Adam Driver on singing, surrealism and ‘Annette’

By JAKE COYLE
AP Film Writer

CANNES, France (AP) — In Leos Carax’s “Annette,” an enchantingly demented rock opera, Adam Driver sings in some very strange places. On a motorcycle. At sea. Since its premiere last month at the Cannes Film Festival, “Annette” has predictably caused a stir. As you might suspect, opinions tend to differ on absurdist-yet-sincere 140-minute musicals of elaborate melodrama scored by Sparks and co-starring a glowing baby rendered in the form of a puppet. And yet, if anyone can agree on anything in “Annette,” it’s that Driver is really good in it. Extraordinary, even. Driver signed on seven years ago after Carax, the French filmmaker of the blissfully bonkers “Holy Motors,” contacted him having only seen him in “Girls.”