Round Midnight

Another of those 1980s films that I had heard about when they came out but was really too young to have seen in the movie theater is Round Midnight. So when TCM finally aired it some time back, it gave me the chance to record it and see what I had missed on its original release.

The movie opens up with a small black and white scene of two men in a crappy hotel room in New York and one of them asking the other if this was the room where a particular jazz legend died. Now, the logical thinking is that the rest of the movie is going to be a flashback to the story of the guy who died, but that's not what actually happens. Instead, the action turns to color. The black guy in that opening scene is jazz legend Dale Turner (real-life jazz musician Dexter Gordon), who is finding life in late 1950s New York difficult for a whole bunch of obvious reasons. So like any number of American jazz musicians, he decamps to Paris.

In Paris, Dale stays at one of those crummy long-stay hotels together with a whole bunch of other blacks who have made the same decision. (I'm not a big jazz fan, so the only name I recognize from this portion of the cast is Herbie Hancock, playing pianist Eddie Wayne. Hancock also wrote the original portions of the score and won an Oscar for it.) They all perform together at a basement club called the Blue Note to the sort of white Europeans who think they're being terribly progressive by identifying with the jazz musicians. It's not much of a living, but the musicians are doing it as much for the art as they are for the money. As for Dale, he's got a serious drinking problem, and leaving his problems (and a daughter) behind in America hasn't really done anything to make the reasons why he turned to drink in the first place go away.

One of the Parisians who shows up at the Blue Note is Francis Borler (François Cluzet), a poster designer with a love of jazz who has problems in his personal life much like Dexter, although in his case the problems aren't quite as serious. Francis has a failed marriage too, although at least his daughter Berangere lives with him. He can't even afford the entry fee to the Blue Note, listening from outside. And then one night Francis gets the chance to meet Dale personally when Dale wants a beer after a show, giving Dale a chance to reveal his back-story.

Francis has idolized Dale anyway, and all this gives Francis a chance to try to "help" Dale, first by taking him to the hospital when Dall gets way too drunk again, and ultimately by taking him into his family, including a birthday celebration for Berangere and a new apartment, with Francis' helpful ex putting up some money. Francis even works to get Dale back to America (Martin Scorsese shows up here as a booking agent who works to get Dale's union paperwork handled among other things). But is it going to be a happy return to America?

For people who are jazz fans, I think they're going to love the music in Round Midnight. There are a lot of bebop and cooler jazz standards, and Hancock's original music is good too. As for the story, however, it's a bit lacking, which is a problem since the movie is a bit over two hours and really drags at times without a good story.

I also couldn't help but think about what audiences of today would say about the movie in terms of a completely different political climate in terms of race relations. Round Midnight is more or less French director Bertrand Tavernier's ode to jazz, and I can see a lot of people taking issue with all sorts of things in the story, from the formulaic look at those blacks who went over to France to Francis as a sort of white savior. It's a romanticized view of jazz, I think, and some people aren't going to be happy with it not fitting into today's presentist views.