Not what I remembered

Rating: 7/10 (12 November 2017)

I saw this movie 13 years ago when it first came out, and I remember I really loved it.
Watching it tonight on TV, I didn't experience the enjoyment I remember feeling back in 2004.
Part of it may have to do with the fact that the music probably made a stronger effect on me in the theater, with a more powerful sound system. Listening to it tonight though just the TV speakers, I found that, while it is beautifully sung by the boys' choir, it is basically all affect with no real substance. Compare it with that of its old American counterpart, the Bing Crosby Christmas class *Going My Way.* Anyone can remember the songs that boys' choir sings, *When you wish on a star* or even the rather bland *Going my way*. None of the music in *Les Choristes* sticks in the memory like that.
The acting is certainly first-rate, starting with Gérard Jugnot, one of my favorite actors. He isn't given a lot to work with here, though. There is no real conflict in his character, nothing for the actor to work with. The school director is uniformly evil, the other characters, even the boys, without three dimensions.
It's all very pleasant, certainly, and I was never bored a moment. But it all seems rather obvious.
The end is strange, looked at with today's eyes. I couldn't help thinking that today Mathieu would be prosecuted for kidnapping, at the very least, and probably be held in suspicion of child molestation, which is sad and certainly not an issue in this movie. I'd have to go back and watch the beginning of the movie, the frame, again to see if there is any indication of whether Mathieu raised Pépinot.
An enjoyable movie, certainly. There just isn't much to it dramatically.