La Vie en Rose (2007)

It's been a very French year thus far. This film, Suite Francais by Irene Nemirovsky, the Parisian New Year's concert . . . . The other two are better than this film (thus far, I haven't finished the book yet).

I completely understand and even advocate the use of an untranslatable word in a book or refusing to include a glossary to help with translation. That makes sense and the meaning of the word can either be gleaned from context or simply looked up in a dictionary. What I cannot abide is a film's subtitles not translating everything. This is a film about Edith Piaf's music and musical career yet the lyrics are not subtitled. This seems more than slightly counterintuitive to me.

While that's the most prevalent problem with the film, it's not the only one. While Marion Cotillard does a fantastic job (worthy of her Oscar nom) just being Piaf (even with the various stages of age make-up), the wider cast of characters is a blur. There are quite a number of people in Piaf's entourage and I never caught their names. A prostitute becomes psychotically and overzealously attached in what could have only been a few months. Her mother and father are in and out of the plot line with no real exposition. One woman pops up from Piaf's youth as a confidant, is taken away in what I thought were her early 20s by her mother and the government (somehow, this is not explained), and randomly pops up later in Piaf's life dressed as a man at first (with no explanation) with what are clearly romantic inclinations although none of this is shown or referenced. When working as a street singer, Piaf gives most of her money to some random violent man--no explanation given. When she begins working in nightclubs, a man is killed and Piaf is questioned about her connections to the mob--no explanation is given. Another man helps her really begin her career--we don't really know who this man is or what his connections are. We never really see Piaf date a man until she sort-of dates a French boxer but apparently she had a child when she was in her late teens but that fact is only mentioned at the end of the film when she is dying--yet the death of this child prompted her heavy drinking and affiliation with less-than-desirable people. She was apparently married twice late in her life but this is only vaguely referred to late in the film (one marriage, not two) and apparently Marlene Dietrich was the maid of honor--who made an appearance as a character in the film although she's only identified as Marlene and the actress had a huge mole on her face that Marlene did not have and therefore the actress bore little resemblance to the famous actress. And Piaf died of liver cancer--the film isn't specific.

I shouldn't have had to look online for any of that info. The film should have filled me in on the details, especially considering that it spanned 2 hours and 20 minutes. It had the time to do so. I guess it's worth watching for Cotillard but be prepared for some unanswered questions and a long movie.