One of the reasons Greta Gerwig’s Little Women was so special, is that she finally pointed out that art is more tied to commerce than media makes it out to be. Moviemakers usually walk that tricky line between making the artistic creation in fear of its essence being sucked dry by profit driven studios. Well for those of you that are Leos Carax fans, you can be rest assured there is no sacrificing his artistic vision in Annette. This is wholly Carax’s story: no profit motive concerns here, just pure artistic expression for better or worse.
As told via musical, Annette is the daughter of Henry McHenry (Adam Driver) and Ann Desfranoux (Marion Cotillard), a Hollywood celebrity power couple. Henry is a shock comedian, with an Andy Kaufman like act that confuses people into laughter, and Ann is an opera soprano whose fame is on the rise. The pair have a torrid, paparazzi driven love affair leading to their daughter Annette, who appears to have inhereited mom’s gorgeous voice.
Leos Carax finds some very creative flourishes inside his epic musical that very near justify Annette’s existence alone. The concept of a gossip column couple told in music is pretty out there, but Carax mines a lot of interesting moments out of his premise. The cacophony of voices grows and contracts as more fans join in the chorus when praising/vilifying either Ann or Henry, and the juxtaposition of Ann and Henry in public vs. their private songs quickly drives home points that your basic dialogue driven film might struggle with. Most importantly, I don’t have to envision musical pornography anymore, because we see a whole lot of our super good looking celebs hooking up with each other. The biggest discussion point will be how Annette is portrayed; even though you will see the third act twist coming a mile away, it’s still no less powerful visually, with Carax doing that writers’ old trick of “showing not telling.”
But total control of a project also means you’re subject to runaway directorial flourishes, of which Annette has many, pretty much from minute one when it starts by singing its opening credits. This movie repeats itself a lot, and thinks its deeper than it actually is, so when the point of the scene comes across, you’re usually left with 5-10 additional minutes of footage (hey, at least it looks amazing) hammering the point home. There’s a couple dream sequences thrown in as well that add a little to the movie, but not enough to justify their existence. But the biggest issue is that Carax started with his third act Annette twist and worked backwards. The story that sprouts from that ending works more than it doesn’t because Adam Driver is an amazing actor, but leaves something to be desired. The best parts of Carax’s story are the public/private love affair of Ann/Henry, and Carax’s vision abandons that part of the story by the end of hour 1, leaving the audience and myself to wonder what might have been.
The other movie that Annette reminded me of was Umbrellas of Cherbourg. Like Jacques Demy’s classic, Annette boldly tries to spin a movie musical in a new direction. But while Demy’s spectacular film hits highs highs early and often, Annette goes high and low, much like the torrid relationship it presents. While that thematically fits, entertainment wise it will put you to sleep with its dulcet tones from time to time. I look forward to Leos Carax’s film being a hotly debated film critic rat at at for years to come, with blood boiling as hot as a Henry McHenry standup routine.