Review: The Artist

Back in May of 2011, for reasons that are too silly to go into here, I found myself watching BBC News 24 at 4am in the morning. They were running a feature on the Cannes Film Festival and focussed on a film that was generating quite the buzz, a film adored and praised by critics and public alike. A film from a little known French director whose surname I’m still unsure how to pronounce, that was set in the golden age of Hollywood, (Or HollywoodLand as it was then known) complemented throughout by an orchestral score, with authentic silent movie intertitles and devoid of dialogue. In other words a classic silent film, in other other words The Artist. 

Ever since then I have been giddy with excitement to see The Artist and yesterday I was finally able to and happily I was entirely justified in my excitement.  For fans of silent cinema like myself The Artist was never going to be a tough sell. Its promise of a 4:3 aspect ratio, black and white cinematography, classic old cars and “mugging to camera” is enough to get most chomping at the bit. The Artist celebrates a more simplistic way of both film making and storytelling; contemporary cinema can be very busy boasting layer upon layer of noise, explosions and nonsense. The Artist strips all that back and takes us back to a more simplistic style of film making and in this bustling film environment The Artist has almost a cleansing effect offering not only a flawless recreation of late 20’s Hollywood but also a genuinely glorious, heartfelt piece of joyous cinematic perfection. 


Hollywood circa 1927 is beautifully recreated with every single detail, lovingly and painstakingly presented to such an extent that apart from a few recognisable actors The Artist could seriously be sold as a restoration of a lost silent classic. So immediate is this effect that it feels like the kind of film you’ve heard so much about but are yet to watch. The story it tells is simple enough a well known silent star George Valentin gives a break to a young stalwart dancer called Peppy Miller whose star rises and rises as George’s sadly wanes. Along with the classic story and splendid cinematography the strength of The Artist lies in the sublime performances of the actors, seamlessly channelling all the greats of the silent age and never once slipping into parody, always paying respectful homage to a much missed way of performing.  John Goodman is a perfect fit for silent cinema; his over the top facial gymnastics portray his every changing emotion with such ease and charm. Same goes tenfold for Jean Dujardin, who gives an absolutely stellar performance sitting somewhere between Rudolph Valentino and Buster Keaton he effortlessly glides and flits throughout the story showing more progression, versatility and talent than most actors can with the aid of reams of dialogue. But the real star of the film is George’s trusty canine companion who ,if they did Oscars for animals, would be a shoe-in. The erstwhile pooch is a pleasure to watch and provokes more “awws” in a film than I have heard in quite some time. All of this makes The Artist a beautiful and impeccable homage to the glory days of HollywoodLand. 

Echoes of Sunset Boulevard, Singin’ in the Rain, All About Eve and A Star is Born are inescapable but The Artist is a truly unique creation. It manages to take a story that we’ve seen a thousand times before and deliver it in an unforgettable way. That being said The Artist is not a flawless film, the classic cinema it recreates frequently suffered from having incredibly long intertitles. Many is the time in a Fritz Lang or D.W.Griffith film that I am able to read an intertitle about 3 times before the director deems it time to return to the action The Artist suffers from a polar opposite affliction, flicking its intertitles quickly across the screen barely giving you time to take it in. But once you accept that we are supposed to be faster readers nowadays you get used to it and the action and performance is so crystal clear that you don’t need to take in every nuance of the sparse dialogue to understand what’s going on. At times the performances can be a bit heavy handed and hammed up but that is all part and parcel of the charm and the cinema it imitates.  


What with The Artist being a classic silent film done in 2011 it is able to experiment and play with certain modern elements. One particular sequence that plays around with sound effects is a stand out moment of modern influence in a classic genre; it makes the scene all the more powerful because as well as showing us the exciting contemporary things that can be done to highlight elements of the story it also serves as a perfectly simple exploration of George’s feelings at the time and sets us up for things that occur later on in the story. Poignant moments in the film are played out in an almost deafening silence from moments of great elation to moments of great despair, this silence invites us as an audience to add our own thoughts and dialogue to what we see before us making us root harder for the protagonists. 


Throughout I couldn’t escape one thought: It's so nice that in an age of films having big budgets, even bigger CGI, 3D, models and wrestlers as actors and countless remakes and heartless films that The Artist can effortlessly swoop in and show us that sometimes it all we need to do is pare back, get rid of extraneous detail and focus on the story and the characters.  The Artist is an absolute joy to behold and one of the most truly feel-good films I have seen in a long time. It provides us the logical conclusion to the recent resurgence in cinema’s fondness and appreciation of its roots and is all the better for being done so damn well.  Anyone who leaves the cinema after seeing it without the inkling of a grin on their face may well be a cyborg. Therefore I implore you, even if the idea of silent cinema scares you, to check this film out. 

SO