The Chorus

You’ve seen the plot of the Chorus hundred times somewhere else, but you’ve never heard it before. As the “chorus’" chorals begin to resound in the twilight of the movie theater it gives you goose bumps… The Chorus will lift your emotions and move you even though it doesn’t offer more than just awesome music upheld by a trivial visual side and predictable, but cute plot. But The Chorus is what it promises to be and does it more than well. (13/11/2004)

After watching War of the Buttons, I expected a burst of pastel compositions and furious attacks on the goal with spectator emotions. But Barratier manages this boyish chorus much more bearably, and he even manages to outline quite interesting relationships between the characters and the very nice character of the "teacher" (if anything, then Barratier's films must be loved by teachers because he shows them as brave and inspiring people) by using pleasant notes where they will do best in terms of general taste. Of course, the narrative framework is chosen precisely so as to throw, just in time, a viewer who is able to evaluate violent manipulations, from the quite pleasantly established atmosphere of the "boarding school" part of the story. And of course, the film is literally set in gold, which is not as annoying and dull as the ideological calligraphy of War of the Buttons. If there is any agitation here, it is the moving story of several people whose only potential is to stir up the great hall of the Thermal (and arouse a bit of that fleeting and pleasing "bourgeois" idyll over the thriving bastards). Although sometimes such films literally cause my eyes to see red, The Chorus is quite simple and in a way pleasantly modest. As a result, I was able to enjoy the film with those few smirks at the moments when the likeable guys become castratos (and screenwriters) for the director. (14/04/2012)

Beautiful experience in every way. Excellent Gérard Jugnot as a kind-hearted loser, Francois Berléand as a sadistic scoundrel, and Kad Merad as a fair gym teacher. I am a very sensitive person, so individual scenes and the film as a whole touched me. Christophe Barratier did a great job with his debut. I think there are never enough of such films. (22/10/2009)

I like movies that move me to tears at the end, I also like those that do it calculatingly with a predictable plot, but I will never like The Chorus because it screams at me what will happen in the end, and I don't like that. The music is beautiful, a few of the actors are excellent, the rest is transparent. (26/05/2006)