Florence Foster Jenkins

This review may contain spoilers!

This is film is quite a bit of a fun and you'll leave the cinema with a grin on your face I'm sure. I'd give Florence Foster Jenkins a 7/10.

This film is rather comedic in how it presents itself, it presents a scenario that is quite artificial and wacky but at the same time manages to be enchanting and entertaining. This is a story that will keep you hooked throughout, Florence is a gem of a character and the journey she takes you on in this film is quite a fun one. The music in this film is used really well, the best part is how off-key music performed by Streep is used for comedic purposes. I also really enjoyed the editing, it helped create the older vibe of this period piece with the transitions that were used.

Hugh Grant, who played St Clair Bayfield, has a lot of passion and chemistry with Streep in this film; I liked that he had two sides to his life and that we saw the duality of his role in this film. Nina Arianda, who played Agnes Stark, was the perfect casting for this boisterous incredible performer; her support for Florence at the end of the film was one of my favourite scenes. David Haig, who played Carlo Edwards, makes the singing lessons a really entertaining part of the film; the stock serious performance contrasting with the events themselves is extremely funny.

However the best performance came from Meryl Streep, who played Florence Foster Jenkins. Streep has always been famous for being a powerhouse actress and you can see it without a doubt in this film. I thought she did a great job of playing out the disillusions of her character; her off-key singing was especially a funny quality of the film. However Streep shows the deep sadness of her role that exists below the surface, the tragic backstory of Florence is explored and her dependence upon the other characters is constantly displayed.

I found that this film let itself down in places by being either too over the top or playing too closely with the tragic biopic aspect; there needed to be more of a middle ground between the two forms of storytelling rather than bouncing back and forth between the two extremes. I also found the cinematography in this film to be quite static, the visuals of this film never really looked too impressive beyond the editing.

Rebecca Ferguson, who played Kathleen, gave a relatively good performance but was never explored as a character much; I thought her subplot with Grant was necessary but she felt more like a plot device than a role in this film. Simon Helberg, who played Cosme McMoon, gave a performance that was far too over the top even for this film; Helberg was a bit too quirky and didn't ever feel like a real person. David Mills, who played Augustus Corbin, wasn't a very necessary role in this film; Mills felt like a last ditch effort to make Ferguson a bit more relevant to the film.