Marguerite review: Off-key, but right on the money

Wouldn’t you know it? You wait for ages for a Florence Foster Jenkins movie, then two come along at once. We jest. This obscure historical figure – a Manhattan socialite with a passion for opera – would perform annually in private recitals at the New York’s Ritz-Carlton during the 1930s.

She was, alas, blissfully unaware that her voice sounded like a zoological holocaust. Her extraordinary vocals are recorded on The Glory (????) of the Human Voice, a record listed among David Bowie's essential 25 albums in a 2003 Vanity Fair piece.

Xavier Giannoli's sumptuous historical dramedy transplants the Jenkins story to Roaring Twenties Paris. As the film opens, the titular heroine (the magnificent Catherine Frot) is preparing to perform the Queen of the Night aria from Mozart's The Magic Flute at a benefit concert staged at her stately home. She is attended to, fiercely, by her seemingly devoted chauffeur and aid, Madelbos (Denis Mpunga, superb).

But even he can’t stop a smart-alec music critic (Sylvain Dieuaide) and his ill-defined avant-garde artist chum (Aubrey Fenoy) from crashing the party. Nor can he force Marguerite’s disdainful, philandering husband (André Marcon) to attend her performances.

In the spirit of the age, the uninvited guests are both amused and smitten by Maguerite’s naive, entirely earnest warbling. The budding Dadaist, in particular, sees great potential.

Comedy ensues. But it’s tempered throughout by Frot’s invariably moving performance and a screenplay – co-written by the director and Marcia Romano – that never allows us to forget about its heroine’s frailties, many kindnesses and, sadly, her invisibility.

Performing Mozart in the same tone as a strangled dolphin, we soon realise, is not just an outlet for this outsider artist, it’s the only thing that’s truly hers.

Marguerite’s unspeakable voice is counterpointed by cinematographer Glynn Speeckaert’s exquisitely composed tableaux. And the denouement yields more than one surprise. If Stephen Frears’s incoming Florence Foster Jenkins biopic – starring Meryl Streep – is only half as good as this film, it’ll still be a must-see movie.