Filed under: Claire Danes, Evening, Lajos Koltai, Meryl Streep, Vanessa Redgrave
The movie Evening introduces us to Ann Lord, an old woman dying of cancer who, in a morphine-induced fog, incoherently jabbers about mysterious people and events from her past, thoroughly confusing her two daughters—“What was her big mistake?” “Who’s Harris?” “What does she mean ‘Harris and I killed Buddy?’” The movie flashes back and forth between scenes of the old woman on her deathbed and scenes from the weekend of her best friend Lila’s wedding over 50 years ago. We soon find out that Harris, a young doctor who she met at Lila’s wedding, was Ann’s one true love (or so she says), and she longs for him even on her deathbed.
The ensemble cast of acclaimed Hollywood actresses—Vanessa Redgrave, Meryl Streep, Claire Danes, Glen Close, and Toni Collette—might well be the estrogen-charged equivalent of the posse of famous actors in the Ocean’s movies. Unfortunately, even their talent and flair couldn’t redeem this poorly written film, which, as a whole, was disappointing. The film seemed to *yawn* drag on and on and on. Its flow was labored, and just when things start to get somewhat interesting in the flashback scenes, all crescendo is jettisoned as we are abruptly brought back to the scenes in the present which are tedious at best, mind-numbing at worst. (One exception is the scene in which Lila and Ann are reunited after a 50 year hiatus from their friendship.) Unlike the découpage of scenes in La Môme, the flashbacks did nothing to contribute to the film.
Despite its faults, I was still stirred by the film. It would be remiss to simply treat Evening as a tragic love story between Ann and Harris. If this were the case, the movie would be utterly unconvincing and a failure because Ann and Harris’ affair is hollow and trite (it only lasted two days, after all). Their “love’s” failed realization cannot be mourned as if it were a truly profound, unselfish love. Fortunately, that’s not all there is to this film. Instead, I think the heart of Evening is the complicated but deep love between mother and child. As an aged Lila says, “We (women) are mysterious creatures, and at the end, so much of it turns out not to matter.” If we look at the film in this light, we see that while it may be difficult to understand why Ann spends so much time pining for Harris on her deathbed, and while it may even be pathetic that the majority of her final thoughts are devoted to their shallow, immature “love,” this element of the film was necessary as the part that “turns out not to matter.” So, while many of Ann’s flashbacks were of Harris, the last one—the one that counts in the end—is a moving scene in which the young Ann, ignoring her screaming husband and dinner on the stove, holds her two daughters and sings to them. Even though she didn’t have Harris—and even though she was consumed by him—all that mattered in the end were the daughters whom she loved.
In the end, Ann tells her daughter that “there’s no such thing as a mistake” only after claiming at the beginning that “Harris was my biggest mistake.” I wonder why she thought Harris was her biggest mistake. Was it because she felt guilty about Buddy’s fate? Was it because she didn’t marry him? Or was it because she spent so much time dwelling on what could have been with him? Even though there will always be consequences for our actions or our decisions, I do agree with her that there is no such thing as a mistake.
So, I guess that even though Evening wasn’t necessarily one to remember, I’m glad I saw it. I just won’t ever watch it again.
Filed under: Edith Piaf, La Môme, La vie en rose, Marion Cotillard, Milford, je ne regrette rien, movies
C’est grâce à Mme. Kelley, mon prof de français au lycée, que j’ai entendu la célèbre chanson La vie en rose d’Edith Piaf pour la première fois à l’âge de 15 ans. Je n’avais pas beaucoup d’informations sur Piaf à l’époque ; je savais que sa vie fut difficile, qu’elle était très petite (seulement 4 pieds 8 pouces, si je m’en souviens correctement), et qu’elle s’habillait toujours en noir. Mais dès le moment que j’ai entendu sa voix, la chanteuse m’a ensorcelée. Puisque personne n’avait l’Internet dans ma petite ville campagnarde du Nouveau Mexique en 1995, j’ai eu du mal à apprendre plus sur sa vie, et comme il n’y avait pas d’Amazon.com, je n’ai pas pu découvrir plus de ses chanson. (C’est dingue comment les choses ont changé dans 10 ans.) Mon enthousiasme a donc fané, mais je n’ai jamais oublié l’histoire triste de sa vie, ni l’émotion qu’elle a transmise à travers sa voix tremblante et intense. Cette fascination d’adolescence a été récemment réveillée quand je suis allée voir La Môme, le nouveau film extraordinaire qui nous fait découvrir la vie exceptionnelle et tragique de cette petite dame fragile qui devint l’une des plus grades chanteuses françaises.
En bref, le film est génial. L’histoire vraie de la vie d’Edith Piaf rivalise n’import quelle histoire farfelue Des feux de l’amour. Née à Belleville à Paris, et abandonnée d’abord par sa mère, la chanteuse, et après par son père, le contorsionniste, Edith est élevée par des prostituées dans le bordel de sa grand-mère en Normandie jusqu’à ce que son père revienne la reprendre après la grande guerre pour faire des cirques avec lui. Une petite gamine de santé fragile, elle devient aveugle, mais sa vue est revenue après une visite de la tombe de Thérèse Martin à Lisieux. Dans le film, on voit aussi ses premières années de chanteuse de rue, on la suit dans les music-halls, à ses grands spectacles à Paris et à New York, et dans sa petite maison à Cannes où elle disparait. Mais au lieu de suivre un fil linéaire, la narration du film est une mosaïque de flashbacks qui sautent entre des étapes différentes de la vie de Piaf, sans respecter la chronologie. Ceci rend le film un peu difficile à suivre si l’on ne connait pas déjà l’histoire romanesque de sa vie. C’est pareillement une manière génie pour transmettre le chaos et l’enchevêtrement qui ont caractérisé la vie d’Edith Piaf.
La métamorphose de Marion Cotillard en Edith Piaf est impressionnante. Sa représentation de la chanteuse dans toutes les étapes différentes de sa vie—d’une jeune chanteuse de rue à Paris, à une vedette internationale, jusqu’à une vieille dame d’une santé fragile—est impeccable. L’Oscar pour la meilleure actrice doit être le sien. En plus, Piaf elle-même contribue à la grandeur du film à travers ses chansons. On y entend tous ses meilleurs tubes, parmi lesquels « Non, je ne regrette rien, » « Milord, » et, oui, « La vie en Rose. »
J’étais ravie qu’il y ait plein de clips des spectacles de Piaf sur YouTube. L’un de mes préférés est ci-dessous, un extrait (en anglais et français) de la Môme Piaf quand elle fut l’invitée d’Ed Sullivan. Même quand elle parle en anglais, elle est fascinante:
Douze ans après mon premier rencontre avec Edith Piaf, je suis captivée à nouveau par son histoire émouvante après avoir vu ce film. Je terminerai mon blog donc avec la dernière chanson du film, et l’une de mes préférées :
Last night, we saw Sicko, the latest documentary from modern-day muckraker Michael Moore. In the film, Moore carefully constructs an argument for universal heath care in the US by juxtaposing portraits of insured Americans whose lives have been irreversibly affected by the atrocities of our for-profit heath care system with glimpses into the health care systems in Canada, England, France, and—gasp!—even Cuba where everyone is insured. Unlike his previous polemic documentaries, such as Bowling for Columbine or Fahrenheit 911, Sicko hits to the heart of an issue upon which most Americans agree and which many facts support: our current health care system is morbidly ill. One symptom of the malady: we spend a significantly higher percentage of our gross domestic product on health care (15.4% as per the World Heath Organization’s statistics) than do other comparable Western countries only to have a higher infant mortality rate and a lower life expectancy. Another symptom: although millions of Americans don’t have health insurance, millions more who ARE insured are unable to receive the care they pay for when they need it due to a dysfunctional and corrupt system that callously puts profits before human lives.
While most everyone agrees that our health care system is broken, we can’t seem to agree on a way to fix it. In short, I think our current for-profit system is inherently flawed and can’t be fixed because it is not run by an impartial third party, such as the government. Those opposed to a government-managed system—many of whom are our elected leaders who receive gross sums of money for their campaigns from the drug and health care industries—throw around “dirty” words like communism or socialized medicine in attempt to conjure up fears in the general public, or caution that “putting more power in the hands of the government” would have catastrophic results on our health system, such as unimaginable waiting periods for treatment, inferior care, and fewer choices for the patient. The insured middle-class in America already have unreasonable wait times to see specialists, numerous hoops to jump through with HMOs, and limited choices in doctors and treatment as a result of a privately-run, for-profit system in which health insurance and pharmaceutical companies get rich by fleecing the sick. How could a government-run system be any worse?
Having lived and worked in France and benefited from their health care system, I can say that it is not “free;” the French are taxed—often heavily—to pay for universal care, which is acknowledged in Sicko, but glossed over. But being taxed to make sure that ALL citizens are taken care of is a value and a responsibility that is natural to the French. How have our values, as a nation, degenerated to the point that health care, or, more specifically, the access to it, has become a capitalistic commodity to be bought and sold rather an inherent right? We already provide (dare I say—socialized?) services such as education and police protection to all members of our society, paid for through taxes, because we believe they are essential and fundamental rights. How is health care less of a basic right?
And what about long wait times and quality of care? Since my first encounter with the French health care system in 2001, I have NEVER had a problem with either long wait times or poor care, nor have I heard anyone else complain about them. I have been in the emergency room in Biarritz, in a general practitioner’s office in Paris, and have received house-calls from SOS Médecins in Dijon, where I also saw a specialist. In each case, my care was superb, swift, and hassle-free. When my father-in-law, who is French, was diagnosed with colon cancer in 2002, he was in the hospital operating room in Bordeaux within days of the doctor’s discovery of his tumor. In 1997, when my grandfather was diagnosed with the same type of cancer in New Mexico, he waited at least 3 weeks before having his tumor removed. I guess we should just be thankful that his cancer didn’t spread and that his claim wasn’t denied. Although my experiences and the experiences of my family are not all-encompassing, from what I’ve encountered and seen, I’d take the French health care system over ours faster than you can say “pre-existing condition.”
Back to Sicko. One thing I didn’t like about the film: since he so strongly advocates a governement-run health care system, I think that Moore should have more thoroughly examined the government-run health care agencies we currently do have in place in the US–Medicaid, Medicare, and the Veterans’ Administration. What are they doing wrong? What are they doing right?
In any case, whether you like the film (like me) and agree with Michael Moore’s solution to America’s health care conundrum, or whether you think Moore is a liberal demon, no one can deny that his films incite debate on issues that are important in our current zeitgeist.
Filed under: Music
Fergie, in the song Big Girls Don’t Cry: “And I’m gonna miss you like a child misses their blanket, but I’ve got to get a move on with my life. . . “
Me, in my head: “What the #&$*$#@. . . is this REALLY the most prolific simile they could come up with?” **Changes radio station immediately.**
