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Author Topic: Merry Music of May Marathon 2016  (Read 33590 times)

Teproc

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Re: Merry Music of May Marathon 2016
« Reply #230 on: May 31, 2016, 05:41:12 AM »
Who cares about lyrics, look at all the dancing !  ;D

You even have a love at first sight moment, which is in no way helped by the single worst moment of directing I can think of right now. To isolate both characters from the surrounding dancers, completely ignoring over 60 years of the exploration of the cinematic language, the camera simply blurs everything but Maria and tony. It looks unspeakably garish and inexcusably gauche. 

This, though... I couldn't disagree more. How is it ignoring cinematic history ? It's taking the very basic idea of love at first sight and stylizing it in a way that is completely at home in such a big, romantic, dramatic story/film. You note that this kind of love story is not your thing : I'm not a big fan either, generally, but that shot was the first step in selling me on it for me : it's so jarring and distinctive, it forces you to recognize that there is something there, that these two aren't just naive fools : it's right there on the screen !
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oldkid

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Re: Merry Music of May Marathon 2016
« Reply #231 on: May 31, 2016, 11:15:35 AM »
Funny Girl

I grew up on the soundtrack (8-track!) long before I ever watched the film.  I fell in love with the songs, as well as Barbara Streisand's banter.  When I finally watched the film in high school, I fell in love with the film, and for years declared it my favorite musical.  This is my first re-visit for a while, so let's see how it holds up.

First, the music is still among my favorites.  I'm tired of "People", and want to sleep through that scene because nothing actually happens during the hit song.  But "I'd Rather Be Blue", "I'm the Greatest Star", "Don't Rain on my Parade", and "My Man" still work for me as some of the best Barbara Streisand, which makes some some of my favorite songs.  And I had just as much enjoyment of the high comic scenes such as "The Most Beautiful Girl in the World" and "You are Woman" (although I always thought "The Swan" to be pretty weak, comically).

This is the first time that I actually understood what the whole film was leading up to, apart from the rise of Fanny Brice: that she and her first love really weren't meant for each other. Um, really, that's it?

Well, I still love it and will watch it again.  But it won't really rank at the top of my list of musical films anymore.  Right now, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers and A Star is Born with Judy Garland are battling for the top.

Hallelujah! (1929)
Zeke is a sharecropper who has a really bad day.  It all started out well, taking his family's annual cotton harvest to the gin and to be sold.  Then he got caught up with the wrong girl, and lost all his family's money in a crooked game of craps.  And then it gets worse.

As a plot, Hallelujah reminds me of Sunrise: A Tale of Two Humans without an emphasis on the romance.  It is hokey at times and very dark at others.

But the key is the music.  Instead of having setups and a performance, the music is punctuation to the scenes, a part of the everyday life of the characters. All of a sudden, without realizing it, the music is there: in the wailing of grief, in putting children to bed, in the sermon at a revival, while travelling.  So much of the music just seems natural, just what I might do in walking to the store or in putting my children to bed.  It is the portrait of a people who have music naturally living with them, without the need for any performance or audience.

There is a claim of racism in the movie-- portraying Zeke as a lust-filled black man, and a couple other stereotypes.  However, I don't believe that they intended to rely on a stereotype.... perhaps this film helped create them.  Instead, I see a 20s melodrama that happens to be made with an all-black cast.  It is a fine film, and I'd be interested to hear what the real claims of racism against it is.
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DarkeningHumour

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Re: Merry Music of May Marathon 2016
« Reply #232 on: May 31, 2016, 10:02:26 PM »
Who cares about lyrics, look at all the dancing !  ;D

You even have a love at first sight moment, which is in no way helped by the single worst moment of directing I can think of right now. To isolate both characters from the surrounding dancers, completely ignoring over 60 years of the exploration of the cinematic language, the camera simply blurs everything but Maria and tony. It looks unspeakably garish and inexcusably gauche. 

This, though... I couldn't disagree more. How is it ignoring cinematic history ? It's taking the very basic idea of love at first sight and stylizing it in a way that is completely at home in such a big, romantic, dramatic story/film. You note that this kind of love story is not your thing : I'm not a big fan either, generally, but that shot was the first step in selling me on it for me : it's so jarring and distinctive, it forces you to recognize that there is something there, that these two aren't just naive fools : it's right there on the screen !

It is so ugly ! Ugly and unsubtle. There would have been so many more elegant ways to do the same thing.

And I know your lyrics comment was in jest (well, at least the « Who cares » part) but words and scripts are the first thing that attract me to a movie (9 out of 10 times) and that translates into lyrics being the crux of a musical.
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oldkid

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Re: Merry Music of May Marathon 2016
« Reply #233 on: June 01, 2016, 11:58:28 AM »
Thanks to everyone who participated!  Anyone who'd like to post more, please feel free!
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DarkeningHumour

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Re: Merry Music of May Marathon 2016
« Reply #234 on: June 03, 2016, 05:32:25 AM »
I actually saw this the same day as WSS, which is a big part of the reason I lay on the comparison so heavily.

The Sound of Music (rewatch)
Robert Wise (1965)

Before she became a magical nanny for posh British kids, Julie Andrews got her training as a singing nanny for posh Austrian kids. Hollywood ; making prequels before they were cool.

In the process of teaching the children in her care how to enjoy the summer - and behave like human beings - and reminding their father that there is a reason military service has age restrictions, Maria gives us a lesson in how to make a wonderful musical. Listen up children, this stuff is important.

The Sound of Music triumphs where my most recent musical disappointment, West Side Story, fails. The writing is a thing of beauty. The second scene of the movie makes nuns appear likeable and funny. Nuns !  After three genuine laughs in a couple of minutes I knew it was not a mistake to rewatch this. Before the nazis bring their distinct brand of serious to the film it remains a perfectly light affair, comanding hilarity whenever it so desires.

All the children act their age but none ever feel like caricatures. Dosage is perhaps the great quality of the sound of music. Liesl is as dumb as any 16 year old who thinks she is in love but without being insufferable. Captain von Trapp is authoritarian but never autocratic. He mellows muh easier and quicker than I remembered. The baroness does what she can to hold on to him but has enough class to not be petty or small in her jalousy of Maria. It turns out I truly cannot trust childhood memories.

Dosage goes much farther than sole character building. The film is a delicate balance that shifts from a playful beginning to a more serious middle and a solemn ending - all the while maintaining a welcome lightheartedness that never undermines the stakes. The humour always works to reinforce whatever tone the scene wants to adopt and the ubiquitous songs never become too many. The movie is sweet, hopeful and gay, and yet avoids becoming naive or saccharine. Unlike so many characters in movies like Les Demoiselles de Rochefort, Maria could actually live in the real world. She is a free spirit but can be serious when the occasion demands it.

That makes it easy to go along with the plot. Songs and dialogue provide a punchy combination that is inescapably entertaining. For the first half of the movie one can contentedly marvel at the wit of the exchanges and the cleverness of the lyrics - not to mention the harmony. Rivers of idiosyncrasies emanate from the characters who somehow pirouette around ever turning the film overbearingly silly.

When the action settles into a love story it starts telling something about relationships and people and the script becomes elevated - all the more so because all its characters are treated like actual, complex people, largely motivated by positive forces. After the Anschluss of course, the movie becomes about something else entirely. It is a credit to the original musical that it manages to combine the beginning with the aforementioned ghastly swastika wavers. Again, dosage.

To stay on that theme, The Sound of Music does something that I discovered enjoying quite a lot with Hamilton: using its songs (or parts thereof) as recurring motifs. A lot of the songs of the former are repeated in different situations to enforce themes and punctuate evolutions and actions. I also found being rather fond of the way the songs actually "exist" instead of being punctual performances that in a way "never happened".

The Sound of Music has virtually no dancing, at least not in the scale of West Side Story. It has much deeper characters and a better love story however, not to mention the incomparable writing. In many cases it showcases what I like in musicals - until I find the perfect counterexample of the movie I will find myself loving despite its doing the diametric opposite that is.

8/10

Also, it has the better song about a girl named Maria.
« Last Edit: June 03, 2016, 06:00:09 AM by DarkeningHumour »
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DarkeningHumour

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Re: Merry Music of May Marathon 2016
« Reply #235 on: June 03, 2016, 05:37:26 AM »
West Side Story (Jerome Robbins & Robert Wise, 1961)
That's more like it ! Basically agree with Adam on everything here (except on "Gee, Officer Krumpke"). Right from the start, West Side Story distinguishes itself within this marathon. First those overhead shots of New York : a simple idea, but one that still stands out and adds a certain sense of scope, which is appropriate given the story's Shakesperean origins. What follows is a ten-minute opening scene with virtually no dialogue, introducing us to the neighborhood and its two rival gangs.  There is an incredible deftness to it, in the way it uses dance as storytelling, that blows anything in this marathon so far out of the water, likely because of its origins as a Broadway play. The group numbers are uniformly great (though "Cool" seems a bit tacked on and doesn't flow that well in the narrative), especially "America" of course, which adds a wittiness to the technical marvel, and a willingness to somewhat confront the ideals and disillusions of immigration in post-War America.

Despite our previous disagreement I am with you about that danced opening. Pretty great choreography and silent storytelling. I would have liked to hear more singing from the Jets because the short gang song we do get is fairly good, but in all cases that opening sets things up beautifully. Shame the rest does not live up to it. Maybe if the rumble had been done in the same dancing fashion I would have been more into it.
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oldkid

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Re: Merry Music of May Marathon 2016
« Reply #236 on: June 03, 2016, 10:46:58 PM »


Although I can't agree with your absolute ranking of TSoM over WSS, I find your review refreshing, especially after the depressingly negative double review on The Canon podcast.  They have no joy in their life, that's all I can say.
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Sandy

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Re: Merry Music of May Marathon 2016
« Reply #237 on: June 05, 2016, 08:22:12 AM »
Despite our previous disagreement I am with you about that danced opening. Pretty great choreography and silent storytelling...  that opening sets things up beautifully.

Happy you like this!

Quote
I would have liked to hear more singing from the Jets because the short gang song we do get is fairly good,

Do you mean the Sharks? Because the Jets get Jet Song, Officer Krupke, Tonight Quintet and Cool.

It may be a good thing the Sharks don't have more focus on their singing, since they're a little pitchy in the quintet, but I love them anyway, because they were hired mainly for their awesome dancing skills!

Quote
Maybe if the rumble had been done in the same dancing fashion I would have been more into it.

darn. I really love the choreography and framing of the rumble scene.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=El9d0lgh3vQ


Although I can't agree with your absolute ranking of TSoM over WSS, I find your review refreshing...

I have a lot of love for The Sound of Music, so want to echo oldkid's words.

It really is a wonderful review, DarkeningHumour.


Funny Girl
But "I'd Rather Be Blue", "I'm the Greatest Star", "Don't Rain on my Parade", and "My Man" still work for me as some of the best Barbara Streisand, which makes some of my favorite songs.

I'm in COMPLETE agreement! :)