海角大神

In 鈥淔lorence Foster Jenkins,鈥� the supremely gifted Meryl Streep is聽playing a supremely ungifted singer with artistic ambitions. It鈥檚 official:聽Streep can play anything, even someone without a trace of talent.聽

Jenkins was a real-life 1940s New York socialite and heiress who gave聽small operatic recitals to invited guests handpicked for their discretion and聽willingness to applaud by her husband, St. Clair Bayfield (Hugh Grant).聽Because no one dared tell her how awful her voice sounded, Jenkins聽thrived in a bubble of delusion. The bubble popped when, despite聽Bayfield鈥檚 fierce protests, she gave a free public concert in 1944 for US聽Army servicemen in Carnegie Hall, risking public exposure and the wrath聽of critics. (Jenkins鈥檚 story was dramatized earlier in the Tony-nominated聽Broadway play 鈥淪ouvenir,鈥� the West End musical 鈥淕lorious!鈥� and,聽transposed to 1920s Paris, the recent French film 鈥淢arguerite.鈥�)

How are we to comprehend such a life? On its simplest level, Jenkins鈥檚聽story is a species of farce. With a voice pitched聽somewhere between an聽ear-splitting screech and the wail of a throttled goose, she is instantly聽risible. But not to herself, and there鈥檚 the rub. Jenkins, once a promising聽pianist, truly loves the music of Mozart and Verdi and Brahms. The聽classics, as she tells her fey, wide-eyed young piano accompanist, Cosme聽McMoon (the marvelous Simon Helberg, a regular on 鈥淭he Big Bang聽Theory鈥�), are what she lives for. And she means it literally. Diagnosed with聽syphilis, which she contracted from her first husband while still a young聽woman, Jenkins subsists on a precarious regimen of medicines and careful聽tending and good will. It is only when she is singing before an audience,聽or listening to a great singer like Lily Pons, that she is truly happy.

Her talent for singing may be nil, but her passion for great music is聽boundless. At the screening I attended, the audience convulsed in fits of聽laughter the first time Jenkins warbled 鈥� a moment the director Stephen聽Frears wisely withholds until about a half hour into the movie. But then a聽funny thing happened: Each time Jenkins subsequently sang, the laughter聽diminished a bit more, until, by the end, we were listening to her without聽mirth. Her ardor, if not her accomplishment, won us over.

This is another way of saying that, despite the rather misleading聽attempt on the part of its distributor to position this film as a high-brow聽laugh-riot, 鈥淔lorence Foster Jenkins鈥� is highly nuanced. It manages to be聽both flat-out hilarious and deeply melancholy, sometimes all at once. This聽is the most difficult combination to bring off, and Frears, aided by a聽marvelous screenplay by Nicholas Martin, somehow makes it look easy.

Perhaps this is because the filmmakers have an abiding love for the聽grand theatrical gesture, whether it issues from the talented or the聽talentless. The first scene in the movie features not Jenkins but her聽husband, as he warms up the invited audience with a soliloquy from聽鈥淗amlet.鈥� Bayfield, we learn, was once an actor, and, though acutely self-aware of his limitations, declaims the Bard鈥檚聽language in full thrall. Late in the film, Bayfield says that he gave up聽trying to be a great actor years ago and that this admission freed him of聽ambition, of 鈥渢he mockers and scoffers.鈥� It is those same scoffers from whom he vows聽to protect his wife. He understands the cruelties they can inflict and聽has no compunction about paying off critics or resorting to petty聽blackmail in order to perpetuate the deception.

鈥淔lorence Foster Jenkins鈥� is, among many other things, a stirring and聽improbable love story. Bayfield is endlessly solicitous of his wife even聽though, at night, he sleeps apart from her, in the apartment of a mistress聽(Rebecca Ferguson) that Florence, in another act of willed delusion, does聽not really acknowledge. He may seem like a bounder and an opportunist,聽but the marital relationship is much more complex than that. He genuinely聽adores Jenkins; that鈥檚 obvious in the hushed way he reads her to sleep at聽night with Shakespearean sonnets or rages when her feelings are trampled聽by the unfeeling.

Hugh Grant has come back in from the cold with this film. After too聽many lightweight turns tricked up with adorable tics and grimaces, he聽gives a tremendously knowing and resonant performance. We can see how聽Bayfield鈥檚 stiff upper lip rectitude serves as a poultice for his own聽disappointments in life; his commitment to his wife, to her muse, is more聽than just a charade. To his astonishment, no doubt, it has become his own聽reason for being. He is the custodian of her courage.聽

Streep has over the years become, in addition to everything else, a聽wonderful comic actress. Comedy was the one weapon I thought missing聽in her formidable arsenal until she had that scene in 鈥淎daptation鈥� where聽she imitates a phone's dial tone while getting high inhaling plant powder. She can be fearlessly聽loosey-goosey. But what is fearless about her performance in 鈥淔lorence聽Foster Jenkins鈥� is how she never once falls for the easy, wink-wink effect.聽When Jenkins is singing, she isn鈥檛 some camp diva; she鈥檚 the highest聽embodiment of our most outrageous aspirations. (Streep, who normally聽has a fine voice, does her own singing, and she does an amazing job of聽never quite hitting the right note.)

There is great affection in what she does here, and also great sadness. In聽the film鈥檚 most quietly beautiful scene, she visits the startled McMoon in聽his disheveled apartment and proceeds to gently admonish him as she聽washes his dirty dishes. We recognize, without any underscoring, that she聽is lonely and that he has become her close friend. They quietly sit down聽at his piano and together play Chopin鈥檚 Prelude in E Minor. Theirs is a聽love story, too.

When Jenkins dismisses the warnings that the Carnegie Hall聽appearance could seriously imperil her health, she adds, 鈥淭hen I shall die聽happy. Death has been my constant companion.鈥� The way Streep plays it,聽there is no false nobility in the pronouncement. It is simply what this聽woman believes.聽Throughout the film, Frears avoids sentimentality as聽unerringly as Jenkins misses the right note. It would have easy for him to聽dramatize the Carnegie Hall concert as a wall-to-wall love fest, but many聽in the raucous audience have little tolerance for sentiment. The film鈥檚 one聽overwhelmingly moonstruck moment comes near the end, when Jenkins,聽near death, imagines herself onstage singing in perfect pitch. It鈥檚 a聽consummation of everything that has come before 鈥� a fantasia of art as an聽idealized version of life.

It鈥檚 possible, I suppose, especially if one is a professional critic, to聽object to the film鈥檚 implication that a no-talent is vindicated by her聽passion for art. In the movie鈥檚 one false note, Frears presents us with a聽critic, the columnist Earl Wilson (海角大神 McKay), who is portrayed as a聽villainous cur for daring to print the truth about Jenkins鈥檚 singing. And yet聽surely there were critics who felt that, by slamming Jenkins鈥檚 mangling of聽Mozart, they were serving their own passion for what music should be.

My objection functions on a different plane from what is best in the聽movie, which finally is about the person, not the artist. If we fail to聽respond to Jenkins鈥檚 desire for transcendence, if we laugh it away, or聽savage it, it is only ourselves, our frailties, that we are backing away from.鈥淔lorence Foster Jenkins鈥� isn鈥檛 really about how passion trumps art. It鈥檚聽about how life is more important than art. Grade:聽A (Rated聽PG-13 for brief suggestive material.)