious, very serious tour de force!
by michael c (movies profile)
Sep 18, 2007
4
of
4 people found this review helpful
At first the choppy flashbacks and forwards seem to interrupt the tale. But by a third of the way through the movie, if one can take his or her mind off the absolutely academy award performance being put out my Mme. Cotillard, one realizes that Dahan is creating a masterpiece. From the very beginning in the dark and dreary early days, through the flash and splendor of money buying anything to the marvelous stage scenes and the very close final scenes, the direction is absolutely superb. European directors call a different tune than we do here, but the soft and guiding hand in what amounts to continual misery of what really was an awful life is simply a masterpiece. In all my years of following movies, I don't think (save maybe Vivien Leigh as Scarlett) I've ever seen an actress totally become, in breath and psyche and actions, more immmersed than Cotillard. How she squeezes her much taller frame into Piaf's 4/8" is almost a physical impossibility. Dahan fixes some of that. Her vivacity, her portrayal of such a tragic figure, her ability to nuance every situation perfectly well: this is a genuine tour de force. The supporting actors were superb. The scenery was marvelous - each scene created an "I am in this place right now" feeling for the viewer. But the music, and the singing, oh how it fit perfectly. The final scene with the perfect ending number was such that just about everyone I looked around at in the audience was wiping away a tear (or two). And not just at the incredible pathos of what had just been transacted in 2 and a half hours; but that such a wonderful, carefully constructed film could end with such a beautiful song sung by a woman who truly was Piaf reincarnate. Sure, some other parts of her life which were very important were missing - notably her part in the Resistance (she must have been something), but to touch briefly on the high spikes of her life and then examine more closely and in more detail the lows which most mortals would have succumbed to was poetry at work. The scene where Dietrich floats over to congratulate Piaf was so real that I assumed they did it before Dietrich died a thousand years ago! It was phenomenal! But the major icing on this wonderful cake was Cotillard. She was simply what acting is and can be all about, at its zenith. She was absolutely on target and portrayed it as if she were living in Piaf's body. The bent over, arthritic Piaf at the end is spectacular. If there is a reason for "foreign films" to receive major nominations, this film, this director, and by any stretch of the imagination, Cotillard deserve it. Cotillard is so far ahead of any performance in any film out there by an actress in a leading role that it is laughable. She is a meteor that lights the sky. Whatever you do, beg, borrow, and steal to see this movie wherever you have to go to do it! |
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