La Mome (La Vie En Rose): A Film Review

The tumultuous life of French chanteuse Edith Pilaf is brought to the screen in the French film La Mome, released in the United States this past year as La Vie en Rose and now available on DVD. Directed by Olivier Dahan and starring Marion Cotillard as Edith, the film is a sometimes grim, sometimes uplifting, and always haunting tale of a complex, fascinating human being.

Edith Piaf could be both likable and unlikable. Her strong will and determination often turned to anger directed against strangers, friends, relatives and business associates alike. She often felt tortured and lonely, and was definitely self-destructive through alcohol and drug abuse. She was also sensitive, passionate, tender, generous, spiritual, and loyal to friends. She is most remembered today for singing two of the most haunting songs ever written: La vie en rose (which she also wrote) and Non, je ne regrettes rien. Her life was her music and her intense, strongly driven, raw passionate powered voice resonates as much today as it did fifty and more years ago.

Born Edith Gassion in 1915, her mother was a street singer and her father was a circus and street acrobat. Abandoned by both at an early age she was left with her paternal grandmother who ran a Normandy bordello where she was raised for several years by prostitutes. She was a sickly child who became blind, and by some accounts deaf, as the result of her illnesses. She allegedly was made well again after a trip to the Shrine of St. Therese. As thanks, she wore a crucifix around her neck for the rest of her life. In her early and late teens she performed as a street singer, first with her re-united father and then on her own where she was discovered by cabaret owner Louis Leplee. It was he who named her La mome piaf (the Waif Sparrow) and introduced her to the general public. During this period she was also connected to the French underworld and following Leplee's murder was briefly considered a suspect. After his death, Raymond Asso became her mentor and taught her how to use hand and arm motions to add emotion to her singing.

After World War II, Edith slowly achieved international fame and met the true love of her life, the boxer Marcelle Cerdan, who would die tragically in a plane crash. By the end of the 1950s her always frail body, but not her haunting voice, began to succumb to the ravages of chemical abuse, arthritis, and liver cancer. The realization that she would never be able to perform again may have hastened her death in 1963.

As with Edith, there are many reasons to like and/or dislike this movie. First the negatives. Some viewers may be confused by Dahan's hop scotch style of presenting events. The film often leaps from one decade to another and back again with no warning to the viewer. This can be disconcerting and confusing to those not familiar with Piaf's life. Characters are introduced and then quickly disappear. Some important people in her life, such as Charles Aznavour, Jean Cocteau, and Marlene Dietrich are barely mentioned. Others like Yves Montand and Edith's strongly supportive second husband, Theo Sarapo, do not appear at all. Nor, is there a hint of the singer's work with the French underground during World War II.

However, La Vie en Rose's strong points greatly outweigh the weak ones. Dahan's non-linear technique of telling his story can be viewed as a reflection of Edith's own disjointed and often chaotic life. It can also be seen as a dying person thinking back on her life in bits and pieces. In fact, the movie is not a biography so much as a series of episodes and vignettes. His use of photography is beautiful in a technical sense. The scenes set in Piaf's early life and in down periods of her later life are dark, grimy and depressing. High points in her life such as when she is performing or when she is with Cerdan - the two true loves of her life - are photographed in more brilliant colors. The director also adds a touch of surrealism in two scenes. The first is when ten year old Edith sees an image of her beloved St. Therese in the sparks from a flame eater's torch and the second in the unique and compelling scene when she learns of Cerdan's death.

But, the strength of the movie is in the acting. Although many of the characters have only brief screen time, Emmanuelle Seigneras as a prostitute who has a positive influence on the young Edith; Sylvie Testud as her factory friend, Momone; Gerard Depardieu, in what is little more than a cameo role as her first mentor, Louis Leplee; and Jean-Pierre Martins as Marcelle Cerdan, are all very good. Both Manon Chevallier and Pauline Burletdo do nice jobs portraying Edith as a child. But the real Edith comes alive through the superb acting of Marion Cotillard. The thirty-two year old actress brings intensity to a complex role that few others could have achieved. She is thoroughly convincing whether playing Edith at the age of 20 or as the frail, dying woman of 47. Because of her portrayal, Ms. Cotillard presents a woman that we can't help but root for despite her many flaws. Her wrenching, exhausting performance is worthy of at least an Oscar nomination. It is not her that we see on the screen, it is Edith Piaf. In performing this feat she has created a real person for the viewer.

This film is recommended for anybody who likes French films, music, fine acting, biopics, or stories about strong women.