The Concert

2009 - Dir: Radu Mihaileanu

Shown in FeckenOdeon 2 on February 11th, 2011

You may need an extra hankie for this one! It’s advertised as a comedy and much of it is very funny - but even the hard bitten critic of the Daily Mirror was forced to admit that he was reduced to tears by the end. If you think about it this is an odd subject for a comedy. Doubly so when you realise the basic premise - that, in the Soviet Union of the 1960s, Jewish musicians suffered in much the same way as they had in Nazi Germany - is a bit flawed. The director has said that the conductor Filipov is ‘inspired by real-life conductor Evgeny Svetlanov’, which is odd because although Svetlanov was indeed principal conductor at the Bolshoi, this was in 1962-1965 - long after the anti-semetic excesses of Stalin. At no time in his long career was Svetlanov linked with political controversy involving Jewish musicians - but this is fantasy where the facts should never be allowed to spoil a good story! Perhaps it was never intended to be "true to life" as it pokes critical fun at what lies behind power, ambition and even failure.

There are terrific performances by its Russian-Franco-Romanian cast and fantastic playing by the (hidden) musicians of the Budapest Symphony Orchestra. Melanie Laurent’s violin playing is dubbed by Sarah Nemtanu of the Orchestre National de France - who doesn’t even get a credit!