Gainsbourg: A Heroic Life

Joann Sfar came from comics, and his first film refuses the rules of biography on purpose. He described it as a tale rather than a life story, so chronology and fact sit well behind invention. A figure with an enormous nose attaches itself to the child Lucien Ginsburg in occupied Paris, and as he grows it becomes a puppet built from his own image, called La Gueule, muttering in his ear for the rest of his life. Eric Elmosnino plays both Gainsbourg and the voice of the puppet. It is not impersonation. The laziness in the voice arrives together with a body that cannot sit still. The performance won him best actor at Tribeca and at Cabourg, and the film took the César for best sound. Its flaw is familiar. The women drift in and out from offstage, and the man's self destruction is at times turned into poetry rather than examined. Who it is for: people who like musician films with strange shapes. Who it is not for: anyone who wants the life in order.