Predictably, another awards ceremony was dominated by The Artist on Sunday evening. Its success at the Oscars didn't quite match its achievements at the BAFTAs, but it still took home a good proportion of the most important awards. Best Director for Michael Hazanavicius. Best Actor for Jean Dujardin as George Valentin. And Best Picture. A final victory lap for a film that has earned outpourings of critical love and devotion from almost everyone who has encountered it. And yet I can't be the only one wondering if the tributes to this film - one that so unashamedly wallows in the past - have gotten out of hand.
Firstly, lets cast aside the underdog narrative that some are trying to attach to it. The Artist has been a clear Oscar favourite for months, it had the weight of Harvey Weinstein behind it, and it was perfectly pitched at Old Hollywood. Given that approximately 86% of the near 6,000 Academy voters are over the age of 50, they were always going to appreciate a film like The Artist; even if few were old enough to actually experience the silent era firsthand, it no doubt played a significant role in their cultural upbringing. Hazanvicius was preaching to the choir from the off.
So, taking the film on its critical merits, what are its themes? What are its ambitions? What does it set out to achieve? It spends so much of its time carefully homaging (and occasionally pastiching) silent films that it largely lacks a unique identity of its own, one separate from its inspirations. Its two main themes could be summed up as 'you can't stand in the way of progress' (which I suppose is a somewhat subversive point for a film largely dealing in reductive nostalgia to make, although both the ending and the entire premise of The Artist arguably contradict said theme anyway) and 'love conquers all' (although the love story is really more of a background element than a key driver of the plot, and plays out more as admiration than heartfelt passion). When you add in the fact that many of its biggest laughs come from either ridiculous slapstick or the Animal's Do The Funniest Things-level antics of Uggie the dog, it doesn't seem unfair to say that The Artist is a film of limited ambition, an interesting novelty that the average viewer will forget about almost as soon as it is over. Beyond a post-film discussion over a pint, I had no cause to dwell upon The Artist until it became omnipresent on the cultural landscape. I thought that it effectively and faithfully mimicked a bygone era, raised a few laughs, warmed the heart a little, and achieved nothing else besides.
(it also has at least a couple of major problems, the most pronounced of which is that the reason for Valentin's opposition to the introduction of sound only becomes clear at the end of the film, and as a result his motivations are only given meaning retroactively. This just about works, but it still leaves Valentin looking like a stubborn, foolish man for the best part of 100 minutes, and it requires a fair bit of suspension of disbelief to accept that no-one in the film would've called him on his attitude at any point. There is also one key scene toward the end of the film that felt like an artificial, overly melodramatic way of extending its running time.)
In terms of the acting, Dujardin and Berenice Bejo are winning, to be sure, but their performances aren't exceptional. The film's very premise hamstrings the pair, who resort to what could at times be described as overacting (or, less generously, mugging for camera) in order to convey emotion. The silent medium isn't made for great performances, and it was the rare talent who overcame the inherent limitations it imposed. For me, Dujardian and Bejo did enough to carry the film, but never quite approached greatness.
Even acknowledging that no-one particularly holds up the Oscars as a barometer of quality, The Artist can best be described as the beneficiary of a groundswell of short-term fascination and sentiment that will not translate into any kind of enduring appeal. History, I fear, will not be kind to it, and that is at least partly because so many have done so much to elevate it above its standing, from the interesting curiosity it is to the object of rapturous critical acclaim it has become.
No comments:
Post a Comment