Gérard Depardieu has at last returned to his true form in THE SINGER, which was a huge hit in France. Xavier Giannoli has created a genuinely touching love story which displays humour and a sense of compassion for its characters.
Depardieu plays the part of Alain Moreau, a nightclub crooner in Clermont-Ferrand – described by one critic as: ‘much lower in the food chain than Charles Aznavour, but cut from the same cloth.’
One night, Alain sees young, beautiful blonde, Marion (Cécile de France) in the audience and decides to engineer a meeting through one of his friends, Estate Agent, Bruno (Mathieu Amalric).
Estate Agent Marion a single mother with an unhappy story, is cautious and untrusting, but before too long, a tentative relationship begins to develop. However, Bruno soon becomes a rival for Marion’s affections…
The on-screen chemistry between Dépardieu and de France is remarkable and the film is further enhanced by emotionally fluid performances by all the actors and and some clever plot twists. Whilst Alexandre Desplat’s excellent score gives an added depth to the proceedings. —Artificial Eye
Xavier Giannoli (born 7 March 1972) is a French film director and screenwriter. He has directed nine films since 1993. —Wikipedia
Depardieu finds his match in Cécile De France in this elegy-cum-romance (think Chaplin’s Limelight), which tracks the fractious relationship between an ageing crooner and a young single mother after he picks her up after one of his gigs. The sort of inhibited romance that Giannoli decides to capture stretches out a bit when played out fully on celluloid, but it’s still quite an involving and likeable tale, with a good sense of mise en scène from the director too.
This used to be a guilty pleasure of mine, but I've been told it's okay to like this film. So now it's just one of my regular favorites. So good. So so good.
