AFI FEST Los Angeles International Film Festival 2009

Imagine Jacques Demy as seen through an urban, jazz-infused American indie filter and you’ll get a sense of writer-director Damien Chazelle’s startling debut endeavor. The electrifying GUY AND MADELINE takes the musical genre to a contemporary new level, telling the story of the title characters’ soured relationship in song and dance. After seducing Madeline (Desiree Garcia), young jazz trumpeter Guy (Jason Palmer, one of the hottest young players on the jazz scene) drifts from affair to affair, while his heartbroken conquest tries her best to get on with her life. Realizing his mistake, Guy utilizes his trumpet to verbalize to Madeline the words he cannot say. Backed by Palmer’s fine trumpet and the sounds of the Bratislava Symphony Orchestra, composer Justin Hurwitz perfectly encapsulates the tonality of Chazelle’s Cassevetes-esque “romantic musical punctuated by song.”

–Stacey Marbrey