Beautiful film and a great experience

Rating: 8/10 (2 February 2012)

Knowing that The Artist was a silent film and having grown up, as we all have, with nothing but those crazy, futuristic talkies, I didn't really know what to expect. The Artist, beginning in 1927 and finishing in 1932, tells the story of George Valentin (Jean Dujardin) an extremely successful silent film actor whose career begins to deteriorate rapidly with the increasing popularity of talking films. Meanwhile, Peppy Miller (Berenice Bejo) is just beginning her career and after she is shown how to 'stand out from the crowd' by Valentin, her career booms. There is therefore a strange link between the pair throughout the film, and whilst Peppy is going up, George is going down - this is effectively the situation that the film spawns from.
I thought the acting in this film was most impressive. I loved the way Dujardin smiled and I thought he really looked the part throughout, I can't imagine anyone else playing that role and I think that's the sign of a good performance. Bejo was also very good, probably not as good as Dujardin but then I don't think she had the same opportunity to perform as he did. What made their performances, for me, so impressive was the fact that they managed to entertain without words. That may sound very silly and obvious, but when you watch Chaplin in a talkie he's so fantastic at both expressing himself with words and as a mute. Whilst Chaplin had never done a talkie before The Great Dictator, I'm guessing no one in this film had done a silent film before and although perhaps one transition is easier than the other, there's no doubting that to make any sort of transition, and to do it so well, is very tricky.
From the directors point of view, I thought that the same was true. Hazanavicious tells a very good story. I thought that there were a couple of really good shots and clever interplay between live action and the little cuts to words being displayed. Also impressive were the shots of films in making and the creation of films in making (maybe I'm being an idiot and they're based on real films? I don't know) that looked very believable. Whether or not he intended to, Hazanavicious creates a really great tribute to film and cinema, as well as telling a really beautiful, classic feeling story. Without having seen it, it is very hard to explain the feeling you get after having seen it, but though I wouldn't say it was my favourite, nor the best film I've ever seen, it was a cinematic experience really quite unlike I had experienced before and that makes it quite special.
Music is also, obviously, a very important part in a silent film. Going back to The Great Dictator, probably one of my favourite scenes of all time, is the one in which Brahm's 5th Hungarian Dance plays because it demonstrates such character and such an entertainer. Whilst I don't think anyone even nearly matches Chaplin in this, I was still really entertained. The music in The Artist is flawless, it is so good, I would imagine music in films is something that seems far easier than it is. It always captured the mood perfectly and without it being so good the film would fail to convey to you the emotion that it does.
I have a couple of tiny trifles with this film. Firstly, there were a couple (and I do mean a couple) of times when the speech almost dragged on, it didn't work very well in silent and we were left with conversation through caption / text (whatever they're called) screens that felt a bit rigid and unpolished, but again I want to reiterate that this only happened twice. Second I think maybe the script or just collectively the film isn't quite there. Right now The Artist has a rating of 8.4 but I don't think it's worthy of being considered one of THE BEST films EVER, because it's just not. Don't get me wrong, I loved the film and really enjoyed it and appreciate that it's almost revolutionary never seen before, but it just lacks something that might have made it worthy, to be called one of the greats.
Overall The Artist is an absolute must see. It's a very intelligent film (which is probably why a lot of people from Liverpool walked out on realising that was silent) and a very enthralling / enjoyable film. Whilst, as I have said already, I don't think it is one of the greats, it is unlike anything you will have seen before and that is what makes it stand out from the crowd so much. Go and see it!