I went to see this movie onna counta I am familiar with who Florence Foster Jenkins was, or I thought I was.
I went to see this movie onna counta I am familiar with who Florence Foster Jenkins was, or I thought I was. I mean, I knew about the terrible singing that was regarded as comic and the concert at Carnegie Hall.
I didn't know she was a sufficiently gifted pianist as a child to have performed publicly, including at the White House. I didn't know that she had syphilis, which she almost certainly got from her first husband, and regardless of what can be completely verified as fact it would have severely affected her life - both the disease and its then treatment in 1885. I knew she had money, which would have made all the difference to her life, especially with that illness.
So, about the movie -
If you only know Simon Helberg from "The Big Bang Theory", that show does his talents no service. Firstly, he's a very good pianist. For realz. Secondly, a great deal of his acting is just his face. It is most impressive and used to excellent effect. Unfortunately, they directed him to be stereotyped and caricatured in some regards, and that was totally unnecessary. I hope he gets a chance to utilize his broader abilities elsewhere, though, he's got some impressive talent.
Hugh Grant has rediscovered an ability to act! No, really. Decades of him being, well, him, suggested that the occasional acting might have been a fluke, but no, he's acting, here. Impressively. He makes you care about a character that skirts incomprehensibility and deceitfulness. I'm sure much of this is without any possibility of precise confirmation from reality, but you care about this character, and you care about what he cares about.
Meryl Streep, character actress trapped in a movie star's career. She learned how to sing badly very well. It's a little concerning that she doesn't cause herself permanent damage. This character was begging for unsympathetic mockery and caricature. Unbelievably, Streep makes her sympathetic, genuine, and compassionate. That's not to say there isn't humor, because no one would know about Ms. Jenkins if it weren't for the inherent shock value.
There's a great British (mostly, anyway) cast for the rest of the roles and one of the best dry sarcastic lines ever in comedy in an exchange between Hugh Grant and David Haig's characters.
The movie definitely takes some verifiable flexibility with the facts, and I can't help but wonder why the gimmick with the briefcase, for example. Unless there's some factual information I don't know about, but I doubt it because I'm pretty sure the reality was a hideous family coming and taking whatever money there was after her death.
They suggest that she dies as a direct result of the horrible reviews of her Carnegie Hall concert. Some stories suggest yes, others that it was coincidence. She also may or may not have been prone to believing people who said she sang badly. There seems to be some support for either. Her costumes were known to be lavish, but I suspect this production amped that up a bit, because lavish then and lavish now are probably not quite the same. Meanwhile, it's a sweet and touching film that manages not to take itself too seriously and I learned something about Florence Foster Jenkins. A woman who was wealthy enough to survive on her own in an era when that just wasn't done, and regardless of her singing, contributed to the musical life of New York City.
http://nypost.com/2016/07/30/how-the-worlds-worst-singer-made-a-career-as-a-musician/
http://nypost.com/2016/07/30/how-the-worlds-worst-singer-made-a-career-as-a-musician
I didn't know she was a sufficiently gifted pianist as a child to have performed publicly, including at the White House. I didn't know that she had syphilis, which she almost certainly got from her first husband, and regardless of what can be completely verified as fact it would have severely affected her life - both the disease and its then treatment in 1885. I knew she had money, which would have made all the difference to her life, especially with that illness.
So, about the movie -
If you only know Simon Helberg from "The Big Bang Theory", that show does his talents no service. Firstly, he's a very good pianist. For realz. Secondly, a great deal of his acting is just his face. It is most impressive and used to excellent effect. Unfortunately, they directed him to be stereotyped and caricatured in some regards, and that was totally unnecessary. I hope he gets a chance to utilize his broader abilities elsewhere, though, he's got some impressive talent.
Hugh Grant has rediscovered an ability to act! No, really. Decades of him being, well, him, suggested that the occasional acting might have been a fluke, but no, he's acting, here. Impressively. He makes you care about a character that skirts incomprehensibility and deceitfulness. I'm sure much of this is without any possibility of precise confirmation from reality, but you care about this character, and you care about what he cares about.
Meryl Streep, character actress trapped in a movie star's career. She learned how to sing badly very well. It's a little concerning that she doesn't cause herself permanent damage. This character was begging for unsympathetic mockery and caricature. Unbelievably, Streep makes her sympathetic, genuine, and compassionate. That's not to say there isn't humor, because no one would know about Ms. Jenkins if it weren't for the inherent shock value.
There's a great British (mostly, anyway) cast for the rest of the roles and one of the best dry sarcastic lines ever in comedy in an exchange between Hugh Grant and David Haig's characters.
The movie definitely takes some verifiable flexibility with the facts, and I can't help but wonder why the gimmick with the briefcase, for example. Unless there's some factual information I don't know about, but I doubt it because I'm pretty sure the reality was a hideous family coming and taking whatever money there was after her death.
They suggest that she dies as a direct result of the horrible reviews of her Carnegie Hall concert. Some stories suggest yes, others that it was coincidence. She also may or may not have been prone to believing people who said she sang badly. There seems to be some support for either. Her costumes were known to be lavish, but I suspect this production amped that up a bit, because lavish then and lavish now are probably not quite the same. Meanwhile, it's a sweet and touching film that manages not to take itself too seriously and I learned something about Florence Foster Jenkins. A woman who was wealthy enough to survive on her own in an era when that just wasn't done, and regardless of her singing, contributed to the musical life of New York City.
http://nypost.com/2016/07/30/how-the-worlds-worst-singer-made-a-career-as-a-musician/
http://nypost.com/2016/07/30/how-the-worlds-worst-singer-made-a-career-as-a-musician
Comments
Post a Comment