CODA: LIFE WITH MUSIC

RELEASED JUNE 3RD 2022

Directed by Claude Lalonde · Written by Louis Godbout · Produced by Nicolas Comeau

With Patrick Stewart, Katie Holmes and Giancarlo Esposito

Henry Field is an acclaimed concert pianist and one of the great virtuosi of his era. Upon returning to the stage after a prolonged absence, he finds himself suddenly afflicted with a severe case of stage fright. His once effortless play has abruptly turned into a self-conscious struggle of every bar. Old wounds have crept up on the master as he now fights to ward off artistic disaster.

Enter Helen Morrison, a music critic with a kindred spirit and a troubled past of her own. Helen believes she might hold the key to Henry’s return to form, but she must first overcome his defences and win his trust. As Henry’s condition starts to improve, the blossoming relationship takes an unexpected turn which could precipitate his downfall. Unless he finally faces his demons and the darker truth lurking beneath the glory of the stage.

Available on Digital HD ➤ https://vimeo.com/ondemand/codalifewithmusic
Also available in French ➤ https://vimeo.com/ondemand/codalavieenmusique
Also available in English with French subtitles ➤ https://vimeo.com/ondemand/codalavieenmusiquestf

CANADA | 2019 | DRAMA | 100 MINUTES | 4K

ENGLISH WITH FRENCH SUBTITLES

Anybody who’s ever played a musical instrument knows how easy it is to fail. This applies to music as well as to any other form of complex activity unfolding rapidly. And the higher the stakes, the less room for error, the slipperier things get. A virtuoso musician inspires awe as much by what she is able to accomplish (with respect to speed, dexterity, memory, etc.) as by what she is able to avoid (errors, memory lapses, etc.).

One sure way to make mistakes is to think about not making any. This is the paradox of concentration. One cannot will oneself not to think. Athletes commonly refer to being in “the zone” or in a state of “flow” as the ultimate form of concentration, a state closer to focussed awareness than hardfought attention. What a concert pianist has achieved through countless hours of analytical practice is the ability and the self-confidence to let the system run on its own, so to speak. Simply put, a pianist is free to make music because she is no longer concerned with the notes. Excess of consciousness is the enemy of good performance.

In this respect, making music is not so different from aging. Success requires staying in the moment. Henry Cole struggles on both fronts for the same reason. He has lost his innocence, his playfulness, now that the advancing years have made him more aware of the fragility of things, including the small miracle of his own talent. His condition is not exceptional, we are all afraid to fail, we all wonder when our luck is going to run out, not because we are especially neurotic, but because we are conscious and flawed and mortal. What matters is how we deal with our condition. As Woody Allen put it, “everyone knows the same truth and our lives consist of how we choose to distort it”. Distorting it completely may provide temporary solace, but at the cost of not living a fully human life. Not distorting it at all is more than what most of us can bear. That’s where the aesthetic experience might come to the rescue.

Coda : Life with Music is a film about music. Beethoven wasn’t a philosopher, but it is hard to listen to one of his late Sonatas or Quartets without feeling that he knows a thing or two about our condition, our hopes and failures, about what it means to be a human being. This might just be an illusion of course, but because it helps us to accept our own fate, it is something like a veridical illusion. What basically happens to Henry Cole is that he has suffered and is growing old and is beginning to doubt himself. What he seeks without quite knowing it is someone who understands his predicament, who doesn’t try to comfort him with empty peptalks and cheers and falsehoods, someone who feels for and with him, and in the process who might help him come to terms with himself, which hopefully means living both a serene and truthful life. That someone will come in the form of actual human beings, through subtle gestures of empathy and fleeting moments of humanity, and in a renewed connection with nature. But it will also come through the legacy of great composers. Above all, Coda is a film about music as a life companion.

After university degrees in communication studies, literature and film, Nicolas Comeau earned in 2002 a graduate degree in film production from Montreal’s prestigious National Institute of Image and Sound (INIS).

He worked for three years producing music videos and commercials, and along the way produced several short films: Portrait of the artist as his muse (dir. Etienne Desrosiers), Trailer Park Unicorn (dir. Sid Zanforlin), Hard Man To Love (dir. Douglas Bensadoun) Passage (dir. Karl Lemieux), A Girl and a Killer (dir. Ann Arson), Choking Game (dir. Cynthia Tremblay) all of which have been presented in Canadian and international festivals (Clermont-Ferrand, Namur, Dresden, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Toronto, Hamburg, Palm Springs, Aarhus, etc.).

In 2005 he line produced the France/Canada coproduction The Passenger (dir. François Rotger) and in 2008, he co produced Story of Jen (dir. François Rotger) another France/Canada coproduction that has been released in France and Canada, as well as screening in competition in Locarno, Pusan, Seattle & Hong Kong. The feature A Cloud in a Glass of Water by Srinath C. Samarasinghe coproduced with Avenue B Productions (France) premiered in Rotterdam 2012. Bruce LaBruce’s Gerontophilia (coproduced with New Real Films) premiered at Venice Days and TIFF in summer 2013 and went on to over 70 international festivals and sold to a dozen territories. Cristian Jimenez’s Voice Over (coproduced with France & Chile) premiered in TIFF and in competition in San Sebastian, 2014; additional festivals include Toulouse, Biarritz, Tokyo, etc. Philippe Grandrieux’s Despite the Night (coproduced with France) premiered in Rotterdam 2016 and followed with the Berlin’s Critics week, Bafici, Sao Paulo, AFI, etc. Currently in festivals, Roads in February by Katherine Jerkovic (TIFF, Canada’s Top Ten, Talinn Black Nights, Mannheim-Heidelberg, etc.) and Saint-Narcisse by Bruce LaBruce (Giornate degli Autori, Venice).