THE MUSIC OF SILENCE
Director: Michael Radford
Stars: Toby Sebastian, Jordi Molla, Antonio Banderas, Alessandro Sperduti, Luisa Ranieri, Nadir Caselli
Rating: (PG)
★★ and a half (out of five)
In fact, the title gets explained in the film, as apparently musicians need to channel silence in order to tune into their musical soul, or something.
You can tell from my limited grasp of the mystical aspects of divine musical ability that this was not a movie that touched my spiritual inner critic.
The Music of Silence is the lightly fictionalised biography of Andrea Bocelli, the blind Italian opera singer. Born with limited eyesight and enduring many operations from an early age, only classical music had the power to soothe him.
He had the voice of an angel as a young boy, but when his voice broke he stopped singing. However, music kept calling to him.
By rights this should be a ripper of a film, but it is a dreary slog for long stretches. The actors seem to chant their lines in a monotone rather than act, which gives the piece a lugubrious air.
By the end, I was convinced that it had been filmed in Italian and then dubbed into English but I found out that it was always in English so there is no explanation for the stilted delivery.
While I found this hard work, the sheer power of Bocelli’s life story does carry you along and the anguish of Jordi Molla, as Bocelli’s father trying to do what is best for his troublesome son, provides an emotional core.
- Christine Powley
