Annette is not a musical; it’s a strange yet classic opera
In theaters and on Amazon Prime Video
The Short Take:
Dark, explicit, confrontational, and flagrantly out of the box, ANNETTE is a modern day tragic opera with fleeting moments of masterpiece. I would only recommend it to theater nerds who want to suffer for their art. (Or fans of the band Sparks.) Adam Driver makes Kylo Ren look like a teddy bear.
The Long Take:
For many films, expectations are everything. And I don’t just mean overhyping, though that is a problem. What you know feeds into what you expect, and what you expect colors how much you enjoy. I first heard about Leos Karax’s Annette as a musical starring Adam Driver and Marion Cotillard, two actors I enjoy. Based on this alone, I was interested. Then, at the Cannes Film Festival, where the film premiered, Adam Driver smoked a cigarette to pass the time during a 15-minute standing ovation. Carax then went on to win Best Director. So, when this film hit Amazon Prime on August 20, I was eager to check it out.
Photo Credit: Insider
I want to be really clear: this film is not a musical in the traditional sense. I was expecting Broadway, and what I got was very off-Broadway. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t have artistic value. But a source of entertainment, of exhilarating song and dance, this is not. The brothers behind the band Sparks have written a song book that musically and intellectually beckons multiple listens. I’m listening to the soundtrack as I write, and am appreciating it on a whole new level. On its own, the music is a haunting and complex mix of late 70s pop rock and something that feels either ancient or timeless. So I wonder if being thrown off by my initial expectations and merely processing what I was seeing took up my sensory bandwidth to the point where I couldn’t really appreciate the component parts. Based on the Sparks brothers’ music outside of this film (of which I am, admittedly, not that familiar), I would have expected all the songs to be discernible glam rock singles.
Only the opening number really fits that bill. In a very meta, “show about a show” fashion, Annette begins in a recording studio, and the creators and cast all gather together for a walk and sing to “So May We Start,” which has a more traditional musical theater pep and a pop ear worm quality to it. The Next Big Picture podcast said that it would be really fun to open this year’s Oscars ceremony with Driver, Cotillard, and company walking into the theater from the streets of Hollywood, singing this song, which, they speculated, could very well get a Best Original Song nomination. And I couldn’t agree more. It gets catchier every time I listen to it and satisfies that theater kid “let’s put on a show” craving. In fact, if the rest of this review turns you away from this film, I would recommend that you log into Amazon prime, watch this opening number, and then stop. Because, if I’m being selfish, I really want to see that movie and live in that world.
But, if you pay attention to the lyrics of this upbeat, head-bobbing tune, the lyrics do warn viewers about what they’re about to see. The troupe announce that they’re about to give us, “A tale of songs and fury, with no taboo.” They openly declare that, “We’ll sing and die for you, in minor keys. And if you want us to kill too, we may agree.” In retrospect, I should have known I was signing up for 2 1/2 hours of melodrama, socially unacceptable behavior, unhealthy sex, scandal, and murder. If that weren’t enough, the line towards the end saying, “So close all the doors and let’s begin the show. The exits are clearly marked, thought you should know.” The Sparks brothers, in light of these words, seem to be having fun at my expense because they know that I’m in for a wild ride when I’m just too busy grooving to the music and enjoying Marion Cotillard holding Adam Driver’s hand and smiling.
Once the show “starts,” the singing shifts to the sung conversations you’d find in Les Miserables, or, if you’re a more cultured person than I am, the opera. (The female lead, Ann, played by Cotillard, is also an opera singer, just to make everything more complicated.) This, again, should have clued me in. Yet, I was wholly unprepared for the mayhem to come.
I almost quit at least twice.
[Mild SPOILERS ahead. I mention specific things that happen, but don’t give away any plot twists. I think it helps to be prepared with this one, so I would encourage you to forge ahead even if you haven’t seen the film.]
Part of this was because I had to start and stop my viewing in fits and spurts. That might have also pushed me to keep going with it. I’ll never know. What I do know is that, after the opening number, I was completely blindsided by the confusion I would only associate with watching performance art. Adam Driver, who plays Henry McHenry, a provocateur comedian, wears a forest green bathrobe, boxes in a mirror, smokes, and puts out his cigarettes with a half-eaten banana. Is he serious or is he joking? Is this part of his character’s act or is this a breaking of the fourth wall? Then the very intimate scenes between Driver and Cotillard — while they literally sing “We love each other so much” mid-act — made it very clear I was not watching the film I was expecting.
So I’m here to warn you: this is not a film you casually throw on the TV while you make dinner. It’s a film that demands your attention, and, if you’re anything like me, will make you grimace for a good portion of it. But sometimes that’s what good art often does — it makes you uncomfortable and challenges you.
Oh, and I haven’t even mentioned the puppet baby. There’s a puppet baby.
I mentioned earlier that the music in Annette functions more as dialogue than as individual musical numbers. That alone would not necessarily push the film into opera territory, but this combined with the simple, tragic, and at times over-the-top plot does. I kept wondering if the Sparks Brothers or Carax had the death of Natalie Wood in mind because not only does some of the plot share similarities, but there’s a preoccupation with celebrity scandal, having a family in the public eye, the tension and jealousy between two halves of a celebrity couple, the relationship between artist and audience, and, eventually, the exploitation of young talent. So it’s almost as if they’ve made a contemporary opera from the drama generated by fame, starting with the age of tabloid celebrity television and ending with YouTube-induced celebrity, when Ann and Henry’s daughter, Annette, reveals her talents. There’s a #MeToo movement dream sequence that feels cheap because it’s never discussed again, and I do have majors issues with this tale of woe privileging the perspective of Henry, with Ann being relegated to the helpless victim role. But, maybe that would be in keeping with classic Western opera, whose gender politics I would assume are outdated.
While the jury, including myself, is still out on whether or not Adam Driver has any musical talent — some critics enjoy his raw energy while others hear straining in his voice — I don’t think anyone can criticize his acting here. It’s quite a flex, and I’m glad this film gave him the opportunity to wreak havoc. Is the character he plays a terrible human? Yes. Does Driver put every ounce of his being into being that terrible? Also yes. Most critics I’ve listened to/read, however, have more unanimously praised Simon Heldberg — who most of us know from The Big Bang Theory — as revelatory. And I’d largely agree, though I think the difference in character likability does skew that comparison. There’s a rare purity and sweetness he radiates — in stark contrast to Driver’s McHenry. His ability to sing to a puppet in a completely believable way is astounding.
Ah yes, the puppet. The title character, Annette, appears in puppet form for the majority of the film, and, this is definitely the most original, bold choice. Thematically it makes sense because both Henry and Ann use their daughter as a puppet in their marriage and Henry parades her around the world to perform like a puppet later on. As the Mike, Mike, and Oscar podcast noted, once a viewer can get past the initial weirdness of a puppet interacting with a cast of live actors, the puppeteers endear us to Annette in a way that I’m personally not entirely comfortable with. One of the Mikes said, “I would die for that puppet,” and, honestly, I’m not that far behind. Can we nominate a puppet for a Best Supporting Actress Oscar?
It seems this film has dragged me down into its vortex of madness. If you’re still reading this, I dare you to watch this film. And then let me know what you thought because I’m still trying to make sense of it.