When I first saw the 2011 critical hit
The Artist, I was halfway through the
10th grade.
This was back when I still thought
Facebook was worth the hassle, and many
of my classmates were into vintage
fashion and swing dance lessons. As an
artistically inclined self-centered
hopelessly romantic teenager in that
kind of environment, The Artist was
naturally a perfect fit for me and it
instantly became one of my 10 favorite
films. But over time, it gradually slipped
out of my top 10 list and now I would be
hard-pressed to consider as even one of
my 20 favorite films.
However, I've since revisited The Artist
and although it seems a tad melodramatic,
its diminishing emotional grip on me
has more to do with the fact that I've
changed as a person;
the film itself has essentially remained
the same. I say all this not because my
personal experiences hold any weight in
assessing the quality of the film, but
because I believe that many people have had
similar experiences with the movie. Praise
for the film seemed unanimous when it
initially played in theaters, but now it
seems like those who saw it tend to look
back on it as one of those films where
the critics gave the film way more
credit than it deserved. Even some of the
critics have slowly turned on the film
themselves, claiming that it was perfect
Oscar bait for the time because it was
"different without being challenging or
worrying". Now, I can understand the
frustration with the Academy Awards. It
takes time for us, as a culture, to figure
out which films deserve to be considered
classics, so proclaiming a picture "best
film of the year"
just months after its release can often
produce some fairly ridiculous results:
"And the Oscar for Best Picture is
presented to...
Bravehart." But while I certainly agree that
The Artist wasn't the best film of the
year,
I'm kind of glad that it won Best
Picture, because the award serves to
bring the film the recognition that
it deserves, because despite how simple it may
seem, this is a challenging film. The
challenge is not in the story itself, but
in the format. Modern audiences must
challenge themselves to have the
patience to sit through a film which is
not only black and white, but also silent,
and furthermore the filmmakers have the
challenge of trying to structure the
film in such a way that it will help
audiences adjust to the different format.
"I want it to be funny...
I try to... write a melodrama, but
to
let room for fun and for entertaining,
just to be polite, because if people come
to see a black and white silent movie, the
nice I can do is trying not to be boring.
I wanted to entertain people."
So, in a way, the movie was the
disadvantaged underdog from the start,
and in some ways, it is kind of a miracle
that it managed to snag Best Picture. It's a
perfect example of creators and
audiences meeting each other halfway. The
critics should enjoy it because of the
inventive ways in which it works with
the format, and the common audiences
should enjoy it because of the simple and
appealing story.
Sadly, while the film may have achieved
brief success, it seems that over time,
audiences have ignored it because of its
challenging format, and the critics have
ignored it because of its simplistic
story. In the same way, I found that I've
become far less passionate about it than
I once was. But as I've said, this is not
the film's fault: I find The Artist is
less emotionally moving with each
viewing, but that's only because I've become
familiar with the plot, and knowing
what's going to happen removes a lot of
the tension that really pulls you in the
first time you see it.
What has convinced me of this film's
classic potential is that, with each
viewing, I've noticed small details and
layers of mastery which have led me to
respect the film more. So, in as few words
as possible, I would like to try to share
with you what I've found and persuade you
to watch this movie for the first time,
or at least give it a second chance, in hopes
that you'll come to see it as the true
modern classic that it is. The first
complaint that people seem to have about
The Artist has to do with its basic plot:
namely, that it's too simple and that it
doesn't have the originality, subtlety,
and nuance that a truly great film
should. And, in a way, they're right: this is a
movie about actors. I mean, it basically
lifts its entire premise from Singin' in
the Rain: a silent star falls under hard
luck when he's forced to cope with the
arrival of sound. And while I'm just as
tired as everyone else is with movies
about movies, I think that the very
clear-cut and generally predictable plot
this movie is justified. The film knows
that we're all familiar with the story,
and so, it has to find unconventional
ways of telling that story to keep us
interested. The brilliance of the
filmmaking techniques justifies the
story, in a way, and that's what makes
this movie feels so fresh and enjoyable,
despite how bland it would be if it
were told in any other format.
Hence, the film becomes kind of like a
card tower: if they hadn't done it
perfectly, the entire thing would come
crashing down.
This is because the director not only
has to persuade the audience to be
interested in the familiar story, but he
also has to persuade them to adjust to
an unfamiliar format.
Michael Hazanavicius leads us into
the story with a movie within the movie.
The audience is watching a silent film,
but as we soon see, the silence is not
just contained to the screen, but also to the
entire world surrounding it, and he
alerts us to this fact by having the
music end at just the right moment, so
that when the audience breaks out in
applause, we receive pure silence
precisely where we would expect to hear
the most noise, and in a moment we are
subconsciously alerted to the kind of
experience that we're going to be
getting from this film. The story is
paced so perfectly that it not only
persuades you, it seduces you. There are
many more instances where the director
plays with this format he's adopted.
He uses homages to silent film
directors like Fritz Lang to
establish himself as knowing the rules
of the game, and then he goes on to break
those rules.
In the absence of dialogue, the story is
told through the visuals. Behind the
broad obvious gestures of the actors, we
get subtle visual clues to what's going
on through movie posters which mirror
the events in the plot, as in one
instance where film poster reads "The
Thief of her Heart" in the middle of a
scene where the two romantic leads share
a tender moment. But beyond the mere
clever gags the film draws your
attention to, it also wants you to take
notice of those moments within the film
that can't be expressed through words.
Unforgettable moments like the coat scene,
or the man's reflection in the tuxedo, or this
darkly comic moment of brilliant
foreshadowing. This connects to what I
believe is one of the central ideas of
the film: that silence allows for a
certain kind of expression and
communication that is ignored in regular
cinema. This answers, I believe, the second
complaint that people have with this
film: they complain that the silent
format is a gimmick, a trick devised to
draw attention to the film. But whether a
concept is a gimmick or tool depends on
how it's used, and what it all comes down
to is whether or not the idea is
necessary for the plot. I felt that some
modern films which similarly employ a
certain degree of silence do it not
because they need to, but rather, because
they can. The Artist, on the other hand,
wouldn't work without silence, and I say
that not as an insult to the film, but
rather, as a compliment to it.
Just as the format justifies the story,
the story also justifies and
necessitates the format, they are
inseparably linked, interdependent. "My idea
was to make a movie you that make
believe that the format comes after
the story, and the story need that format.
People need justification: why did he
make a silent movie, and so that's answered the
question. I did the silent movie because it's a
story of a silent actor." But what is it
about the content that makes the style
so important? Well, why is the film
called "The Artist" to begin with? It's a
big title that could be applied to quite
a few other films, and I'm sure that
there are plenty of other times that
might fit this film better: "The Actor", "The
Star", and so on. But the title is
important because it leads us to examine
acting not as a skill or a feat of
endurance, but instead as a form of
artistic expression. The art which the
actor produces is not the film but the
performance within the film. Silent films
allowed for a very physically expressive
type of acting, relying on pantomime
rather than speech to communicate.
Writing on the film, David Denby of the
New Yorker reflects on the acting of the
day.
This is a talent that George
Valentin, the main character of the film,
has worked very hard to develop, and it's
how he's come to express himself. He's
afraid of talking pictures not because
he is a purist, but because they will
draw attention away from his abilities
as a performer.
Thus the film embraces two meanings for
silence, which interact paradoxically.
Through silence, he can speak, but in the
world of speech, he realizes that he is
unable to express himself: trapped in
silence.
Some have criticized the film for being
too clean and glossy in its aesthetic, as
many films in the silent era presented a
more raw passionate experience for the
audience.
However, The Artist seeks not to be a
carbon copy of the traditional silent
film, nor to revive it.
Instead, it exists to point us back to
them.
This film was actually what led me to
explore the work of Charlie Chaplin and
Buster Keaton in the first place. On the
surface, The Artist may look like
another pretentious film trying to snag
awards, but looking at the interviews
with the director and stars, you really
start to understand
and how hard it was to get this idea off
the ground, and that when you get down to
it, this was a film that was made because
of the passion of those who wanted to
make it. Each era in our collective
cultural history seems to be accompanied
by a different trend in filmmaking: the
fifties had the rule breakers and the
French New Wave, and the seventies had
its own wave of countercultural
filmmakers, just as the nineties had a surge
of independent films. It may be too soon
to say what defines the era of film that
we're in now, but I believe that starting
somewhere in the mid-to-late 2000's
we slowly began to enter an
age of nostalgic cinema. The three best
films of 2011 were all reflections on
the past and reflections on the films of
the past. Familiar pop-culture figures
dominate the box office, spawning an
endless stream of sequels and prequels.
This is not only an artistic trend but a
social and political trend as well. We
are scared about the future, and as a
result, we are retreating into the past,
and if you want proof, let me remind you
that we just elected a man whose entire
campaign centered around the idea of
changing things back to the way they
used to be.
"You almost make it sound like J.J. Abrams
is responsible for this entire election."
"Does this look familiar?"
This is why films like La La Land, which
many people believe will win Best
Picture this year, concern me. Because
it's important to remember the past, but
it's all too easy to fall into the trap
of getting lost in it. The Artist serves
as a kind of landmark for when we fully
entered this area of nostalgia, but
nonetheless, I don't think that The
Artist is entirely nostalgic. It isn't
trying to persuade us the past is
necessarily better. Instead, it's trying to
get us to respect the past. The solution
at the film's end is not a call for the
return to days gone by, but rather an
encouragement to use what we've gleaned
from history to help us push forward
into the future, and it's that kind of
hope that I wish was more emphasized in
similar films. I hope that I've shown
that The Artist definitely has a certain
degree of intelligence to it, but in the
end, there's no denying that the film is
experienced less in the mind, and more in
the heart. And even if you don't see it
as anything more than a brainless film
that just happens to be very charming and
enjoyable, at least give it some credit
for being a real pleasure to watch. "Some
of you might have noticed that the name of
the channel has changed from 'Second
Viewing' to 'Essential Films'.
It's just, new year, new start, I just
wanted to give it a name, while the
channel is still small, that better
conveys what the channel is really about,
and anyways...
subscribe or donate and thank you all
for watching!"
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