La Vie en Rose

Starring: Marion Cotillard, Sylvie Testud, Pascal Greggory, Emmanuelle Seigner, Jean-Paul Rouve, Gerard Depardieu
Directed by: Olivier Dahan
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Drama
2007

Times Seen:
Tim: 2

Summary: Follows the life of French singer Edith Piaf (Marion Cotillard).

Review:

Tim: I've seen La Vie en Rose twice now, and both times left me feeling exactly the same- that I was stunned by the performance of Marion Cotillard and scratching my head a bit about Edith Piaf. This is one of those films where the performance of the lead is so extraordinary, it tends to overshadow the rest of the film. Cotillard is brilliant here, the rest of the movie is good but not great.

I do want to highlight just how amazing Cotillard is. As I watch this movie, I continually forget it's Cotillard I'm seeing. It's a remarkable performance where she almost completely vanishes into the character. The hair and makeup certainly help, but her mannerisms, the way she walks, it's all Piaf. It's such an amazing performance because Cotillard fully embodies this other person. It's no surprise that she won the Academy Award for Best Actress- this is one of the strongest, most memorable performances I've seen in recent years. The movie is completely about her and Cotillard has a great range of emotions she gets to display. The biggest reason to see this movie is for her excellent performance.

The rest of the movie is good, but I can't help but feel a bit cheated. At the end of the extremely long movie (140 minutes is just way too much), I didn't leave with a much better understanding of who Piaf was. The movie tells me she had a rough childhood marked by illness and surrounded by prostitutes. I know that she was a bit of a wildcard and drank a lot. She had a serious affair with a married man. She fought to make it big and then didn't want to let it go in the end. I know what she did, but the movie never fully gets under her skin. Why did she do the things she did? We learn one source of her pain at the end of the movie, but it's almost too late. She's as enigmatic at the end as at the beginning. No biopic can ever completely reveal what makes a person tick, but it was almost as if this movie didn't even try. We watch this chaotic mess of a person through various stages of her life, but for all the emotional sequences we see, it's all somewhat surface-level. Did she really love singing as an expression of herself, or was it just for the money? Was it all about fame and fortune and good times? I left the movie with more questions about who Edith Piaf was than I was comfortable with. I wanted to know more about this fascinating individual.

The supporting cast is fine, but there's really no standouts. Cotillard's performance is so stark that she draws your eye to her in every scene. All the supporting cast members are caught in her orbit, swinging into view for a few moments before swinging out again. This movie would have been helped with a truly incredibly supporting performance to compliment Cotillard.

La Vie en Rose follows the path that many similar films have tread- you take one remarkable performance and surround it with a good (but absolutely not great) film. The individual performance almost transcends everything else. Indeed, watching this film, it's all about Cotillard and Piaf is secondary. I blame that on the director. This is a good movie, but the movie lets Cotillard down- it doesn't live up to effort she puts forth.

So, adding it all up, I can say that La Vie en Rose is a good movie. We see moments from a fascinating singer for almost two and half hours. Director Olivier Dahan keeps the story moving, even though not all the scenes were compelling. What saves this movie is the impressive performance of Cotillard and the makeup that helped transform her into this character (not surprising, Makeup was the only other Academy Award win). This is a good movie, but it's not even close to Cotillard's great performance.

Rating 1-10

Tim's Rating: 7



If You Enjoyed This Movie, We Recommend: Almost Famous, Walk the Line