The Charm of Silence

Rating: 10/10 (1 February 2012)

I don't know if "The Artist" is the best movie of 2011 but it is certainly the most charming, original and unexpected. To make in 2011, in the age of the breathtaking and jaw-dropping video possibilities, sound techniques and rapidly becoming the common place 3D, the authentically looking and feeling black and white SILENT movie just like they made them back in 1927, takes guts, talent, and deep and tender love and admiration for above mentioned movies. It takes the director/writer who not only had a dream of bringing the long gone era of cinema's adolescence on big screen but made his dream come true. It takes two basically unknown to the American audiences French actors who were splendid as the stars of the silent pictures in the silent picture (Jean Dujardin and Bérénice Bejo). They were helped by John Goodman, James Cromwell, Penelope Ann Miller, Missi Pyle, and Malcolm McDowell). Let's not forget one special four-legged artist (or there were three of them?) - the cutest, smartest, and most loyal dog that ever graced the screen.
I wanted to see the film since I first read about and I expected to like it but I did not expect it to be not only technically perfect and very funny but also melodramatic in the best, sadly almost lost now, meaning of the word. I expected more lighthearted comedy but it is more tragic comedy. It is easy to overdo the melodrama but it never happened with The Artist. It is beautiful, romantic, funny, and spectacular. Jean Dujardin and Bérénice Bejo are the best silent era couple on screen since well.. the end of the silent movies era.
As I am writing, "The Artist" is one of the major contenders for the Best Picture of the year Oscar having received already the awards from many prestigious organizations and made the countless critics lists. Ironically, in the case of "The Artist" to be noticed and heard meant to go completely silent. Is it not miraculous? Another observation - language of cinema is truly international: one of the sweetest love letters to the Hollywood's early years is created by a European director, French Michel Hazanavicius. His film speaks the native film language that involves the images, gestures, eyes, faces, and most importantly - the soul to perfection. It speaks clearly and loudly to movie lovers everywhere. "The Artist" is artistique, fantastique, magnifique, et très charmant.