Boy. A silent movie in 2011 and even an Oscar winner for best movie and 4 other categories. This is something of a feat in the age of CGI and big budget sound and image bombardment. I am always suspecting of movies receiving oscars, it may be deserved but usually I do not agree with the choices, and this is not only because it is mainly american movies. It seems that once in a while movies are made that is sharpened to go exactly after Oscar statues, by selecting plots, themes or sentimental effects that usually garners statues. But this one seem to be so much out in left field, that there must be something special that carries it through.
We are transferred back to the era of the silent movies in the roaring twenties, just at cusp of entry of the talkies ... the movies with synced, integrated sound. George Valentin is a Douglas Fairbanks/Gene Kelly type filmstar, who is very much in love with himself and his own image as a filmstar. He does have a larger than life attitude and his filmhero alter ego is accompanied by a dog, that is also his real life companion. He seems to have a romantic and soft side that does not really get any release in the golddigger marriage he is living in.
Peppy Miller (Bérénice Bejo) is an ambitious and fresh faced, modern dancer, who by accident is "discovered" by Valentin and they strike a mix of friendship and potential love affair. But she is focused on taking care of her growing career while Valentin, sure of his mega-star status and invincibility, takes life as it comes and keeps his superficial distance to everyone in his vicinity. What he does not see is that the new technology with sound in movies is going to be the new hot thing and potentially make him obsolete in the business, since he relies completely on the "old" format and has no training or interest in speaking to his audience. This was a big problem for many a big silent star, and some even ended their life when they found themselves out of work in a few short years.
While Miller gets better and better jobs in the new sound world, Valentin slides more and more into oblivion stubbornly denying that his "work" has no interest for the future of moviegoing. He loses his wife, his butler he has to sack and auction away his furniture and art and so on. He is on a unwilling character suicide. At the same time Miller has become the greatest talkies star of the day.
The roles are switched. The age of talking girls has made the age of action men obsolete. This is a very clear metaphor in my opinion. As long as there were no talking in movies, men always had the upper hand since they are the physical characters and the women only can faint or cry, to simplify things. Now male limitations in oratorical abilities can be duped by same better female abilities and at the same time as feminism and the kickstart of gynocentrism in statism and culture can set in, women get talking pictures.
Valentin ends up basically on the edge of suicide all alone, only to be saved by the girl he "found" when he himself was the star and she was the unknown. She supports him in the left effort to get him back in business and they end up as a parallel to Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire.
The director chose to set the movie all in silence until the end when Valentin enters the talkies. The picture ratio has even been set to the 4:3 of the olden days. Now it is clear that the purpose of the movie is to reminisce over and send some praise to some of the virtues of the movie-making of a nearly forgotten era. I can only praise that idea, but the problem with "The Artist" is that it is kept in a sarcastic and superficial tone all through. The clichés and the stereotypes are just too thick and the effects too thin to really be an homage with the risk of becoming a joke instead. The plot is not really more than an excuse to make the film and the story is too simple and two-dimensional to be of any real interest. I can see why the academy would want to throw statues at it, because otherwise they might look like they cannot see the homage and at the same time they can polish their image of movie enthusiasts of sorts by showing "interest" in old style movie making also. This is not a great movie in the 5 Oscars sense. It is good fun and gives a likable view of days gone by, but not much more.
Rating : 6/10