'The Artist' and the afterlife of movies

 

JEAN DUJARDIN AND BERENICE BEJO STAR IN ‘THE ARTIST.’

JEAN DUJARDIN AND BERENICE BEJO STAR IN ‘THE ARTIST.’

Maybe you’ve noticed that stimulating movies often have a lingering critical afterlife. Media writers like to take an interesting, engaging film and dig deeper into the work—a phenomenon that I believe speaks to the cultural richness of the film experience.

The presence of an automaton in “Hugo” prompted a lengthy overview in The New York Times of this ancient mechanical invention that can do magical and human-like things. The article supplied details that helped explain the automaton’s narrative functions in Martin Scorsese’s film—how the machine was engineered to make drawings and even write poetry. When the lad Hugo gets his automaton working again, it produces a drawing that sets the final plotting arcs in motion and leads us to the work of film’s first fantasist, Georges Méliès. The article reports that Méliès himself owned automatons.

One of the many follow-up articles on “War Horse” centered on the important role of landscape imagery in the film, with its compositional framings reminiscent of one of Spielberg’s favorite directors, John Ford. I fully concurred. The classic Ford reference analogy would be “Stagecoach” (1939), one of my all-time favorite films, with its magnificent sky-dominated views of Monument Valley. I took a second look at “War Horse” and saw just how often the landscape compositions consisted of a sliver of horizon line with great expanses of sky commanding the remainder of the screen. The technique generated a certain visual mood that overlaid the action. You see this especially in the beautiful training scenes with the horse Joey, and those where he and his farm family struggle to survive on seemingly infertile land.

In another post-review commentary I caught a lively discussion on NPR radio about the accuracy (or lack thereof) of Marilyn Monroe’s characterization in “My Week with Marilyn,” a film about her affair with a novice on-set assistant while Monroe was in England in 1956 shooting “The Prince and the Showgirl.” The discussion included an interview with a British professor who’s written biographies of Monroe. Based on her knowledge of Monroe’s personality, she questioned the authenticity of the book, written by the film assistant Colin Clark decades after Monroe’s death, from which the script (by Adam Hodges) was adapted. Significant too, she said, was the fact that Clark himself was dead when the book was developed into a screenplay and that freed him from being held accountable for the claims in his story.

Hearing these comments somewhat dampened my initial response to a tender little film that with its supposed first-hand “secret” revelations seemed to make Hollywood’s favorite screen goddess into a more compassionate, caring human being. Oh well, maybe the film—like many another screen biopic before it—was born of imaginative fiction. But I’d still see it again just to re-experience Michelle Williams’ marvelous reincarnation of la Monroe.

Now herewith is a post-review piece of my own—on “The Artist.” It’s about how director-screenwriter Michel Hazanavicius appropriated elements of Hollywood’s “silent” filmmaking years to create an irresistible motion picture that is both nostalgic and original in its creation. (Spoiler alert: If you’ve yet to see the film, you might want to save the following discussion for later reading.)

Structurally, “The Artist” incorporates into the narrative flow a plethora of classic transitions from scene to scene. To name a few: the iris-in/iris-out; vertical, diagonal, and flip wipes. I haven’t seen the wipe device (an optical movement that wipes out one image as another appears) used so well in a contemporary film since Richard Attenborough’s “Chaplin” (1992). Passage-of-time montages condense major events central to the plot—an essential technique in a film like “The Artist,” which begins in 1927 and ends in 1932. In its recounting of the demise of silent film star George Valentin (Jean Dujardin), who rejects the talkies, and rising star Peppy Miller (Berenice Bejo), who embraces them, montages are key to the fast-paced flow of story line. Quick-cut shots of the stubbornly-proud Valentin filming a final silent adventure film form a montage that contrasts with Peppy Miller’s concurrent rise to stardom, encapsulated in a montage made up of movie magazine covers featuring the ascendant Peppy.

Hazanavicius weaves into “The Artist” homages to classic old films, filmmakers and actors. Much has been written about its inspiration from “Singin’ in the Rain” and “A Star is Born,” so I’ll move beyond those to other films. The dissolution of George’s marriage occurs succinctly in a breakfast table montage that owes much to Orson Welles and “Citizen Kane.” A scene in which Peppy enters George’s dressing room and performs a pas de deus with the silent star’s jacket on a coatrack echoes the famous (Ernst) “Lubitsch touch”—indirect, discreet sexual innuendo. Through masterful body movement, Jean Dujardin conjures up a memory of silent movie greats as opposite as the swashbuckling Douglas Fairbanks (legs wide apart, arms akimbo, disarming, triumphant smile) and Charlie Chaplin (subtle body and facial gestures imbued with an aura of comic pathos).

Fairbanks can be also recognized in Valentin’s adventure-film romps and in his post-screening “live” stage appearances. His Chaplinesque qualities appear in a lovely table scene where Valentin, emotionally down-and-out, dips his head into a bowl of pudding and has it licked from his nose by his sympathetic dog. In a backlot audition scene there’s a W.C. Fields look-alike; in another scene the dialogue recalls Greta Garbo when Peppy says: “Take me home; I want to be alone.”

As for production design, “The Artist” brilliantly masters the favored techniques of black-and-white cinematography for a luminous silver-screen effect. Actresses’ costumes are made of highly reflective materials, as are their shoes. Blonde women are especially suitable for the romanticizing, three-point light that falls upon and radiates off every character in “The Artist,” male and female. Male characters appear in white shirts, suits with white collars, and satin vests, all of which halate and glow in the sparkling mise-en-scene.What is most original about

JEAN DUJARDIN AND BERENICE BEJO STAR IN ‘THE ARTIST.’

BESIDES THE BEAUTIFUL SILVER-SCREEN STYLE AND THE ALLUSIONS TO CLASSIC MOVIES, ONE OF THE HIGHLIGHTS OF ‘THE ARTIST’ IS A DANCE NUMBER BETWEEN JEAN DUJARDIN AND BERENICE BEJO.

“The Artist” is its playful suggestion of a silent film that is anything but silent.

A musical score with varied stylizations by Ludovic Bource expresses emotions and feelings often better than words. Think of the accompanying underscoring that occurs when George discovers the whereabouts of his auctioned possessions. It’s the ultimate moment of George’s humiliation, and his emotions are rendered through loud musical crescendoes that become powerful expressions of agony. When realistic sound itself is used in the film, its effect is often expressionistic and psychological. The clinking of a drinking glass on George’s dressing room table initiates a sound effects sequence that ends with George watching a floating feather as it lands and explodes on a studio backlot. The sequence offers an objective correlative (in the form of a nightmare) for George’s obsessive, terrorizing fear of sound motion pictures.

I’m certain that film historians and devotees can come up with many other examples of “The Artist”‘s cinema allusions and its masterful aesthetic design. But I’ll end with one more: the dancing. I’m always blown away watching Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers’s dance sequences. The couple didn’t depend on retakes and an editor’s cutting skills. Their dance routines played out in real-time, single shot artistry. Jean Dujardin and Berenice Bejo, guided by the film-savvy Michel Hazanavicius, cap a brilliant film by putting on an Astaire-Rogers display that leaves filmgoers applauding. It’s one reason I’ve added “The Artist” to my list of film classics.

What did you think of “The Artist”? Were there allusions to old classics you found particularly interesting? And what about Prof. Beaver’s notion that the best films linger in our memories, and spark new ideas? Are there certain films that seized your imagination and led it to new discoveries? Share your thoughts in the comments section.

Comments

  1. Michael Firlik - 1974

    Good article with many good insights, but I must take issue with one comment: Fred and Ginger were not \”one take\” wonders. Yes, their dance sequences have many long takes, but I don\’t believe (going on memory here) that there are any one-take, complete dances in their films. The reason, of course, was their insistence on long rehearsals and disciplined film making. It doesn\’t diminish the beauty of those dances or the films. And it doesn\’t diminish the power of this article. Thanks, Prof. Beaver, for reminding us of some great movie moments, and giving us more to look for in some new movies.

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  2. paul Wiener - UM - 1966;1978

    Your column is interesting, pointed, observant, and spirited. Evidently you loved The Artist. You seem to take it for granted that your readers did or will as well. But no matter how well you can deconstruct it, historicize it, sentimentalize it or describe it, you can’t force me to like it. I remain appalled that it’s considered a shoo-in for an Oscar. I’ve seen many silent films, have written about films, programmed and introduced them, created a huge film library for a university, and am extremely film literate. Yet I felt The Artist was basically brilliant fluff, a cold-blooded, sentimental, totally predictable, pretentious work devoid of meaning – eye candy. Deliberately empty. If it wins the Oscar, and it probably will, it’ll be both a commentary on the essential emptiness of most American film (and its audience), and an insult to all the movies this year, nominated or not, that actually made an effort to speak to viewers, using real people, about something more than self-regard. The Artist will always be an excellent film for teaching purposes. Beyond that, it’ll be seen as a symbol of a year everyone would like to forget, in a decade tumbling into self-centering technology, celebrity-worship, inescapable marketing and packaged information. It left me cold, with nothing to dwell on, a brilliant, inhuman technical feat, no doubt, Hollywood celebrating itself, but nothing else. It’s a sad commentary on 2011. Personally, I found Margin Call to be by far the best film made last year. It figures that it’s been almost ignored.

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  3. Alec Hughes - 1990

    I just saw “The Artist,” and I walked away in a state of awe. The experience of watching a modern “silent” movie was surreal for me. I felt bewildered and uncomfortable at times, like a mild anxiety dream. However, I increasingly became aware that I was witnessing something very special and unique at least and perhaps genius and legendary at best. I did marvel at the musical score and composition to the film. As prof. Beaver pointed out, “The Artist” was anything but silent. I recently attended a MoMA presentation of famous short films at the High Museum in Atlanta. I had the pleasure of watching two classic silent films: “The Great Train Robbery” and “The Tourists.” We were treated with a professional piano player providing musical accompaniment to the films. What an awesome precursory experience this was in preparation to seeing “The Artist,” which I had not even heard about prior to prof. Beaver’s article. I can already feel this film “brewing” inside me, and I’m sure that the more I learn about the history of movie-making in general and the silent film era specifically, the more revelations I will experience. Jean DuJardin (George Valentin) blew me away both with his poignant silent-acting precision as well as his bombastic “mugging.” The allusions to Chaplin and Fairbanks were wonderful! My jury is still out on the storyline. Part of me feels it was simple and sappy. Part of me has a hard time with suspending my disbelief at the devastating role of pride in the lead character’s (George Valentin) demise. I’m not sure what to make of the dog either – cute, trite, clever? In the end, I’m a sucker for a good love story and a happy ending. I thought the ending was awesome in terms of our protagonist, George Valentin, discovering his possessions in Peppy Miller’s home followed by his suicidal retreat to his burnt down home. I felt a lot of film-noire in these sequences. I’m sure the score was equally as potent in casting this dark mood. The “bang” ending was a little fluffy and corny as well as the “roll-over and play- dead- act” by the dog, but it may have been effective at bringing us back home to the goofy, happy-go-lucky nature in which the film began. And the dance scene denouement was truly exhilarating and inspirational. I really enjoyed “The Artist,” and overall, I deem it to be very good, with potential to grow into the status of great, and perhaps, classic.

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  4. Sharon Domenech

    This comment is directed at Paul Wiener. Apparently you don’t like people talking about the movies they love, especially when they speak of them as eloquently as Prof. Beaver does. Nowhere in this article is he forcing anyone to like or love “The Artist”. Your obvious hatred of the film has blinded your judgment of the article. I think “The Artist” is underrated for all the hype it’s gotten, and this is the best article I’ve seen on it. It actually takes the film seriously, which is a relief from all the noise about the Oscars. I enjoyed the movie enough not to have any hard feelings toward the Academy for voting it Best Picture. I just wish they would divide the Best Picture, directing and acting awards into separate categories for comedy and drama so that the better movies in those categories can be recognized instead of unfairly competing against each other for the same award.

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  5. susinpatrik susinpatrik - 1999

    Keep posting the good work.Some really helpful information in there. Nice to see your site. Thanks!

    Reply

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