The silent film form is admired and duplicated in Michel Hazanavicius’s The Artist, a combination of homage to and out-and-out replication of early, pre-sound American cinema. Beginning in 1927 Hollywood, the film follows the tumultuous career of George Valentin (Jean Dujardin), a highly popular silent movie star in the vein of Rudolph Valentino (that the names are so similar is a testament to Hazanavicius’s lack of subtlety). Opening with one of Valentin’s flicks showing to a packed house, switching between the audience and the movie-within-a-movie, Hazanavicius immediately foreground his meta concerns, making very sure that were are watching a film about film. Further, Valentin’s intertitled dialogue in the scene shown – “you’ll never make me talk!” – is terribly on-the-nose, heavy-handedly foreshadowing the concerns of the rest of the movie. Alas, such are the characteristics of The Artist.

As such, the plot soon shifts into Singin’ in the Rain mode, depicting the mass changeover to sound film in Hollywood and subsequent dismissal of silent film stars, including Valentin. In a scene eerily reminiscent of the Gene Kelley picture, the studio head, played by John Goodman, shows Valentin a test film of his (the studio head’s) wife singing; although there is no sound, this is clearly a reference to Jean Hagen’s performance as the beautiful-yet-grating Lina Lamont, based solely on Valentin’s amused reaction to the (undoubtedly awful) singing. Nonetheless, talkies are here to stay. While Valentin attempts to salvage his career, making the leap to directing, he is rapidly overshadowed by Peppy Miller (Bérénice Bejo, Hazanavicius’ wife), a bright young starlet with whom Valentin has a flirtatious relationship. From there, his career quickly spirals out of control – as Miller’s climbs, another plot point foreshadowed in a metaphorically obvious scene – with his movie failing (due in no small part to its downer ending, a clear sign of Valentin’s depression), his wife leaving him, and his possessions forced to be auctioned off. Only his driver (James Cromwell) and his faithful canine sidekick stay by his side, leading Valentin to drink heavily, burn his films, and ultimately contemplate suicide; of course, since the film is essentially a classical Hollywood romance, you can probably guess how it ends up. In the end, Valentin’s career (and life) is saved, and everyone lives happily ever after.

For his part, Hazanavicius has the look and feel of silent film down. Black-and-white cinematography, irises in and out, overly exclamatory intertitles – all work to present The Artist as truly a film of the time it depicts. The performances are equally impressive (and deliberate), with Dujardin’s expressive face the perfect counter to Béjo’s wide-eyed naïveté – and it should go without saying that Goodman and Cromwell are terrific. However, except for a terrific nightmare sequence, in which sound effects break into the diegesis while Valentin remains silent, Hazanavicius ultimately doesn’t do nearly enough with his high-concept premise. In fact, this scene had me hoping for a Pleasantville-esque aesthetic device, in which the film is gradually overtaken by sound until the entire thing is audible; it would’ve been gimmicky as hell, but then The Artist itself is little more than a gimmick. And it might’ve saved the film from its generic outcome.

Ultimately, Hazanavicius simply presents an ode to silent film, without comment or critique – save for the aforementioned nightmare sequence and the film’s final joke, which I won’t spoil here but which you can probably guess. Although some might appreciate his audacity and commitment to his concept, in the end, I was terribly bored. Once you get past the novelty of the premise – which really doesn’t take that long – you’re left with merely the performances (which aren’t enough to save the thing) and the narrative (which is, to put it kindly, formulaic as hell). I get that Hazanavicius’ conceit was to make a pre-sound Hollywood film, warts and all, but that really isn’t enough in this day and age. There has to be some sort of critical response to the silent film form, whether positive or negative; otherwise, you’re merely creating a simulacrum, without any real good reason for doing so.