Music connects, music touches. Music is a wonderful thing. But when music becomes an obsession, it can also exert its power in rather negative ways. The film "The Concert" by Radu Mihaileanu ("Train of Life") shows in a humorous but also very moving way the power music can have over a person's life and how much it can enchant us.
Years ago Andreï Filipov (Alexeï Guskov) was a celebrated conductor. His work with the Bolshoi Orchestra was celebrated and revered by the public, as well as by the musicians who worked with him. Today, at the age of fifty, Andreï still works in the hallowed halls, in the Bolshoi Orchestra, though no longer as a conductor, but as a janitor. One day, when he learns that the director of the Téâtre du Châtelet in Paris wants to engage the orchestra for a major concert, he promptly accepts the request and hatches a crazy plan: he wants to gather the members of his old orchestra and travel to Paris with them to face his greatest challenge: the performance of Tchaikovsky's Concerto for Violin and Orchestra in D Major, op. 35.
Stupidly, the aged musicians have long since moved on to other professions, earning their bread and butter as mobile phone salesmen, furniture movers or taxi drivers. And yet Andreï manages to put together his very own Bolshoi Orchestra. And the young violinist Anne-Marie Jacquet (Mélanie Laurent), whom Andreï has requested as a soloist in Paris, has also agreed to participate. But even if everything seems to go smoothly at first, total chaos breaks out at the latest when the musicians arrive in Paris...
"The concert"was a great success in France. Over two million visitors and two Cesars, the French Oscar, speak for themselves. With a well-balanced mix of drama and comedy, it is easy for the film to play its way into the hearts of the audience. The humor of the film is sometimes melancholic, sometimes very tender, then again very direct and straightforward. But the whole thing never slips into silliness, never becomes flat. As a result, even the dramatic moments don't seem out of place, but fit very harmoniously into the proceedings.
So Andreï, even if some of his actions are very amusing, is more of a tragic figure, haunted by the ghosts of his past at every turn. What is amazing is that Mihaileanu manages to throw the viewer off the scent here, as one is quickly sure of the connection between the Russian conductor and the young French violinist. But even if these assumptions were correct and the film would be more predictable than it is in the end, "The Concert" would not be less successful. After all, the story the film actually wants to tell ends up being told primarily through the music, rather than the dialogue.
That doesn't necessarily make it a musical film, however. Rather, the music at the end is merely an expression of all that the plot and dialogue prepare in just under 100 minutes. At the end, director Mihaileanu takes the time to perform the wonderful piece by Taschaikowski in a very extended sequence. The intensity with which Andreï conducts the concert and with which Anne-Marie plays the piece is simply overwhelming and gives you thick goosebumps. A special praise to the actors, who really show a great performance here.
"The concert" is a moving good mood film, which relies less on thigh-slapping humor and more on the quiet tones, but plays them extremely powerful and convincing. That you leave the film as a viewer with music in your heart and a smile on your face, is definitely a good sign and reason enough that the conclusion is: absolutely recommendable!
Ein Artikel von Frankfurt-Tipp
