Review

Here's another rave for Cotillard, this time from The Post and Courier. Side note: I have to say, this blog has opened my eyes to just how many media outlets there are out there. I mean, I normally keep to the New York Times, the Washington Post, Vanity Fair, and Time. If I'm feeling a bit fresh, I will venture onto the USA Today website, no shame in that. But this is insane. Jeez.

In any case, here's a taste:

Marion Cotillard takes the role of a lifetime, one writ large, and makes it her own. Her portrait of Piaf is one for the ages, as much alchemy as performance. The same actress who stood eye to eye with Russell Crowe in "A Good Year" seems to have diminished in height right before our eyes, channeling then becoming the diminutive Piaf across a range of age from her 20s to her death, grievously ill and decrepit at only 48. Even in youth Piaf was stooped, slumped-shouldered, with huge, haunted eyes. Cotillard gets it all, impeccably. Not since Albert Finney played Hercule Poirot to the hilt in "Murder on the Orient Express" has an actor worked this kind of magic on screen. But the physical, impressive as it is, takes back seat to a tour de force of emotional range. If from time to time the work feels a trifle over the top, well, so was Piaf. More...