London Film Fest 2011 Day 7 - THE ARTIST

Jean Dujardin and Berenice Bejo, the stars of
THE ARTIST, at the UK premiere at the
BFI London Film Festival 2011.

Michael Hazanavicius’ charming silent movie about the end of silent movie-making stars Bérénice Bejo and Jean Dujardin (of the recent secret-agent spoofs OSS 117) as actors Peppy Miller and George Valentin, who fall in love against the dreamy backdrop of an early golden-age Hollywood. When the talkies take off, George, the go-to man of the silent picture, finds himself outcast by a determined and winning Peppy, a role in which Bejo dazzles, and where THE ARTIST might have kept up with her singular energy it slows to the nostalgic time spent by George in relative poverty and obscurity. Nonetheless, Dujardin's performance remains a broad and irresistible focus, and there may be no modern leading man better suited to the demands of the silent movie genre. Rare in any case does it seem to enjoy watching actors watching themselves on screen.

THE ARTIST played Cannes, where Jean Dujardin won Best Actor; Toronto and London 2011. It is on release in France. It opens in the US on November 23rd; in Italy on December 9th; in Spain on December 16th; in Greece on December 22nd; in Germany on January 26th and in Hong Kong on February 9th.

OSS-117: LOST IN RIO - sporadically funny French spy spoof

The OSS-117 movies are French parodies of the early Bond movies, where Bond was a slick-haired, cock-sure spy in a flash car and a shiny suit, bedding women to cheesy 1960s background music. The latest release, RIO NE REPOND PLUS or LOST IN RIO, sees the hapless French spy Hubert Bonisseur de la Bath dispatched to Rio to purchase a microfilm containing the names of French collaborators from a Nazi colonel. On the way he teams up with a beautiful Mossad agent called Dolores, the Nazi’s hippie son Heinrich, and a CIA agent called Trumendous. As with the previous OSS-117 flick, when the movie works, it works because of star Jean Dujardin’s tremendously funny facial expressions coupled with the fact that he really does have the cheesy grin and good looks of Sean Connery. There’s also a lot of verbal humour around Hubert’s verbal clumsiness in dealing with women, Mossad and Germans. The resulting film contains more than its fair share of laugh-out loud moments, even if the source of the humour is sub-Austin Powers. The problem is that this film is too long and contains too many scenes that just don’t work, especially early on in the film. For instance, the character of CIA agent Trumendous, who seems to just laugh and swear for no reason, simply doesn’t work as a spoof of Felix Leiter. I would’ve preferred a shorter, more tightly written movie, with a runtime of maybe 80 minutes rather than 100 minutes. This would’ve put the sequel up there with the first movie, CAIRO, NEST OF SPIES, which felt like it had a lot more energy and more consistent laughs. So, maybe one for DVD.

OSS 117 - LOST IN RIO / RIO NE REPOND PLUS was released in Belgium, France, Latvia, Greece, Russia and Kazakhstan in 2009. It is currently on limited release in the UK.