Accompanist Sings, 'If Music Be the Fruit of Love, Play On'

The Accompanist directed by Claude Miller starring Elena Safonova, Richard Bohringer and Romane Bohringer

"The Accompanist" is not a typical World War II flick. Though what action there is takes place in occupied France and war-torn London, reference to international conflicts serve only to illuminate the nature of individual characters. Focusing on Irene Brice (Elena Safonova), a diva on the brink of universal success, her husband Charles (Richard Bohringer), and her impoverished accompanist, Sophie Vasseur (Romane Bohringer), the movie--through lighting, facial close-ups, music, and symbols--studies personalities, not history.

The movie begins with a shot of the as-yet- unidentified Sophie ascending a staircase that appears much too wide for her small frame. She rises on stage. As she mounts the stairs, the orchestra accompanying Mme. Brice becomes increasingly audible, and when Sophie finally stands watching soprano and orchestra from the balcony, the audience sees the singer's face--closeup against black background--through her eyes. After the concert, Sophie proceeds backstage to introduce herself to Mme. Brice and request an audition, and is swept into the tumult of the soprano's life and her post-performance party.

This initial scene established both the tone and symbolism of the movie. Sophie, whom Irene hires, and who becomes the diva's personal maid as well as accompanist, is shown always in shadow, often in transit, and frequently on staircases. Indeed, her nondescript character becomes almost obtrusive in the film. Irene, by contrast, is invariably in the spotlight, observed not her elusive lover, Jacques (Samuel Labarthe). While Sophie is famished and shabbily dressed, a perpetual onlooker, Irene, the consummate actress, is adorned with smiles and the white dress she will wear in performance throughout the movie. Though the characters appears exceedingly dissimilar in these respects, they do evince integral internal similarities.

For a film that concentrates on characterization, "The Accompanist" is surprisingly spares in dialogue. This dearth is amply commpensated through visual and musical means. Frequently the camera focused on the face of a single character of several seconds at a time, revealing subtle change of expression music, as in one scene in which Irene and Sophie rehearse. In this episode, unlike those of most movies featuring piano players, the camera picks out only the characters' faces, not even expending a single shot on Sophie's hands.

This type of representation is quite effective in the context of "The Accompanist." The film constantly thwarts the desires of the audience to enter into the though process of a specific individual .Irene is seen only from the outside, through the eyes of her husband and Sophie, while Sophie herself, who, almost pressed into the position of indentured servant, should be the most sympathetic character, seems so devoid of human emotion that she is as colorless in personality as in visual depiction. The audience perceives the principal characters as they perceive each other, solely through sight and sound.

The one person whose feelings the viewers can perhaps understand, is Charles Brice, Irene's husband, whom Richard Bohringer play as only truly nuanced characters. As the movie progresses, it becomes increasingly apparent that he is utterly devoted to his rather unappreciative wife; at one point he risks himself to save her from enemy fire, and another he affection is excessive, though. Because of it, he is labelled a "collaborator," having arranged concerts for his wife in Vichy, and through it he is ultimately destroyed.

Two other subsidiary characters occupy themselves almost exclusively with "principles" above personal affairs. One is Irene's lover Jacques, who, though a member of the Resistance, has no concern for other individual 's lives and tells Irene that he would willingly kill her husband to secure their happiness together. The other principled characters is Benoit Weizman, a young Jewish communist and aspiring Resistance fighter whom Sophie meets when travelling from Portugal to London. These who characters and their relationships with Irene and Sophie respectively, illuminate both affinities and distinctions between the diva and accompanist.

Irene's life, while eventful, is reliable. The lyrics to a song she sings repeatedly throughout the movie translate as, "Tell me that I'm beautiful, that I'll be beautiful forever." Husband, lover and Sophie are always eager to maintain this fact, and the movie several times cuts from Irene's face to the statue of an angle above the London pub of that name. Despite her demanding and abrasive personality, Irene assumes a semi-divine status, the image of the perfection to those surrounding her: on the other hand, leads a temporary and contingent existence. She will retain her somewhat exalted only so long as she remains within the ambit of Irene. Likewise, her love affairs, if they could be so called, are brief, occuring between the end-points of a voyage; one takes place in the corridor of a train, and the other in the hold of a boat.

Both Benoit and Jacques, the two women's "lovers," are, however, willing to risk themselves for the principle of freedom, not for the love of a single woman. This similarity corresponds to a similarity in the personalities of Irene and Sophie. Irene assert during one of her first meetings with Sophie that "Your eyes show you can be very tough. That doesn't bother me; I see the same look in the mirror every morning." The face of the individual, important throughout, here forces audience and characters to recognize internal likenesses. Indeed, one is made to realize throughout the movie that, had circumstances been altered, and Sophie endowed with a more appealing visage, she would not have different significantly from Irene; the way Sophie treats her mother is even less gracious than the way Irene behaves towards Sophie.

The two women who play Irene and Sophie, Elena Safonova and Romane Bohringer make do quite well with the faces with which they have been endowed. Bohringer's expression is convincingly impenetrable and Safonova's face when singing on stage is the flexible mask of an actress. Safonova, however, portrays Irene too personably in her private life; she does not behave as contemptibly towards Sophie as her words suggest she should, and not content with her concert audience's attention, she arrogates foe herself too much of the film audience's allegiance somewhat, it does not significantly disturb the balance of the film.

Yes, "The Accompanist" is another French film featuring voyeurism and a diva, but with a twist. Seducing the audience with vibrant singing, the film suggests that voyeur and diva are not inherently dissimilar, but are separated by the constraints of nature and circumstance.