The Artist

This is the absolute best picture I have seen in a very long time and everybody with any sense should find a theatre where it is playing, even if you have to go to the next town over, and see it now. It will be at all the awards shows so you had better see it now so that you know what all the hype is about.

I don't know how I first heard about The Artist. It might have been mentioned on FlickChick's Facebook page, a forum for all old-time-movie lovers. For those of you who haven't heard about it, The Artist is a 2011 silent movie, although, to call it silent is to underestimate the very clever use of sound employed by the movie-makers. The story opens in the mid-1920s with a young, handsome, famous silent film star, George Valentin. He meets a young female fan, Peppy Miller, who is working her way up the ladder of the movie business. When sound pictures are introduced in the late-'20s, his career starts to plummet while her's takes off like a rocket. The plot is not very complex; as he falls lower and lower into depression, she becomes more successful and attempts to help her fallen idol. The Artist is full of laughs, accompanied by some tears. But most importantly, it touches on a very basic human quality: what it means to feel and to care.

Although the film does not have spoken dialogue, sound is very artfully used throughout the film. Not only is the musical score superb, the sound effects play an integral part in the story. It somehow seems unfair to call the movie silent. The subtle use of sound gives The Artist unimaginable depth that is only possible in a silent movie. It is very important for prospective audiences to know that the lack of spoken dialogue in no way slows down this movie, nor does it make it difficult to understand. The beautiful camera work, sound technique, and excellent timing on the actors' part gives this movie a definite snap, crackle, and pop.

A lover of silent movies myself, I can greatly appreciate the historical accuracy not only of the story, but of the style of the film itself. The director and cutters really captured the tempo of the old silent films. They also employed the old-fashioned color tinting techniques, displaying an amazing attention to detail that I have not seen in a long time.

It is so exciting that a silent black and white film is making such waves in this day and age. It has been nominated for more awards than you can count, including at the Cannes Film Festival, the Screen Actors Guild Awards, and the Golden Globes. This film completely revises the modern image of quality film-making. It reminds audiences that the films of our past still have a lot to offer. The Artist, in its own way, legitimizes the films of our past, allowing us not only to view them as part of cinema history, but to also appreciate them in their full value as works of art.

It is my firm conviction that anybody who can see and hear and feel deeply should go see this movie. I think that people who claim not to like black and white movies, and those who admit never to have seen a silent picture, will be able to enjoy this movie many times more than those who already love old films. I think The Artist can open the eyes of modern audiences to the great possibilities yet available in the film-making industry. It may also reveal both how little and how much we viewer need to expect from Hollywood. This film raises the standard to monumentous heights and it gives me a thrill down my spine to think of what I experienced when I saw this movie at the theatre.

Hugo

Hugo Cabret is a little boy who lives in the walls of a 1930s-era Paris train station. His job is to keep the many clocks of the station in working order, but in his spare time he works on his late father's pet project, trying to repair a broken automaton. He is constantly getting into scrapes with a toy-shop owner and with the station's guard, a lame WWI veteran with a mean doberman. Hugo's work on the automaton leads him into some unusual friendships, including the unexpected relationship with one of the great pioneers of filmaking, George Melies.

This film, directed by Martin Scorsese, is wonderfully cast, with a couple familair faces from the Harry Potter films; Richard Griffiths, Frances de la Tour acompany other greats like Christopher Lee, Ben Kignsley, and Sacha Baron Cohen. However, the characters portrayed by these talented actors are not very well folded into the storyline of the film, nor do they have any direct connection with the central character. At a climactic moment of the film, Hugo reaches out to these characters, begging them to help him, and all we get from them are blank looks. The exchange leaves the audience wondering about the purpose of those characters if they are not going to be in any way involved in Hugo's story. This is one of the many frustrations a viewer experiences when watching this film.

The two young actors who play Hugo (Asa Butterfield) and his friend (Chloe Grace Moretz) display a remarkable amount of control in their movement and facial expression. They are clearly talentated young people, but they did not have the raw, clean, candidness of real children. In many ways, Butterfield and Moretz's mastery of the technical aspect of acting keeps them from seeming childlike. In many cases, their fear, sadness, and excitement feels forced, calculated.

It cannot be denied that the film is asthetically pleasing. But the drive of the plot is profoundly disjointed. The audience is not always sure about the central theme of this picture. Is it about living in a train staion? Is it about clocks? Is it about film? Filmaking? Books? A Father-son relationship? Magic? In trying to be all of these things, the film fails to be any one of them. There is no glue binding the story together. I could understand how the many sub-plots might have worked very well in book form because it's easier for a reader to follow the linear pattern of several stories simultaneously. But the film audience is rather different. Either the stories must be distincly separate narratives, as in Love Actualy, or they must be completely coherent.

The film also takes its time in answering many questions which tend to nag the viewer and distract from enjoying the film. For example, we know that Hugo is living alone at the station, but it isn't until you are a good way into the film that we are told how he got there and even longer until we discover why he's alone. We never learn how his mother died. And we never know how Isabelle's parents died.

There are some good points to the film. The designers have done an amazing job capturing the look and feel of 1930s Paris. The costumes are superbe. I don't remember having heard any egregeous grammatical errors, and that's always a plus. The film also pays tribute to the earliest pioneer of film-making, the great Georges Melies. It is always nice for film-lovers to stroll down memory lane and experience some of those innovative shots again. If this film had been devoted to the history of film from the start, instead of being constantly distracted by the many random floating themes, it could really have been something.