‘The Concert’ sticks the landing

You think finding a good movie is hard these days? Try watching one that’s great right through the end credits.

Consider “The Last Exorcism,” a terrific indie thriller with an ending so foul the audience I saw it with let out a disgusted sigh during its waning moments.

Even one of my favorite films from 2010, “The Town,” settled into a mediocre groove as those Boston bank robbers faced their last showdown with the cops. Let’s face it. It’s tough to tie a film’s many themes into one satisfying coda. Today’s film endings tend to be either too predictable, too saccharine or just too pedestrian.

It’s one reason to celebrate the belated release of “The Concert” this weekend. You don’t have to be a classical music lover to stand up and cheer its final act.

The story follows a janitor for the Bolshoi Orchestra whose own musical career ended years earlier when government officials fired him for hiring Jewish musicians. When he intercepts a fax asking the Bolshoi musicians to perform at an upcoming event, the janitor decides to reunite his old orchestra and play the gig in the group’s place.

What follows is a sentimental farce with a measured performance by “Inglourious Basterds’” Melanie Laurent as the soloist hired to highlight the rejuvenated orchestra’s return to the stage. Some may quibble with the film’s chaotic narrative, while others will find the buffoonery on display a turnoff. But the final 15 minutes represent a cinematic triumph. It hits all the appropriate emotional notes and features a musical finale that might make Justin Bieber fans start downloading Tchaikovsky.

You’ll leave the theater on a very legal high, something we rarely experience at the movies.

(Photo: Melanie Laurent plays a violinist in “The Concert,” that rare movie with an ending that more than measures up to the rest of the film. The Weinstein Company)

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