The film “Les choristes” is an excellent work directed by the famous director Christophe Barratti and released in 2004. The film has attracted attention in the film industry for its rich musical elements and excellent filming techniques, and has received a lot of praise. It was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 77th Academy Awards for its excellent quality.
The story of this film takes place in a boys’ boarding school in the French countryside in 1949. Most of the students here are difficult children, and they try everything they can think of to fight against the teachers, against the school, and against education. The principal, Hassan, is cruel and high-handed in controlling this class of problematic children, and every teacher has instinctively learned to deal with emergencies in a quick and fierce way.
As a result, the school became known as what we call a bad school with a group of mainly bad students. It was at this time that Clement, an unemployed music teacher, came to the school. As soon as he entered the school, he entered a children’s hell. He was deeply surprised by the experience of the former superintendent who fled in a hurry, and witnessed the severe punishments, the cruelty of the principal, the callousness of the other teachers, the lawlessness of the children and their pitiful helplessness, which gave him an urge to change the school’s control methods. Eventually, thanks to Clement’s efforts, most of the teachers abandoned their violent punishments and began to understand the true meaning of education.
Les choristes is a work that combines music and storytelling and has a wide reach. In the film, master musician Bruno Coulais and the Bulgarian Symphony Orchestra set the beautiful and romantic piano against the harmonious orchestra, blending the realistic performance of the children in the film with the heartfelt chorus, combining the warmth of the film’s music with the soulful singing of the children.
After its release, the film’s original soundtrack was very popular among the French public and won several awards in the French music category and the American music category. The film not only left a deep and beautiful musical memory for movie audiences around the world, but also injected a new perspective into the film.
This movie has no big war scenes, no violence and no sex. Les choristes” captivates and impresses audiences with its unique French aesthetic and pure children’s chorus. The film is a seemingly ordinary educational story made with embellished subtlety, bringing the audience a very different image of France.
The director’s excellent cinematic language allows the audience to be psychologically cured in a natural and relaxed state. The film clearly exposes the difference in parenting styles between the school administrators led by the principal and the new school superintendent, Clément, a difference in behavior that always reflects different educational concepts and leads to different results, thus making it all the more intriguing.
Although the overall scene of the film is somewhat limited, it tells a realistic story of education that takes place in a school. The director gives the film a distinct personality, a gripping storyline and conflict, realistic and detailed character portrayals and rich camera expressions that allow the actors’ performances to create a powerful immersive atmosphere that easily engrosses the audience in the situations created by the film and brings out the film’s beautiful and profound themes.
Throughout the film, Les choristes, a film full of human concern and beautiful music, blended with the children’s deep and sincere chorus, not only touches the hearts of audiences around the world, but also infuses the film with a new direction of reflection. Through the successful intervention of music, this film breaks the rigid impression that French cinema is a dull art film and changes people’s imagination of the French film genre. To some extent, it shows a new direction of French cinema, which has far-reaching significance and value. It can be said that “Les choristes” is an excellent and inspiring work in the history of French cinema.