Céline

I strongly appreciated this biopic about Céline Dion the singer. Maybe it's because I don't like her music or her personality, so that I wasn't expecting much from this movie when I started to view it.

The fact that the actors do not look like the real persons is a very good point: whenever a film tries to mimic known figures, the viewer is distracted by any little detail that doesn't match. Here, we don't have to track these unimportant visual details, so we're much involved in the story itself and the psychology of the characters. Also, the songs are not the original versions from Céline Dion, everything has been redone with talent, it's brilliant.

There's a chance a part of the story was romanticised and some mistakes and omissions were done, but I don't care about that. A biopic is not supposed to tell every aspect of every moment in the life of an historical figure. At the end of the movie there is a text that boldly explains that this story is about Céline Dion and that she didn't participate in any way in its production. I find this to be a courageous attitude from the producers, given the number of movies about real people who try to disguise it with the usual warning "any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental" because they just don't want to be sued for public defamation (The Social Network is a famous example).

(Please note that I watched a version dubbed in French for the French public, so that any consideration about erroneous accent was hidden in the version I watched. Also I don't care that the international part of her career was almost eluded, I don't consider Céline Dion to be representative of French culture)

TL;DR This movie is not hand-tailored for the typical Céline Dion fan (and I like that).

So, who doesn't know Celine Dion? But we don't all know her back story. Enjoying her music as much as I do, I was interested to know how her career started.

Coming from a musical family, and her brother having recorded an album, it was Celine's dream, too, to record. A series of events lead to her finally landing a recording contract.

I enjoyed Rene Angelil's story, as well - the man who signed Celine and whom she eventually married. The film also shows us Celine's incredible loyalty and dedication. Christine Ghawi gives a good performance as Celine, and Enrico Colantoni stars as Rene.

If you're a fan of Celine Dion, I highly recommend this TV movie. And if for any reason you're not a fan of her music, 'Celine' still makes for an interesting watch.

This film is a disaster, especially if you are a true fan of Celine. Virtually none of the people presented really look like their real-life counterparts. The Dion family is almost completely misrepresented. The mother looks like an upper-middle class suburbanite. Most distressing are the vocal renditions, not only missing the mark in duplicating what was actually there, but doing it in a way that is hardly worthy of comparison to the original, both as a little girl and as a star. I hope they paid Celine plenty for this joke. It will serve her poorly as a memento. I especially disliked the songs done as a teenager. Some of them are exceptional, but not these. Unfortunately, this may keep people from going back and actually listening to the originals, which were great. Finally, her French is almost completely overlooked. Most of her early songs especially were in French. She didn't even know any English until she was about 14/15. Her Anglo-style persona just isn't her!

What a disappointment this movie was. The casting was terrible! There was absolutely no resemblance of the characters to the people they were portraying. Where on earth was the French Canadian connection? Not one accent? We all know where Celine was born and raised and yet her entire heritage was completely missing. It made no sense whatsoever to cast the movie in a way that did not recognize her background. I can understand that whoever backed this movie may have been concerned about too much French Canadian or too much emphasis on the Francophone accent but let's face it, without it the movie bombed anyway.It was a sham. I'm not criticizing the acting - each person would likely be fine in any other roles. I particularly liked Enrico Colantoni as Rene. I'm not surprised the movie wasn't endorsed by Celine Dion. The producers and the director, the casting company were so far off the mark. The time line was off throughout the movie as well. I don't have an ounce of Francophone in me and it made me feel embarrassed for Celine and her family.

I liked it. It got me thinking; otherwise, I wouldn't be writing here. I fell asleep for a few minutes(I was tired; the movie didn't bore me) and suddenly Rene's really bad toupee was replaced with a bald head. What made him take the toupee off? Second question: it says on his bio that Rene married and divorced twice before Celine, not once. Does Celine's mother ever mention that in the movie? Third: I thought the voice-over singer was better than Celine, who's sort of nasaly like Barbara Streisand. Who is Trish O'Brien? I can't find her online.

And now a comment: I love Enrico Colantoni, who played Rene. No matter who he plays, a sleepy lovability surrounds him. He's totally hot in Just Shoot Me!