Wilder and Grander
I’ve been saying all along that I’d be a much more passionate Artist fan if it looked, moved and emoted like a real silent film, instead of offering a pastiche of one.
“The Artist, a likable spoof, [is] bland, sexless, and too simple,” New Yorker critic David Denby wrote a few days ago. “For all its genuine charm, it left me restless and dissatisfied, dreaming of those wilder and grander movies [of the silent era].
“Jean Dujardin, with a pencil mustache, looks a little like John Gilbert, but his cavorting star is meant to be a [Douglas] Fairbanks equivalent. A chesty, full-bodied man who moves quickly, Dujardin is good at buoyant peacocking, as when he shows off to an appreciative audience at the premiere of one of Valentin’s films. But most of what Dujardin does is obvious and broad. He smiles fatuously; he grimaces when things go wrong.
“The Artist is an amiably accomplished stunt that pats silent film on the head and then escorts it back into the archive. The silent movies we see in The Artist all look like trivial, japish romps. Certainly, there’s no art form on display whose disappearance anyone would mourn. Hazanavicius’s jokes are playful but minor, even a little fussy, and after a while I began to think that the knowing style congratulates the audience on getting the gags rather than giving it any kind of powerful experience. ”
“The Artist lacks the extraordinary atmosphere of the silent cinema, the long, sinuous tracking shots, the intimacy with shadow and darkness. Well, you say, so what? The movie is just a high-spirited spoof. Yes, but why set one’s ambitions so low? The movie’s winningness feels paper-thin, and, as Peter Rainer pointed out in the Christian Science Monitor, The Artist, with its bright, glossy appearance, looks more like a nineteen-forties Hollywood production than like a silent movie.”
Yeah almost every major group has given Dujardin Best Actor because they felt bullied, and not because there’s any real depth to his performance.
Please just talk a long walk tonight instead of watching the Oscars. Come back fresh tomorrow. You and the site will be better for it.
I agree with these sentiments completely. It was an amiable lark. Not only did it fail to aim for the wilder emotions of classic silent dramas, it lacked the atmosphere of a classic silent comedies.
I can see why a critic or journalist trudging through a film festival packed with heavy, earnest, poorly executed indie films would find The Artist a welcome splash of soda water. But catching it in the theater in January, as I did, with the Oscar momentum and hosannas, I was left to shrug, and let my mind wander.
I was left thinking I’d much rather catch an old Buster Keaton movie. More surprises, less mugging.
What an awful score to that clip! Where’s Carl Davis?
I’m watching the NBA all star game tonight, read a book and get results tomorrow morning, staying off the internet this evening. Let me know how many hours the show is and of course I will hear about it on the morning shows, because it will be story number one.
Yup. All Star Game for me too
Jeff, give it a rest. It will be over tomorrow. I echo #1 above.
Here’s why I liked the Artist, whether it’s a great movie is for another discussion.
For the first time in a long time in a theatre I sat with people and everything was silent. It was a new experience, and it took me back to the silent movie era. Just like it used to be, liked I read about. No noise, totally silent – who would have thought? And it says a lot about technology — in case you missed that point — and the every man. Technology is taking over and putting people out of work. Simple as that.
This is all true, go buy the stunning blu-ray of Wings if you want to know what silent cinema is capable of.
Still, it’s about as sweet and funny as, say, The Patsy or Show People. Nothing wrong with that.
The real irony will only become apparent in 10 or 20 years when people talk about how the one visual masterpiece capable of silent movie sweep didn’t win and the minor charmer did, because people couldn’t handle the dinosaurs in it.
Politicking on the very same day? Isn’t that against the law?
Checking out Crystal’s opening…then off to bed with the remaining Sunday papers. Monday morning rehashes will fill in the blanks.
Good call on THE PATSY and SHOW PEOPLE.
Didn’t like it. Not my style maybe…?