Wednesday, April 6, 2011

From One Movie To Another (2011)


Claude Lelouch looks back on his life in film.

It begins with C'était un Rendézvous, the mad drive he did and filmed across Paris early one Sunday morning (which looks fantastic on a HUGE screen: it's like being strapped to his bumper), and it then charts the course of Lelouch's career film by film over 54 years, from 1957 to the present.

Is this a great film? Probably not. But goddamn it's a great deal of fun. Watching one man's career ebb and flow over two hours is so much fun. Sure Lelouch has made a career of largely remaking the same film over and over again with a few variations, but when you look back at his career you realize how many good film's he's made, beginning with A Man And A Woman.

Actually what I loved about the film is how it charts the course of a life of a man who refused to ever give up, filmmaker or not. Failure followed failure until it be came hit after hit until fortunes reversed, and then reversed again. It's the wonderful story of a man who just never quit, even if it meant making a movie under another name (something he recently did).

I have no idea how this will play for anyone who doesn't like movies, or movies about movies, but if you can go with the flow of a life, you'll have a wild ride as we follow the course charted by a man who refused to go to Hollywood and who made the movies he wanted to.

Worth tracking down.


No comments:

Post a Comment