Fiction, but said to be inspired by events in the lives of commercial artist and jazz aficianado Francis Paudras and the musician Bud Powell, (with a touch of Lester Young thrown in), Bertrand Tavernier's "'Round Midnight" is one of the great movies about jazz, (just take a look at the jazz alumni in the cast), and at its very large heart is the relationship between the great tenor saxophonist Dexter Gordon in the central role of Dale Turner, (Oscar-nominated for Best Actor), and Francois Cluzet as Francis Borier, (the Paudras role).
Of course, being a movie about jazz it's also a movie about drugs and alcohol and all the things that can destroy a great talent but unlike say, "Lady Sings the Blues" director Tavernier doesn't fashion it as a conventional biopic. This is in every respect a much looser kind of film, more in keeping with its subject, (which is jazz rather than just jazz musicians), and he styles it like a reverie from the past with a Paris more in keeping with an MGM musical than from any kind of reality. Of course, if you don't like jazz, (and I've heard it said some people really don't), you might not 'get' the movie but if you do you just might feel as if you've died and gone straight to heaven.
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