Indie Film Release Guide: April 21st [An ONTD Original]

[scriptedending]

Comments

[little_vienna]

Oop re: the 'What you should know on' Chevalier, lol. I'm going to see it tomorrow. It's going to be hard to write about because based on the write-ups and reviews from TIFF, and the marketing/interviews/talkbacks I've watched, I get what they're doing. I get the themes. It's just... those themes don't apply to Joseph Bologne in the way they want them to, and pretending that they do is not doing justice to this historical figure.

Notably, suddenly the marketing PR lines all include admitting how it's heavily fictionalized, pulling from myth/rumor, when leading up to the past 2 weeks (and you can see this when you watch the featurettes) the marketing was mostly about how they're telling the "real history" of his "untold story."

Also the film as well as the marketing keeps pushing the myth that Napoleon banned and/or erased his music, which there is zero evidence for. And weirdly enough, the biography that Stefani Robinson cited in an article as being the first step specifically points out that the Napoleon claim is unsupported, and even specifically points out how the notion that Bologne was "forgotten" by history is not really accurate, either.

[sandstorm]

Hm. I listened to an interview with the director/writer on BoxOfficePodcast last week and while I don't remember what they said, I don't remember them touching too much on the validity of the story.

[little_vienna]

This recent one that came to mind.

Specifically:

“Every piece of information I could find [on Bologne] was helpful,” Robinson said. “I did my best to fact-check, but taking in things that might not have been true, rumors or contradictory facts about him, was useful. Anything that crashed the myth and legend of this person.”

From the beginning, Robinson and Williams agreed that Chevalier would not be a traditional biopic. “We thought of the film as a mash-up of what actually happened and a series of imaginings that we thought were truthful and, hopefully, spiritually honored Joseph Bologne.”

Which just, to me, contradicts what's been said in the featurettes and earlier marketing--that they wanted to tell his story, bring him into the forefront, etc. But they're not really doing that with this film with how much they've changed or made up, especially in regards to taking Bologne's achievements in real life and giving them to white people instead. Such as in real life, Bologne earned the title of chevalier on his own merit by graduating from a royal academy in 1766--before Marie Antoinette set foot in France. In the film, Marie Antoinette giddily bestows the title on him in the 1770s so that he can be at court.

[little_vienna]

Also I ranted back in November about my primary issues about how the film treats Bologne's story. I'm excited, though, to finally see the full film and not just go by write-ups, reviews, and clips.

[tillychar]

ooh, i appreciated this insight. i'm planning to watch it so it'll be helpful to do so with this in mind!

[cherrynorth]

Great read, thank you for sharing

[drnilescrane]

lol i remembered your original rant and that's why i'm going to wait for it to hit streaming.