Gainsbourg
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Gainsbourg

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"A quintessential French icon gets his big screen bio. In the 60s, singer Serge Gainsbourg mixed pop outlawry with low-down lechery to blaze his own hipster manifesto, seducing Brigitte Bardot, Juliette Gréco and Jane Birkin in the process. Persistent iconoclasm and highly visible personal degeneracy made him a fixture in French public life until his death in 1991. The simulated female orgasm performed by Jane Birkin in his song Je t’aime…moi non plus may have brought him the most attention internationally, and Lemon Incest, recorded with their daughter Charlotte, still causes many a jaw to drop, but it was his reggae version of their national anthem that proved the step too far for many of his compatriots. More

"Cartoonist Joann Sfar proves a bold and inspired choice as director, interpolating occasional puppet action into a pacey account of the defining dramas – and greatest hits – of Gainsbourg’s lurid life." (New Zealand International Film Festival 2010)

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2010Rating: M, contains sexual themes117 minsFrance, USAFrench, English and Russian with English subtitles
AnimatedDramaMusicWorld Cinema
Director:
Joann Sfar (feature debut)
Writer:
Joann Sfar
Cast:
Eric ElmosninoLucy GordonLaetitia CastaDoug JonesAnna MouglalisMylène Jampanoï

Streaming (2 Providers)

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Gainsbourg | Reviews

73%83 reviews

Rotten Tomatoes® Score

All reviews on Rotten Tomatoes
Urban Cinefile

Urban Cinefile

Comic book artist Joann Sfar strides fearlessly from his drawing studio into the film studio with the bravura of the naïve, ignorant of the rules that apply to this new medium, This is both a good thing - a fresh take and abandonment of rules - and a bad thing; the insufficient control over the medium. But then Serge Gainsbourg was no respecter of rules, nor did lack of artistic control ever worry him. For his many fans, though (mostly in France) the picture of a strange and isolated soul raging against the unknowable forces of the universe is no doubt music to their ears.

Full review
Total Film

Total Film

You don’t expect to see anti-Semitic puppets in a biopic of a Gallic chanteur, a surreal flourish which automatically lifts Joann Sfar’s imaginative take on Serge Gainsbourg above the ordinary.

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The Guardian

The Guardian

Adored and despised in fairly equal measure, Serge Gainsbourg is the subject of an appropriately spiky biopic.

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Little White Lies

Little White Lies

Adapting his own graphic novel on the life of legendary chanteur Serge Gainsbourg, Joann Sfar brings a peculiar sensibility to the big screen. The result is a film that contains wild flights of imagination while stumbling badly when it comes to narrative, context and dramatic pacing.

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Empire Magazine

Empire Magazine

Eric Elmosnino is terrific as the louche French icon in Joann Sfar's vivid biopic. Shame about that second hour.

Full review

Gainsbourg | Release Details

Gainsbourg is available to stream in New Zealand now on Google Play and Apple TV.

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