SILENTS ARE GOLDEN (THE ARTIST)

It's the silent movie that has been making a huge noise during the awards season.

Michel Hazanivicius' 'The Artist' has been wowing critics ever since it premiered at last year's Cannes Film Festival.

And last night it further boosted its Oscar frontrunner credentials after it scooped the Best Picture (Musical or Comedy) and Best Actor (Musical or Comedy) at the Golden Globes.

But is this French-made movie worth all the hype? 

Unquestionably.

In a year when Steven Spielberg and Martin Scorsese have been paying their debts to their cinematic forefathers, 'The Artist' is a daring concoction that harks back to a golden age of silent cinema, yet celebrates talking pictures with a message that is hugely relevant to the audiences of today.

Hazanivicius' film begins with a silent movie icon, George Valentin (Jean Dujardin) riding the crest of a wave.

His latest movie 'A Russian Affair' has the audience on its feet at its Hollywood premiere. Valentin - who is one part Rudolph Valentino, one part Douglas Fairbanks - milks the adulation for all its worth along with his canine sidekick, Uggie.

As he meets adoring fans and an equally fawning press scrum after the premiere, a young Hollywood hopeful Peppy Miller (Berenice Bejo) literally stumbles into his spotlight and ends up being catapulted to stardom.

But whereas Valentin refuses to embrace change in the form of talking movies, Peppy Miller immediately adapts to the new era as she embarks on her career. 

While Valentin is busy rehashing the romantic action films that made him the leading silent movie actor of his generation, Peppy Miller is making a crowd pleasing talkie which eclipses his movie when it is released on the same day.

In a devastating sequence, Valentin's first and only film as an actor-director plays only to a handful of people while audiences queue around the block outside the cinema next door for Peppy's film.

In the perfect visual metaphor, Valentin's character in his own movie drowns in quicksand in a downbeat ending, while audiences revel next door in the relentless charm of Peppy's upbeat talkie film.

And so, while he goes from riches to rags, Peppy follows a different trajectory. Pride really does come before a fall as Valentin loses his studio contract, his marriage, his mansion and the trappings of fame.

At the heart of Hazanavicius' silent film is a message that is as relevant to the world of commerce today as Brad Pitt's recent dialogue driven baseball film, 'Moneyball' - adapt to changing consumer tastes and technology or you will go out of business.

Hazanavicius pulls this off without being too preachy and with a film that has bucket loads of charm and plenty of humour. 

He is helped by a fantastic lead performance by the hitherto unknown (outside of France) Jean Dujardin who not only channels the spirit of Valentino and Fairbanks but also Charlie Chaplin, Orson Welles, Gene Kelly, David Niven and Maurice Chevalier.

Argentine-born Berenice Bejo is equally impressive with her pitch perfect performance as the appropriately named Peppy, lighting up the screen with her beauty, her optimism and enthusiasm.

Dujardin and Bejo have worked before in Hazanavicius' French spy spoof 'OSS 117: Cairo, Nest of Spies' and there is no doubt the screen chemistry between them fuels the bubbling romance between their characters.

But while the two leads are the undoubted stars of the show, it is also a joy to watch famous Hollywood character actors revelling in the challenge of silent film acting.

James Cromwell is delightful as Valentin's loyal butler, Clifton. John Goodman shines as the studio boss Al Zimmer. There's a lovely cameo by Malcolm McDowell on a film set and Penelope Ann Miller rises to the occasion as Valentin's estranged wife, Doris.

And then there's Uggie - Hollywood's best canine performer since the dogs, Moose and Enzo played Eddie in the television sitcom 'Frasier'.

'The Artist' may be a love letter to the artistry of silent cinema but it is arguably more enamoured with talkies.

In fact, the movie is peppered with in-jokes and references to many classic sound films.

While at times 'The Artist' may evoke the playfulness of Chaplin in 'The Gold Rush' or the silent era melodrama of FW Murnau's beautiful 'Sunrise', it most resembles 'Singin' In The Rain' and 'A Star Is Born' while riffing on 'Citizen Kane' - not least in its use of a breakfast table montage to show the decline in Valentin's marriage.

There are echoes of 'Sunset Boulevard' in the mansion Valentin calls home and the butler who recalls Erich von Stroheim's Max who works for Gloria Swanson's deluded silent film star in Billy Wilder's Hollywood satire.

However it would be wrong to assume Hazanavicius has simply come up with a patchwork quilt of movie references and in-jokes.

The director carefully constructs his own memorable images, laden with huge symbolism - not least in the scene when Valentin runs into Peppy on his way down a three tier staircase after he has been let go by the studio.

She is naturally on her way up and passes him by before catching his eye and conducting a conversation, with Valentin gazing up in awe at her.

There is also a remarkable nightmare sequence as Valentin dreams about the advent of sound and a wonderful scene where a drunken Valentin no longer casts a shadow on a projection screen.

There is some wonderful cinematography from Guillaume Schiffman, clever film editing by Hazanavicius and Anne-Sophie Bion and a wonderful musical score by Ludovic Bource which at one point borrows Bernard Herrmann's score from Alfred Hitchcock's 'Vertigo'.

All this makes for a fascinating contest in the coming weeks in the run-up to the Oscars between Hazanavicius, Alexander Payne's 'The Descendants' (the other big Golden Globes winner last night) and Martin Scorsese who scooped Best Director for 'Hugo'.

But regardless of whether the film lifts Academy Awards, 'The Artist' is already a huge triumph - proving classic visual storytelling is very much alive.

And if it switches on a new generation of moviegoers to classic Hollywood movies - whether they are silent or talkies - that will be one hell of a legacy.

Northern Ireland's multiplex chains have thus far adopted a cautious approach to 'The Artist' - opting to wait and see if the movie goes on to Oscar glory before screening it.

But why wait for the Oscars?

Beat a path right now to Belfast's Queen Film Theatre for the most uplifting cinematic experience for many years and revel in a showbiz story that is full of heart.

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