Florence Foster Jenkins (Blu-ray + DVD + UltraViolet)

By: Amos Lassen

"Florence Foster Jenkins"
The World's Best Worst Singer
Amos Lassen
Meryl Streep and Hugh Grant star in Stephen Frears' film that focuses the true events of the latter days of America socialite, Florence Foster Jenkins. It is a very funny romp set in New York City towards the end of the second World War.

Foster Jenkins (Meryl Streep) was known for her very off-key performances as an opera singer, her appearances on-stage fully financed from her fortune left to her by her late father. BY her side is St Clair Bayfield (Hugh Grant), her common-law English husband and manager who continuously protects his other half from ridicule, and limits her live performances to a music club in the Grand Ballroom of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in the city, where she would perform alongside her pianist Cosme McMoon (Simon Helberg) to an extremely select audience. It really gets going when Florence decides to bring "her talents" before an audience, and eventually recording. She hires the constantly tortured McMoon, and then ultimately performing in front of an audience at Carnegie Hall.

Florence Foster Jenkins was a real person and a terrible singer. She was also an heiress and this explains how she managed to persuade people to do what she wanted. What she wanted was to sing. In The Forties in New York, with a World War going on overseas, she organized concerts, or rather her English husband, St Clair Bayfield (Hugh Grant), bribed, cajoled and orchestrated these events. including the hiring of an unknown accompanist Her pianist, McMoon, had a nervous disposition and a fear of ruining his career before it had started by being associated with someone like Florence's who really could not sing.

The embarrassment levels are high which must be the point unless this is a lesson in the power of money over integrity. The only person who refuses Bayfield's charming advances is the NY Post's music critic. His opinion of the Carnegie Hall fiasco is as true as it is cruel.

Meryl Streep, fat and wearing a wig is perfect and Grant proves that he is a good actor. Helberg actually walks away with the movie in his pocket. He is able to convey the feeling of being trapped as an alternative to being free, with all its fears and uncertainty. Wealthy New York socialite Florence Foster Jenkins has gone down in history as the worst opera singer ever. She caused music lovers to feel queasy while everyone else would be struggle to hold in laughter. Yet in Stephen Frears' and Meryl Streeps' Florence is so much more than a figure of fun.

Indeed, while the film finds hilarity in Florence's awfulness as a singer it also finds something admirable about her pursuit of her musical dreams in 1940s Manhattan (even if those dreams are kept alive by a massive fortune, tremendous self-delusion and the loyal support of her partner, St Clair Bayfield).

St Clair manages Florence's amateur career, arranging her private recitals and coaxing everyone in her orbit into delivering a positive response whenever she opens her mouth to sing. As the story builds towards Florence's legendary Carnegie Hall concert of 1944, the film is not only very funny but also totally gripping. We cannot help but wonder about St Clair's true motives. Does he really love Florence or is she just a way to enjoy the lavish lifestyle that her fortune allows him to do?

Streep wonderfully reproduces the horrible noise she made by singing Florence made with impressive fidelity, yet she also gives us insight into the heartaches and tragedies lying behind her desire to perform. Just wait until you hear her sing "The Queen of the Night" from Mozart's "The Magic Flute".

By: Amos Lassen

"Florence Foster Jenkins"
The World's Best Worst Singer
Amos Lassen
Meryl Streep and Hugh Grant star in Stephen Frears' film that focuses the true events of the latter days of America socialite, Florence Foster Jenkins. It is a very funny romp set in New York City towards the end of the second World War.

Foster Jenkins (Meryl Streep) was known for her very off-key performances as an opera singer, her appearances on-stage fully financed from her fortune left to her by her late father. BY her side is St Clair Bayfield (Hugh Grant), her common-law English husband and manager who continuously protects his other half from ridicule, and limits her live performances to a music club in the Grand Ballroom of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in the city, where she would perform alongside her pianist Cosme McMoon (Simon Helberg) to an extremely select audience. It really gets going when Florence decides to bring "her talents" before an audience, and eventually recording. She hires the constantly tortured McMoon, and then ultimately performing in front of an audience at Carnegie Hall.

Florence Foster Jenkins was a real person and a terrible singer. She was also an heiress and this explains how she managed to persuade people to do what she wanted. What she wanted was to sing. In The Forties in New York, with a World War going on overseas, she organized concerts, or rather her English husband, St Clair Bayfield (Hugh Grant), bribed, cajoled and orchestrated these events. including the hiring of an unknown accompanist Her pianist, McMoon, had a nervous disposition and a fear of ruining his career before it had started by being associated with someone like Florence's who really could not sing.

The embarrassment levels are high which must be the point unless this is a lesson in the power of money over integrity. The only person who refuses Bayfield's charming advances is the NY Post's music critic. His opinion of the Carnegie Hall fiasco is as true as it is cruel.

Meryl Streep, fat and wearing a wig is perfect and Grant proves that he is a good actor. Helberg actually walks away with the movie in his pocket. He is able to convey the feeling of being trapped as an alternative to being free, with all its fears and uncertainty. Wealthy New York socialite Florence Foster Jenkins has gone down in history as the worst opera singer ever. She caused music lovers to feel queasy while everyone else would be struggle to hold in laughter. Yet in Stephen Frears' and Meryl Streeps' Florence is so much more than a figure of fun.

Indeed, while the film finds hilarity in Florence's awfulness as a singer it also finds something admirable about her pursuit of her musical dreams in 1940s Manhattan (even if those dreams are kept alive by a massive fortune, tremendous self-delusion and the loyal support of her partner, St Clair Bayfield).

St Clair manages Florence's amateur career, arranging her private recitals and coaxing everyone in her orbit into delivering a positive response whenever she opens her mouth to sing. As the story builds towards Florence's legendary Carnegie Hall concert of 1944, the film is not only very funny but also totally gripping. We cannot help but wonder about St Clair's true motives. Does he really love Florence or is she just a way to enjoy the lavish lifestyle that her fortune allows him to do?

Streep wonderfully reproduces the horrible noise she made by singing Florence made with impressive fidelity, yet she also gives us insight into the heartaches and tragedies lying behind her desire to perform. Just wait until you hear her sing "The Queen of the Night" from Mozart's "The Magic Flute".