We haven’t heard any music from the film, nor seen any imagery, but just based on the talent involved, “Annette” is one of our most anticipated films of 2020. How could you possibly go wrong with actors such as Adam Driver and Marion Cotillard teaming with filmmaker Leos Carax to film a musical written by the musical band Sparks? It sounds almost too good to be true.
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And in new interviews, both members of Sparks talk about what film fans can expect, and they do nothing but hype this film up even more.
“We’ve wanted to do a movie musical for a really long time,” Ron Mael said, in an interview with KMUW. “We had worked on this radio project, ‘The Seduction of Ingmar Bergman’ and hoped to get that made into a film. About eight years ago we had written ‘Annette,’ which is a narrative thing. It isn’t discreet songs like a typical Sparks album. We thought it might be an album and a live presentation but we went to Cannes that year to pitch ‘The Seduction of Ingmar Bergman’ and met with the French director Leos Carax, who had used one of our songs in his film ‘Holy Motors.’”
He continued, “When we got back to L.A., we sent him ‘Annette’ and he was interested. Things take a really long time to come together but it’s been amazing. It stars Adam Driver and Marion Cotillard. It was supposed to be premiered at Cannes this year. Unfortunately, Cannes has been delayed and downsized. I think maybe the film will be shown at the Venice and Toronto Film Festivals if those are still on in the fall.”
The musician added that “Annette” isn’t your typical film musical, which can be expected given the music that Sparks creates, as well as the previous work from Carax.
“It’s really special,” he explained. “It’s different than a normal movie musical, as you might expect coming from us. It’s just such a thrill that such big names were impressed enough by it to want to become involved.”
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In another interview with Consequence of Sound (via Film Stage), Russell Mael talked about “Annette” and shared some more information about the musical.
“Adam Driver is just really spectacular in the movie and it’s all singing, all of the dialogue, 95% of it is sung in a way but in a way that’s stylistically true to Sparks’ sensibility, so if you can imagine that, Adam Driver doing Sparks, that’s what we have,” he said.
So, is the world ready for a Sparks-written musical directed by Leos Carax and starring Adam Driver? If the reaction to the karaoke scene from “Marriage Story” is any indication, fans are definitely ready to see Driver sing. Clearly, “Annette” should be near the top of your most-anticipated films list for 2020.
