Lights, camera, action. All the world’s a stage when it comes to a musical production, and it is no small feat. Traditionally vibrant and bursting with song and dance, the musical has become a near lost art in Hollywood, that is, until recently. Musicals were the industry’s bread and butter during the Golden Age, and the most popular kind of film. Entertaining the masses during the Great Depression with joyful, decadent sets and dance numbers, Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers ruled the silver screen while offering some happiness to Americans during a dark time. Then came Judy Garland, Gene Kelly, John Travolta, and Zac Efron. The list goes on and on, and then abruptly stops. Musicals stopped ruling the silver screen, while gritty action films, superhero flicks, and buddy comedies took over the box office instead. Some of the magic of make-believe from the olden days disappeared, and people couldn’t suspend their judgment to sit back and relax while watching men and women tap dance off into the sunset while falling in love. But, even though the musical may be dying, some directors have attempted to resurrect it.
Both Greta Gerwig and Damien Chazelle have done their part in reviving the musical in the past several years. Chazelle’s love of old Hollywood and his idealization of the dream factory is evident in every film he writes and directs, as every film is infused with music. Often depicting the brutality of show business, he received critical acclaim for his films Whiplash and the Oscar-winning musical La La Land, while his most recent film depicting the rise and fall of Hollywood during the silent era, Babylon, was a critical and box office bomb. Though it was picked apart during its initial release, Babylon is well on its way to cult status, thanks in part to Margot Robbie‘s explosive performance as an aspiring starlet who has fantastic dance moves up her sleeves.
Another major director in Hollywood right now, Greta Gerwig, has recently dipped her camera into the dream factory of yesterday that churned out musicals like Singin’ in the Rain and An American in Paris. Prancing into movie theaters across the world with the summer blockbuster Barbie, audiences unanimously loved the musical numbers in Gerwig’s film. It features Barbie, a once again dancing Margot Robbie, doing disco on a light-up floor, and a bedazzled Ryan Gosling as Ken, singing power ballads as he rides into battle on a wooden horse. Barbie may very well be the crowning jewel of Gerwig’s career so far, and La La Land is certainly Chazelle’s, and though they’re both drastically different in plot, they both share a love for old-fashioned musicals. While you may think both films were mostly influenced by the musicals that were dealt out during the golden age of Hollywood, you’d be wrong. It was a 1964 French musical starring a young Catherine Deneuve and Nino Castelnuovo that served as a major influence for both Chazelle and Gerwig. Often included on lists of the greatest musicals of all time, here is how The Umbrellas of Cherbourg influenced both Barbie and La La Land.
La La Land exploded onto movie theater screens across the world in 2016 with vibrant colors, exuberant musical numbers, and a devastating love story destined to fail. It introduced us to Ryan Gosling as a song and dance man for the first time, won Emma Stone her Best Actress Oscar, and introduced Chazelle as one of his generation’s most exciting new directors. Set in Los Angeles, the film stars Emma Stone as an aspiring actress, Mia, and Ryan Gosling as a lonely jazz pianist, Sebastian. As the pair fall in love, La La Land goes on a long odyssey within the city of stars as the couple find themselves near and far from each other as they chase their dreams, leaving their dreams of each other behind. Their tragic love story is almost a modern take on the love story at the center of The Umbrellas of Cherbourg.
A romance film reminiscent of Romeo and Juliet, Deneuve stars as teenager Geneviève Emery, who helps her mother run a small umbrella shop. Castelnuovo co-stars as an autoshop mechanic, Guy Foucher, and the two young Parisians begin a courtship in the town of Cherbourg. Despite the disapproval of Geneviève’s mother, the pair fall in love, but do not get to see a happy ending as Guy is drafted into the Algerian war. Now pregnant and alone, with no knowledge if Guy will ever return home or survive the war, Geneviève’s mother arranges her to marry a wealthy older man, played by Marc Michel. One of the saddest romance films ever made with a heartbreaking story of love gone cold, Chazelle cites the musical as one of the influential films behind La La Land. Comparing the two films, it is clear that The Umbrellas of Cherbourg acts as one of the guiding lights to the romance between Mia and Sebastian as their love for each other slowly fades due to their differing dreams of what they want out of life.
La La Land turned heads because of its colorful sets, ambitious musical numbers that sprawled all over Los Angeles, and Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling’s performances that proved triple threats still existed in Hollywood. Chazelle appears to have been inspired by the extravagant production design in The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, where every shot is crafted like a painting of beautiful pastels with incredible attention to detail. It’s one of the greatest musicals of all time alongside classics such as The Wizard of Oz and West Side Story, and Chazelle pays homage to the French musical that’s known for its dream-like cinematography, beautiful costumes, and gut-wrenching songs full of heartbreak. As Mia and Sebastian fall in love as they dance all across Los Angeles, it’s a mirror of Geneviève and Guy’s blossoming love as they sing and dance in cafés and dance floors throughout Cherbourg. Chazelle’s love for musicals is undeniable, and he’s been vocal about how The Umbrellas of Cherbourg influenced him in writing and directing La La Land, in addition to it being one of Chazelle’s favorite films. The tragic story between Geneviève and Guy, alongside its striking, colorful mise-en-scene, was a guiding inspiration for Chazelle. He lovingly takes ideas from the 60s film, while adding to those ideas by paying tribute to one of the most influential musicals that has defined the genre.
Greta Gerwig lovingly pays tribute to multiple classic musicals, including The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, with her own showstopping production with larger-than-life sets and pastel-colored costumes in Barbie. With its artfully crafted musical numbers and incredibly detailed production design that pops with hundreds of colors, the film history buff cherishes the nostalgia of how big and bright the movies used to be throughout Barbie. A fantasy comedy with a heart of gold, Barbie has a blast not taking itself too seriously while giving important messages of empowerment. Though Barbie is not influenced by the love story or characters within The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, Gerwig cites it as a major influence on the look and feel of Barbie. Often surreal with fantastical-like numbers abruptly bursting free in colorful umbrella shops and tearooms, Barbie similarly embraces the absurdity of classic movie musicals with over-the-top disco dance parties and cotton candy-coated dream worlds. When discussing its influence over Barbie thanks to its breathtaking artistry, Gerwig said in an interview with Letterboxd, “That’s an amazing movie and astonishingly beautiful. I loved the use of color and the surrealness…Everything feels painterly, and that was a big part of it.” Even Robbie’s luscious locks in Barbie was an ode to Deneuve’s famous blonde hair in The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, with her perfect hair flip and various, colorful bows.
Hundreds of tissues have been soaked and thousands of pillows stained thanks to The Umbrellas of Cherbourg. Directed and written by Jacques Demy, his film started a revolution within the musical genre, and to this day, it continues to challenge newcomers who watch the film. One of the saddest films ever made, and the most heartbreaking, it captures the excitement of falling in love for the first time. Hollywood loves nothing more than telling tales of young love between beautiful people, and this epic French musical inspired generations of directors to come. Demy has always been known for his attention to detail, his love for pastel pallets, and general exuberance when turning reality into fantasy thanks to his dreamlike sets and one of a kind shot-making. The Umbrellas of Cherbourg left its mark on not only musicals, but film as a whole, and over 50 years later, it’s still inspiring the likes of Greta Gerwig and Damien Chazelle. If anything, Barbie and La La Land have proved that showbiz is still alive and well, and there’s nothing like a musical number featuring a bleach blonde Ryan Gosling singing laments of love and heartbreak to keep the grandeur of the movies alive.
The Umbrellas of Cherbourg is available to stream on Max in the U.S.
