The on, off, and possibly on-again affair of a young African American jazz trumpeter and a Euro-American waitress and aspiring performer, shapes this lovely, loose pastiche of Hollywood musical, French New Wav and urban vérité.
Guy and Madeline soars in the cool sizzle of Guy’s trumpet solos and the blessed-out atmosphere of his jam sessions.
Screened as part of NZIFF 2011
Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench 2009
Maybe Guy loves his trumpet at the expense of all else, but who’s gonna complain when his fluency on the instrument would stir the most broken heart? Not me, nor 25-year-old debut filmmaker Damien Chazelle, who matches musical passion with his own exuberant love of a street-savvy camera and black-and-white film. — BG. “The enthusiasm with which Chazelle and company put on this show is anything but innocent, but it is infectious. Guy and Madeline is at once self-conscious and breezy, clumsy and deft, diffident and sweet, annoying and ecstatic. It’s amateurish in the best sense, and it radiates cinephilia. No movie I’ve seen this year has given me more joy.” — J. Hoberman, Village Voice