Florence Foster Jenkins

source: Florence Foster Jenkins

Meryl Streep as Florence Foster Jenkins in the true story about a rich woman who had no idea she's the worst classical singer of all time. Like Ed Wood, she was full of confidence, but unlike him she lived in a lie, being fooled by everyone around her. Unfortunately, unlike the movie ED WOOD, the story is very thin. The characters have no depth and the movie doesn't tell you a lot more than the little that you may know before watching it, simply because there isn't much more than that. Like the real characters, the story is flat and predictable. Meryl Streep is OK in her role, but since the character has no depth, it's not that impressive. The only thing that is amazing about this whole story is how a person could be so delusional about her lack of talent. The singing in the movie may seem exaggerated for comical effect, but this is actually as bad as the real Florence sang and it was that awful, butchering one classical piece at a time. If you want to see a wonderful movie about a person who devoted his life for his passion, but unfortunately lacked any talent, watch Ed Wood instead. With Hugh Grant and Simon Helberg.

I was umming and ahing for quite some time whether to see this or not after first hearing about it, and once I saw the first trailer. But as it was directed by Stephen Frears, I felt that was enough to give it a go. Also, anything starring Meryl Streep is worth thinking about seeing at least. Also, the trailers seemed to purposefully hide her voice as that is the main part of the story. That was good marketing as I feel it will attract to hear how bad her voice really is. Some of you may have already seen a film earlier this year with the same story called Marguerite. Sadly, I did not. But it is always a fascinating thing when two films are released pretty close to each other talking about the same thing. One recent example was when Snow White And The Hunstman, and Mirror Mirror: The Untold Adventures Of Snow White were released in 2012 a couple of months apart. I don't know how these things happen, but it always a nice topic to discuss. It is not often that I see a film at the cinema that gives me a lot of laughs as most straight-out comedies do not appeal to me. But I can now add this one to the small list. I have been fascinated by this true story since I heard about this and Marguerite being made. The film does explain that in parts. But I think it is comedy that was winning me over early on. For the rest of the film, I had a big smile of my face and was pretty satisfied with how everything ended in the end. I really liked the old fashioned feel to it and I can see it being a big winner with the elderly cinema-goers. Also, the production design of the time period was great to look at. It is set in 1940's New York and it felt great to look at with the steam flying off the street and the style of cars was a delight to witness. Meryl Streep and Hugh Grant are wonderful together and are the biggest draw out of the other performances. I appreciate Streep's performances more than love them. However, I really liked this particular leading role. It is probably because the performances reminded me so much of the character of Hyacinth Bucket from the sitcom, Keeping Up Appearances. Hugh Grant was great and made me forget how good an actor he is, especially in comedies. His posh British voice fitted into the time period perfectly and you can feel that Grant was born into the wrong era. Simon Helberg was a real crowd-pleaser as the main supporting role. I was really happy to see Rebecca Ferguson back on the big screen. She was brilliant in Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation, and I am glad to see she her getting noticed. The only negatives worth mentioning was probably some of the running gags in the film felt like they were running out of steam towards the end. Also, there was a small part to Streep's character that I did not like about. So there was a part of the film where I could not sympathise to root for the character. But all in all, I had a very good time. It was certainly a good decision to go and see it in the end. It was a lot funner then I thought it would be and the strong performances of Streep and Grant certainly helped that. It does have a sitcom style of approach to the story and I think that will please the audience and will do well in the box office. However, I still don't feel that they explained how the main character became so popular or why she is much loved. But I will still recommend this, especially if you are in the mood for a few laughs.

Initially, this movie did not work for me. The set and costume design were impeccable and the structure and basic story were solid. But I just felt that the acting was over-blown, the chemistry between the actors was non existent, and the script did not zing or engage you. But I got a better grasp of the movie the second time I saw it. And I realised that terrible opera singer and socialite Florence Foster Jenkins (Meryl Streep) was a kind of hero. After a disastrous early life in which her father died and her first husband gave her syphilis, Jenkins used an inheritence to become a patron of the arts. She organised concerts, put herself out there and followed her dreams. Yes, the movie does make fun of Jenkins' off-key performances, but it also explores some ideas, such as how people delude themselves, and how other people support their delusions. Also how people use and deceive others for their own ends -- Florence's husband St Clair Bayfield (a brilliant Hugh Grant) comes across as a terrible cad, flagrantly keeping a mistress in an apartment Florence pays for, while pretending to adore Florence in exchange for a comfortable lifestyle. But he claims that Florence is aware of all this -- so is she also using him? And is it her friends, or Florence herself, who created the culture where no one was brave enough to tell the rich lady the truth? In many cases, it suited people financially to protect her delusions, and admittedly it created some absurd situations.

Sometimes true love/friendship just tells the truth. I felt so sorry for Florence, ill with syphilis, probably tone deaf to her excruciating singing and so "protected" by her faithless husband and others in her generous employ, that she ended up making an utter fool of herself. How cruel to have to find out the truth at the scathing hands of the Post critic. I can't help but compare this "based on actual events" story with recent similarly true releases; Lion, A United Kingdom, Queen of Katwe, all worth spending the dollars and time to bring to the screen and a wider audience. I see this production as just creating a wider audience to laugh at Florence, not matter how you dress it up as her joy of life etc people are YouTubing to laugh at her horrendous recordings. My take home message from this: be kind, gentle etc but tell the truth, it's so much kinder in the long run.

It would be both foolish and inaccurate to describe Meryl Streep as anything but a fine actress and nor do I begrudge Stephen Frears the right to earn a crust - with only a journeyman talent he needs all the help he can get - but I would probably have enjoyed this film more had I not already seen the superior Marguerite, released in 2015 and already awarded Four Cesars (the French 'Oscar') including Best Actress, Catherine Frot as the eponymous leading lady. Marguerite was a lightly fictionalised version of Florence Foster Jenkins with minimum effort to conceal the fact. Marguerite is based in Paris in the 1920s where Marguerite Dupont is a wealthy society hostess with a delusion that she is a gifted Opera singer and a husband and group of friends who go along with her lack of self-awareness and shield her from the ridicule of the rest of the world until she decides to give a concert at the Opera House in Paris. The real Florence Foster Jenkins did more or less exactly the same thing except that she hired Carnegie Hall in 1944. The biggest crime that the producers of Florence Foster Jenkins are guilty of is a cynical and ruthless attempt to erase Marguerite out of existence. The FFJ PR has been in full flow during the last few weeks with Streep working overtime on talk shows and in print to promote the film whilst Marguerite played a handful of unheralded performances at Cine Lumiere in March. When I caught Marguerite in Paris in December and reviewed it on this very site I predicted that FFJ would draw all the attention largely because of Streep and it seems I was correct. Catherine Frot does not need to take a back seat to Meryl Streep, she is equally accomplished, equally versatile and is also a fine stage actress. The same may be said of Isabelle Huppert who also fell victim to UK rip-off when Mike Leigh ripped-off the Claude Chabrol-Huppert movie Une affaire de femmes more or less in reverse fashion: Une affaire de femmes was based on the last woman to be guillotined in France, during World War Two. Her 'crime' was to help French women abort German foetuses. Mike Leigh's Vera Drake transplanted the action from France to England and moved the time forward to the 1950s otherwise he just replicated Chabrol- Huppert. Leaving no stone unturned FFJ even 'borrows' the idea of the risible/grotesque/weird accompanist portrayed by Victor Buono in Whatever Happened To Baby Jane, down to the initial horror when first he hears his 'boss', respectively Bette Davis and Meryl Streep 'sing' and a final nod by FFJ to the superior Marguerite comes at the end when Streep is shot from behind, standing centre stage wearing the huge 'angel' feathered wings. If this rip-off encourages punters to seek out Marguerite it will have served some purpose.

The film is based on the true story of the New York socialite Florence Foster Jenkins. In 1944 she hired Carnegie Hall to perform as a soprano soloist. With no musical ability whatsoever but a large inheritance to enable her to indulge her love of performing, Florence Foster Jenkins becomes an unwitting musical clown which sustains the comedy throughout the film. The character is played with gentle comic affection by Meryl Streep. Hugh Grant is well cast as Florence's doting and enabling husband St Clair Bayfield. It is to Grant's charisma and acting ability that he is able to portray an adulterous scoundrel who is milking his wife's inheritance and turn it into a devoted and loving husband. His brilliant charm offensive is one of the remarkable things about the movie. Hazel Finn

This the true story of a New York heiress who became an opera singer despite her painful to the ears voice, and complete lack of technique. It is not a bad movie per se, but I regret I saw it, and I advise you to avoid it. There are a lot of things that bothered me. First of all, it is 24h since I saw (and heard) Meryl Streep singing purposely out of key, and it still brings me the chills. Honestly, after the initial laugh, her discordant voice it sticks in your head in a bad way. Secondly, this is a truly sad story, for so many reasons. I write a spoiler-free review, but the deceit, the lies, the adultery, the sordidness of the people surrounding this delusional (not to mention seriously ill) rich woman, is disturbing. Some people might see a "love story" in this, but believe you me that is not true. And there are no morals here. Quite the opposite. Performances from Streep and Grant are OK, but not from the trained musician Simon Helberg, who has the exact tone of voice and mannerism of his character in "The Big Bang Theory". Overall: A true story which is mostly sad. Not a bad movie but, for the reasons above, I advise you to avoid it.

This is an unusually sick, sad and true-life story about a bunch of "sick" opportunistic people who took advantage of a mentally and, perhaps, physically sick woman merely because she was wealthy and demented and had no sense of what a fool she had become. I can find no redeeming quality to the movie. It was not enjoyable, enlightening, or educational; it was just SICK! It you want to watch it once, go ahead. But I, for one, didn't like seeing a person being made a clown of simply because her disease made her engage in clownish behavior. If you want to see a freak show, go to the carnival--not the movies. I have enjoyed Meryl Streep's work for decades and have loved her talent for taking on the roles of people we know and remember well. But, I have never seen her demean a real person as she did in this movie. Here, she portrayed Florence Foster Jenkins in 1944 at the age of 76. Jenkins was a wealthy person who had contracted syphilis from her first husband, Dr. Frank Thornton Jenkins, at about the age of 18. After finding out she had contacted syphilis from him, she reportedly divorced him and never spoke of him again—although she did (privately) in movie. She did, however, retain his surname. Her second husband, St Clair Bayfield (Hugh Grant), takes advantage of her money and lack of self-knowledge about how terrible her singing ability really was. Later her pianist, Cosme McMoon (Simon Helberg), does the same thing. (Good people don't let their loved ones make fools of themselves, but they did.) However, it was not just the people closest to her who lived off of her and laughed at her. There were many famous people of the day that were also enjoying her sick foolishness too. These people included Arturo Toscanini (John Kavanagh), Lily Pons, Cole Porter, Tallulah Bankhead, and even Enrico Caruso (not portrayed in the movie). Many of these same people came to Carnegie Hall to hear her make a fool of herself. According to Wikipedia: "At the age of 76, Jenkins finally yielded to public demand and booked Carnegie Hall for a general-admission performance on October 25, 1944. Tickets for the event sold out weeks in advance; the demand was such that an estimated 2,000 people were turned away at the door.[20] Numerous celebrities attended, including Porter, Marge Champion, Gian Carlo Menotti, Kitty Carlisle and Lily Pons with her husband, Andre Kostelanetz, who composed a song for the recital. McMoon later recalled an "especially noteworthy" moment: " (When she sang) 'If my silhouette does not convince you yet/My figure surely will' (from Adele's aria in Die Fledermaus), she put her hands righteously to her hips and went into a circular dance that was the most ludicrous thing I have ever seen. And created a pandemonium in the place. One famous actress had to be carried out of her box because she became so hysterical." Since ticket distribution was out of Jenkins's control for the first time, mockers, scoffers, and critics could no longer be kept at bay. The following morning's newspapers were filled with scathing, sarcastic reviews that devastated Jenkins, according to Bayfield. "(Mrs. Jenkins) has a great voice," wrote the New York Sun critic. "In fact, she can sing everything except notes ... Much of her singing was hopelessly lacking in a semblance of pitch, but the further a note was from its proper elevation the more the audience laughed and applauded." The New York Post was even less charitable: "Lady Florence ... indulged last night in one of the weirdest mass jokes New York has ever seen. This, to me, is a callous thing to do. I think the movie is callous too. This is not a comedy, it is pathos. Laughing at this movie would be a bit like laughing while watching The Elephant Man.

Florence Foster Jenkins is a wealthy New Yorker who lives for music. Her husband StClair enthusiastically indulges her passion: she sings for the musical appreciation club she has created, and they all love her. The only thing is, well, she's not very good. But she's harmless and kind and tries her very best, so everyone (including her new pianist accompanist, Cosme McMoon) goes along with her. And she doesn't seem to be aware (or worried) about the fact that St Clair spends very night at another apartment with his mistress. Based on a real person, this film tells the story of a woman whose talent so woefully falls short of her ambition that the result is funny, yet she would be mortified if she realised that is what people actually thought. StClair cushions her from the unkindness which would otherwise come her way: this protects her, but also encourages her to push her (lack of) talent further, to the extent that she arranges a concert at Carnegie Hall which will inevitably expose her to press hostility. This is the dramatic heart of the film, the story of which is otherwise relatively slight. Having said that, there is a similarity between this film and Eddie The Eagle – superficially they appear to celebrate mediocrity but they actually celebrate the indomitability of the human spirit (see also Ed Wood). We already knew Meryl Streep can sing: here we found out how brilliantly she can't sing, too: this is an hilarious portrait of someone who specialises in being half a tone out just when she needed not to be, who knows what technique ought to be but can't actually manage it (but thinks she can). This is Les Dawson piano playing, parlayed into operetta. She makes Florence wonderfully human. I also loved Simon Helberg, going from Beatle-wigged nerd in The Big Band Theory to brilliantined accompanist with a very funny line in reaction shots. Oh, and the lad is not bad on piano either. There are some nice turns in the supporting cast, especially Nina Arianda as common-as-muck nouveau riche Brooklyn wife Agnes Stark. But, for me, this film belonged to Hugh Grant. His quasi-aristocratic StClair, gracefully (for the most part) balancing his support for Florence with his parallel life with mistress Kathleen, it is a nuanced performance of humour, skill and kindness – I was never in doubt about how truly he loved Florence. This was an excellent film.