Review of Gainsbourg: A Heroic Life (2010) by Daniel P — 10 Aug 2010

I have to admit it is really difficult to be objective when you watch a movie about someone who was alive while you were a child or a teenager as your memory is still filled with his presence, his ups and downs and his unforgettable brilliant mind.

This film is not a thorough biopic and the world created by Joann Sfar is surprising and clever at the same time but you have to get more distant from the Serge Gainsbourg or Gainsbarre you knew to immerse into Sfar's creative world.

Laetitia Casta, Eric Elmosino deliver an amazing performance as it is once again so hard to fill the shoes of such well-known and charismatic people who are still perfectly alive in your memory. Nevertheless, I was deeply disappointed by Lucy Gordon's performance as Jane Birkin.

It didn't work for me at all. But their relationship is well-described. The big flaw of the movie is that the director tried to combine an imaginary world as part of Gainsbourg's mind and his actual life in just 2 hours and there were too many things to say, to describe, to dig in such a short time.

Could have been much better. I totally understand that Charlotte Gainsbourg didn't want to participate in or watch this movie as it must be so hard to see your own father dissected this way.