MARIANNE & LEONARD: WORDS OF LOVE
★★★★★
(12A) BY FRAMING the relationship between musician Leonard Cohen and ‘muse’ Marianne Ihlen as an enduring love story, this uninspired documentary puts the most positive possible gloss on 1960s’ rock star behaviour.
If, like me, you know little about Canadian singer, poet, songwriter and novelist Cohen, you’ve at least heard his 1984 song, Hallelujah, which Alexandra Burke bellowed to chart-topping (12A) X Factor success in 2008.
In 1960, Cohen lived on an idyllic Greek island, Hydra, with beautiful Norwegian divorcée Ihlen in a relationship which lasted for most of the decade. She inspired his songwriting, appeared on album covers, and supported him while he mined their relationship for commercial success.
Cohen comes across as a selfish character who treated her as little more than a long-term groupie, and she was foolish enough to judge him not by his actions, but by his words of love. here being William Kemmler, the first victim of the electrical chair, collateral damage which both innovators are keen to distance themselves from.
But the only really moving fatality is a horse who is sacrificed in pursuit of a tactical advantage.
Despite being stitched together with CGI cityscapes and stuffed full of corporate espionage, ambition, tragedy and inventions such as the electric light bulb and cinema, the drama lies as inert as Frankenstein’s monster on the slab, waiting in vain for electricity to jolt it into life.