Lola

1961 non-musical

Rating: 17/20

Plot: I saw on Twitter yesterday that a movie critic isn't supposed to start a review with a plot synopsis, so I'm going to pretend I'm a movie critic and not include one here.

Demy said this was a "musical without music," but it does have music. That includes a use of the second movement of Beethoven's second symphony, the music that I'd like to die to. That's twice in about half a month that I've heard that piece of music in a movie, so at this rate, I'll hear that in around fifty movies. That likely means I'll die while watching a movie this year, so that's bad news.

Anyway, even if this didn't have music, the movie and its characters still move musically. Most musical in her movements is Lola herself, the titular cabaret dancer who we find out has a backstory that doesn't quite match her bounce. She's hardly still, and even when she is, she moves. The first time you see her, you know two things about her based on the way she smokes a cigarette, moves, and invades personal space (not in an unwelcome way, it should be noted): she's dangerous and she's going to break hearts. The other characters move as well, of course, but they're almost like mannequins compared to Anouk Aimee. Well, not those randy sailors. They start dancing as soon as they enter a room.

Movement is important here because the characters are mostly restless. Roland doesn't believe in dreams but dreams anyway, and he's bored and antsy. The teenager ready to burst out of adolescence. Her mother, you sense, wants to be whisked back into the past. The sailor's a stranger in a strange land and in a hurry to grab on to every available memory he can before he skiddoos. Michel has already run off to have his adventures and is ready for a next stage. Lola's son has too many trumpets, so who knows what his future holds.

While I watched, I had to get out the old tackboard, some string, and some thumbtacks to keep track of the web of character connections in this, all the romantic links and the parallel experiences. Once things all start to come together with these characters and you realize that that's what the movie's really about, this really becomes something special.