Well voila, that is the extent to which I can recall any of the three years of education in the French language that I completed (apart from that French line in 'Lady Marmalade' which everyone knows) - which is precisely why I had to download the version of 'Janis et John' with English subtitles, despite their being hilariously sub-par ('It would be out of playce!')
I stumbled across 'Janis et John' about four years ago late at night on SBS, and I cannot remember ever having been so drawn into a film as I was then. Obviously the attraction was the strange, absurdly but comically unrealistic plot which includes two of my favourite people to ever exist in this world, John Lennon and Janis Joplin. I won't spoil the story for you, because it is sweet and nice even if it may induce eye rolling at some crucial moments within the story arch, but it involves an acid trip-vision of Janis Joplin and John Lennon walking into a bathroom in 1973, washing their hands, then saying 'We'll be back,' before walking away. Ooh so good and creepy.
My favourite thing about this movie is clearly the abundance of references to particularly Janis because when I first watched a portion of this film, I was going through a phase where I was listening to Janis Joplin exclusively, ferociously obsessed to the extent only teenagers seem capable of. I breathed her, and she was everything an introverted music geek like me needed - she was everything, everything to me. She remains one of my most revered idols.
The most wonderful thing about this movie is the transformation of Marie Trintignant's* character. So consumed by the persona of Janis Joplin, she learns to live. One of my favourite scenes in the movie is towards the end, where her character literally mimes Kozmic Blues in this pub - the entire song, unedited. I feel as though a lot of people like me would have related to her character's total immersion in Janis Joplin's life throughout the film. (*A really awful sidenote: Marie Trintignant was actually murdered by her husband - I think he was her husband - some days before the film's release. Look it up.)
Janis Joplin was the master of her own existence. She oozed confidence even when all evidence shows that she quietly possessed little. She moved so beautifully, and sometimes it seems as though she's singing like seven different notes all at once, and it sounds so broken, but so mind-blowingly real, all at the same time. She was so groovy!
And I didn't intend on this post so uncannily resembling my diary entries from 2007 so I'm gonna stop!
This movie is really so great! And funny! And pretty! And freaky! Particularly when the main guy wakes up and walks past Janis Joplin and John Lennon sitting on his couch in the middle of the night! OoooooOOOooOOOooo!
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