The Artist
Bottom Line: Talk about (or, rather, mouth about) an automatic Oscar for Best Picture!
“With pleasure.” —Jean Dujardin as George Valentin
Directed by: Michel Hazanavicius
Starring: Berenice Bejo, Jean Dujardin, John Goodman
Beautifully produced, witty, silent gem chronicles the years of 1927 to 1932, the transitional cinematic era from silent films to “talkies.” Its focus is on George Valentin (Jean Dujardin), who was famous for a while as a silent film star, but by the rise of the talking pictures, his career has hit rock bottom. Early on, George meets younger dancer Peppy Miller (Berenice Bejo, screenwriter-director Hazanavicius’s own wife), who begins a massive rise to stardom in the newly popular sound cinema, after hitting the newspaper headlines with about a dozen photographs.
