THE ARTIST

A GREAT SILENT FILM ABOUT... GREAT SILENT FILMS

he Artist is a kind of miracle, an odd and unexpectedly delightful gift from the movie gods. Written and directed by Michel Hazanavicius, a Frenchman best known in this country for. . . well, he's not really known in this country at all; but American-centric my opia notwithstanding, he has made what to my knowledge is the most enjoyable silent film in decades. (Ha ha: no, it's not the only silent film in decades.)

Set appropriately in a 1920s Hollywood poised on the brink of talkies, The Artist is a mash-up of Singin' in the Rain and A Star Is Born, with wall-to-wall music but, naturally, no actual singin'. The Norman Maine downward career trajectory belongs here to George Valentin, a manly action star possessed of a trademark roguish grin (think Douglas Fairbanks); the film's ascendant Vicki Lester is a skinny bundle of flapper energy with the Rialto-ready name Peppy Miller. (This pair is played by the French him stars Jean Dujardin and Berenice Bejo. More familiar faces, such as those belonging to John Goodman and Malcolm McDowell, round out the cast.) George and Peppy's story is told with physical grace and ah due period-appropriate melodrama. Fortunately, the only real tragedy is the broader one of what him lost when it gained voice—a glorious "silence" to which The Artist and its sublimely ironic ending serve as not-so-mute testament.

BRUCE HANDY