The Singer (2006)

Sick Product of a Sick System

Save your money for something good and enjoyable

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

Great movie! If you want to be entertained and have a few good laughs, see this movie. The music is also very good,

'Quand j'étais chanteur' (or 'The Singer') is a lovely, funny, bittersweet film which gives Gérard Depardieu an excellent leading role as cynical, arrogant, washed-up singer Alain Moreau, who sings love tunes for middle-aged lady dancers who adore him. He meanwhile searches for love and finds something akin to it in the person of damaged, deep, prickly Marion (Cécile De France), many years his junior and out of his league.Depardieu, even approaching his sixties, brings a mix of bravado, charm, and vulnerability to the character of Moreau. Sometimes you can see where he is coming from, sometimes you sympathise, sometimes you laugh, sometimes you are irritated - a well rounded character, believable, and just that little bit broken from a lost chance to rebuild a marriage, the idea that he just might be a nicer guy than the ladykiller he has become.With Mathieu Amalric as Bruno, friend, estate agent, adversary, and Christine Citti as Michèle, former wife and backing singer, muse and manager, 'The Singer' is an intimate portrait of where life can take you if you just stop and let it. It does not shy away from poignancy and the ubiquitous happy ending, but on the way it makes its creations real and their problems and preoccupations realistic.The songs, incidentally, are sung by Depardieu and although the lyrics may be lacking in style (certainly in their translation), the delivery and ambiance proves there may well be life in the old dog yet, making it understandable why Moreau has become the obsession and fixation of lonely single, divorced, or widowed women. But under the gloss and the stagecraft is someone just as lonely, just as envious of the passing of time, and this is the ultimate strength of the film, making that obvious.

After seeing the trailer I didn't expect to enjoy this movie. Lesson: don't judge a movie by its trailer.Although it is a fairly corny affair, the setting is an unusual one, the performances and production values are high, and the script unexpectedly funny.However, without a star of considerable magnitude the entire soufflé would fall flat. Fortunately the great Depardieu is on hand, his giant presence matched by his lightness of touch. It's curious how the old American lions - de Niro, Pacino and the others - don't seem to be able to both play their image while sending it up at the same time: they only manage one thing or the other. In this modest movie, Depardieu is both himself and something of a parody of himself. The result is two-for-the-price-of-one enjoyment.The songs he sings - very well - are all genuine French pop songs which themselves border on self-parody, in the way that so many country-and western songs do - a seam of humour richly mined by Altman in Nashville. There's nothing so subtle here: Quand J'Etais Chanteur is so loosely woven that close scrutiny would unravel it. But for all that, it's surprisingly enjoyable.

I saw this film this afternoon at the London Fim Festival and loved it. You clearly got a sense of a singer in the twilight of his career observing either younger singers much better than understanding the needs of the audience than himself, or realising that his companions from years ago have done much better than he has.I sometimes felt that we were watching two stories, one about the Singer and another about the younger woman. Each had baggage, both were drawn to each other in ways they did not expect.go see this if you get the chance, and stay and watch the credits to find a few extras thrown in.

The London Film Festival is only three days old and already we've had the finest film, this one. Not that the pretentious pseuds who actually run the BFI will agree - if they did I'd be seriously frightened - even as I write they've probably got scouts out scouring the world for something from the Galapogas Islands shot from the point of view of a turtle and redolent with her inner torment as she watches her offspring being picked off by scavengers as they make for the sea but those of us who actually LIKE film as, dare I say it, Entertainment and think it is at its best exploring the Human Condition with tenderness, sensitivity, wit, etc will respond to this entry as positively as last night's packed audience i.e. with applause and cheers. It scored heavily at Cannes and on its release in France last month there was agreement amongst the critics and punters that this was Depardieu's best role in a long time and I am pleased to endorse that opinion. The problem with someone as versatile as Depardieu who can do anything is that he's frequently prevailed upon - and too often consents - to do Everything. Here he is inch perfect as a middle-aged third-rate singer - the English equivalent would be Vince Hill with charisma - making a living in clubs and discos and waging a war against karoake. It's a measure of his charm that his ex-wife, now his manager and living with a new partner, still loves him and watches over him like a mother. Short of a mid-life crisis he hits upon - both literally and figuratively - Cecile de France, half his age, a single mom and 'troubled' as they say in the soaps. As a rule Cecile de France is asked to light up the screen with her faux Audrey Hepburn smile as she did so winningly in her last outing Danielle Thompson's brilliant Fauteuils d'orchestre but here she is allowed to do 'serious' and save the smile for isolated moments which is, of course, doubly effective. At best the relationship is doomed and both parties know this deep down but the joy for the audience is how they get to that good place that we all covet. This is the kind of wonderful movie that those BFI mandarins probably used to love themselves when they were kids and thought that if they went to work for the BFI they'd be able to watch stuff like this all day long and get paid for it then, having joined, they realised that pleasure is no match for pretension. For film lovers only.