Ah, modern technology. Somehow my Amazon algorithm saw fit to recommend Aline, which is about a French-Canadian singer who’s the youngest of fourteen children. As a baby she slept in a dresser drawer and as a child she started singing with her family. She goes on to marry her much older producer, have three boys, bring the house down with “My Heart Will Go On,” and enjoy a long residency in Vegas.
Gee, who does that sound like? One guess, as if it’s not painfully, wincingly obvious already.
This movie freely admits it’s a Celine Dion biopic. It uses Celine’s music (although the songs are voiced by French singer Victoria Sio), yet it also freely changes some of the relevant names and facts, maybe so the filmmakers wouldn’t get sued.
Watching this film was weird experience, not only because of the half-hearted evasive maneuvers, but for some reason its fifty-six year old director and star, Valerie Lemercier was airbrushed and shrunk down to various child sizes so she could play the younger Aline. Who in their right mind would do this? It’s creepy as all get-out, especially when Lemercier peeks over the edge of a stage and all we see are her eyes. It’s as if she’s a gremlin or a female Robin Goodfellow or something. Yikes.
The other weird part of watching this film on Amazon was that the English subtitles didn’t work, just the Spanish ones. Yep. I watched a French film with actors speaking mostly French while reading Spanish subtitles. If that doesn’t turn the brain inside out, I don’t know what does.
Fortunately, anyone who’s somewhat familiar with Dion’s life and career will easily be able to suss out what is happening, so that’s good.
I liked that Aline shows what a supportive family Celine Dion has and her love for her children, as well as her inborn love for music. It’s always fun seeing her with her family and how close they’ve stayed over the years through all the changes.
And the film nailed the look of Dion’s concert sets and costumes. Well, with one exception: The 1998 Oscar stage in the film was waaaaay bigger than the real stage was, and Aline’s Heart of the Ocean looked like costume jewelry. Other than that they pretty much got it.
On the other hand, it brings up yet another problem: If Lemercier was going to go to all the trouble to change character names and fictionalize Celine Dion’s life, why would she have Aline singing actual Celine Dion songs and experiencing Celine Dion’s actual life?
Hmmmm.
Overall, the film is kind of boring, and not just because of the partial language barrier or the creepy sprite Aline in the first scenes, which, by the way, have been very distracting for many critics. While the film does feature a lot of Dion’s music and hits all the high and low points of her life, it’s way too long. Aline also has a TV movie feel to it and seeing as the film had a twenty-five million dollar budget, that says most of the money was probably spent on costumes. The Spanish subtitles were one of the few things that kept me engaged.
Who knows if the real Dion has seen Aline, although her oldest son has requested a copy. Some of the Dion family members have expressed outrage at the liberties taken because they think the film made them out as a pack of buffoons, not to mention the film erroneously portrays Dion as having a gay makeup artist. Apparently the movie’s done quite well in France, though, so there’s that.
As for the rest of us, Aline is a curiosity and anyone who can slog through it deserves a pat on the back.
Aline is currently streaming on Amazon Prime. Rated PG-13.
My grade: C-
Principal cast: Valerie Lemercier, Sylvain Marcel, Danielle Fichaud, Roc Lafortune, Pascale Desrochers
Directed by Valerie Lemercier
Written by Valerie Lemercier and Brigitte Buc