The Movie Amadeus
malcolm oakes
Was Amadeus the best movie ever made or what?
Comments?
Malcolm Oakes
RD615
Well I don't know if I would go that far, but I did enjoy it quite a bit.
However I don't know if it was historically accurate or not, any Mozart
experts out there?
Another movie that I thought wove the music into the story well was
Immortal Beloved. That movie was also enthralling. Whomever made the
musical choices for the different scenes made some wonderful choices.
~~
Randall Davis
rd...@aol.com
John Edwards
malcolm oakes <m...@west.net> wrote:
>Was Amadeus the best movie ever made or what?
>
>Comments?
>
>Malcolm Oakes
It's a very good film, but one that has been roundly criticized for its
supposed historical inaccuracy with regard to Mozart's life. Two points
should be made in response to this criticism:
1. The film is not a "life" of Mozart. It is really the story of a
struggle between Salieri and God, with Mozart as a pawn in the struggle.
Note that the title employs Mozart's middle name, meaning "beloved of
God."
2. Since the whole story is told by Salieri, the viewer is free to be
skeptical about the accuracy of his version of the events. It is natural
to assume, under the circumstances, that Salieri would introduce
distortions.
Check out the new Pioneer widescreen laserdisc.
---
John Edwards
polaris
malcolm oakes wrote:
>
> Was Amadeus the best movie ever made or what?
>
> Comments?
>
Shaffer took a great deal of poetic license with Mozart's life.
Elliott Starr
Deryk Barker
What.
--
Deryk.
===========================================================================
|Deryk Barker, Computer Science Dept. | Across the pale parabola of Joy |
|Camosun College, Victoria, BC, Canada | |
|email: dba...@camosun.bc.ca | Ralston McTodd |
|phone: +1 604 370 4452 | (Songs of Squalor). |
===========================================================================
Seongwook Kwon
RD615 (rd...@aol.com) wrote:
: >Was Amadeus the best movie ever made or what?
No. But it was one of the best movie ever about classical music and its
composers. Regardless of...
: However I don't know if it was historically accurate or not, any Mozart
its historically accuracy. Salieri's role in Mozart's death was
concocted simply to maximize the dramatic quality of the movie. And it
was a success, I think.
: Another movie that I thought wove the music into the story well was
: Immortal Beloved.
No, again. It sucked. A poor immitation of Amadeus. Beethoven looked
like Beethoven, only in looks. His acting was average at best (think of
Mozart in Amadeus, then you will realize it). The story development
wasn't engaging that much. The matching of music to the movie wasn't so
convincing sometimes (sorry, IMHO). I'd rather listen to the soundtrack
without watching the movie itself. And again, I'd rather 'watch' Amadeus
to get the full impact of its soundtrack.
Seongwook Kwon
swk...@email.unc.edu
http://www.unc.edu/~swkwon/
Try some Korean music at my homepage.
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
% %
% In the beginning, God said, Let there be music: %
% and there was music. %
% And God saw the music, that it was good. %
% %
% From 'The Creation' by F. J. Haydn :) %
% %
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
Margaret Mikulska
: In article <31CCA2...@west.net>, malcolm oakes <m...@west.net> writes:
: >Was Amadeus the best movie ever made or what?
: Well I don't know if I would go that far, but I did enjoy it quite a bit.
: However I don't know if it was historically accurate or not, any Mozart
: experts out there?
It was extremely inaccurate. Of course, the point of this movie wasn't
the biography of either Mozart of Salieri. It is often argued that
people know very well that "it's just a movie, not a documentary", and
therefore poetic/cinematic license can be applied indisciminately. My
experience is quite different - from numerous postings and conversations
I see that movies like "Amadeus" are taken to be historically accurate.
In the case of this movie, nothing could be farther from truth: any
resemblance of the Mozart from the movie to the German/Austrian composer
is just a lucky coincidence. The music used in the movie, however, is
by the real Mozart.
As a movie about a composer envious of another composer, it's quite
good. But why call them Mozart and Salieri if they have very little in
common with the historical figures?
: Another movie that I thought wove the music into the story well was
: Immortal Beloved. That movie was also enthralling. Whomever made the
: musical choices for the different scenes made some wonderful choices.
Unfortunately, those musical choices included showing an
early-19th-century fortepiano and using a modern-piano recording on the
soundtrack at the same time.
-Margaret
PPD
wrote:
>Was Amadeus the best movie ever made or what?
>
>Comments?
>
>Malcolm Oakes
No, it was Lawrence of Arabia. Excellent script, impeccable acting,
stunning direction and music such so "loud and long" and true and
bright that the desert itself reverberates to it from end to end!
M:PPD
P.S. As regards Mozart, we used to see him in terms of the "porcelain
doll", child prodisy who cried when Marie-Antoinnette would not kiss
him stereotype. Amadeus has widened our perception of him a bit,
showing him as a wild reveller who destroyed himself because his music
somehow consumed him. But it's still a stereotype! The other side of
him, the one who studied Bach and helped publish some of his up to
then lost works, the one who taught at a school in Paris, the one who
had such a desire to innovate but whose innate fear of Leopold
forbidded him from it, who tried to conceal his talent by adopting a
childish image and tried to conceal the wonderful complexity of his
music by writing simple melodies, all these have never been shown.
K. W. Jeter
John Edwards <jted...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>Since the whole story is told by Salieri, the viewer is free to be
>skeptical about the accuracy of his version of the events. It is natural
>to assume, under the circumstances, that Salieri would introduce
>distortions.
The story is _not_ told by Salieri; it is told by the playwright Peter
Shaffer, who felt free to libel someone who perhaps comes closest to
being the most saintlike individual in the history of music. It is a
matter of historical record that Salieri did not conspire to suppress
Mozart's music, but actually did a great deal to promote Mozart's
music after Mozart's death -- a point that Shaffer conveniently
disregards.
The play AMADEUS is really a piece of junk, irredeemably trite and
sophomoric. It's a shame that for many people it represents some sort
of "true" story.
KWJ
Matthew Elgin
K. W. Jeter (je...@europa.com) wrote:
: John Edwards <jted...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
: KWJ
Unless, of course, you've never had any interest in classical music or
its masters, and you happen to stumble on this brilliant film, which by
fabrication introduces you into the marvelous world of classical music
from where you are left to explore the music and facts for yourself. Yes,
the film and the play Amadeus "is really a piece of junk, irredeemably
trite and sophomoric".
Matt
H. Krehbiel
>The play AMADEUS is really a piece of junk, irredeemably trite and
>sophomoric.
Well, let us not be over harsh against Peter Shaffer; I enjoyed the movie while fully aware of
its inaccuracies. I think it describes the self-feeling (a better english word?) of WAM quite
well, and the feelings which He might have aroused in any mediocre composer. I remember a
sentence, in the film spoken by Salieri (in a scende with Constanze), which describes Mozart's
music quite well. Maybe the back-translation is inaccurate:
Change a note and it is a damage; change a passage and everything collapses.
What I found disturbing is that P.S. did not give credit to important figures in Mozart's life,
e.g. da Ponte. And in the German version of the film they kept the English performances of
Seraglio and Magic Flute.
"When actually listening to Mozart it is difficult not to feel that God decided to amuse
herself by dictating a few piano concertos. And that choosing Amadeus as amanuensis was the
best joke of all" (The British neuroscientist John C. Marshall)
Greetings!
David Sherman
>The play AMADEUS is really a piece of junk, irredeemably trite and
>sophomoric. It's a shame that for many people it represents some sort
>of "true" story.
>KWJ
It must have been raining in Portland, OR when he wrote this. I don't
know if a lot of people think it is true or not. But I do think they
felt that it was good theater. What's wrong with leaving it at that?
The original poster said "Is Amadeus the greatest movie ever made or what?"
See, he liked the movie. Why try and convince him otherwise?
NCB
It was one of my favorites also, though it was extremely innacurate, even
unfathomable at times.
I thought Immortal Beloved was one of the worst movies I have ever seen.
The accuracy of that I am unsure of.
> However I don't know if it was historically accurate or not, any Mozart
> experts out there?
>
Aloysia
malcolm oakes wrote:
>
> Was Amadeus the best movie ever made or what?
>
> Comments?
>
> Malcolm Oakes
That movie turned me into a mozart fanatic!! I love it! My
favorite symphony's first movement is played in that movie when Saleiri
cuts his throat.
Aloysia
Aloysia
John Edwards wrote:
>
> malcolm oakes <m...@west.net> wrote:
> >Was Amadeus the best movie ever made or what?
> >
> >Comments?
> >
> >Malcolm Oakes
>
> supposed historical inaccuracy with regard to Mozart's life. Two points
> should be made in response to this criticism:
>
> 1. The film is not a "life" of Mozart. It is really the story of a
> struggle between Salieri and God, with Mozart as a pawn in the struggle.
> Note that the title employs Mozart's middle name, meaning "beloved of
> God."
>
> skeptical about the accuracy of his version of the events. It is natural
> to assume, under the circumstances, that Salieri would introduce
> distortions.
>
>
> ---
>
> John Edwards
I think what you say is very correct. Many things are not the
same as it really was, but what can one expect from a movie?
Aloysia
K. W. Jeter
"H. Krehbiel" <kreh...@desy.de> wrote:
>I enjoyed the movie while fully aware of
>its inaccuracies.
To describe Shaffer's portrayal of Salieri as an inaccuracy is overly
polite. It's slander of a decent and worthwhile person who, in fact,
performed many acts of friendship to Mozart. To slander the dead for
the sake of making some trite pseudo-philosophical point is an evil
enterprise.
> I think it describes the self-feeling (a better english word?) of WAM quite
>well, and the feelings which He might have aroused in any mediocre composer.
Actually, there's enough of Salieri's music available on CD now that
we can determine for ourselves that Salieri, while no Mozart, was far
from being a "mediocre composer." The devastating contrast between
Salieri's music and Mozart's that is made in AMADEUS is again a
concoction of the playwright.
>What I found disturbing is that P.S. did not give credit to important figures in Mozart's life,
>e.g. da Ponte.
A historically accurate biography of Mozart would be an interesting
film, all right. But we certainly didn't get it from Shaffer and
company.
KWJ
James Kahn
>It was one of my favorites also, though it was extremely innacurate, even
>unfathomable at times.
>I thought Immortal Beloved was one of the worst movies I have ever seen.
>The accuracy of that I am unsure of.
It was not accurate, at least in the resolution of the story. But I don't
understand why people pan this movie so much while praising "Amadeus."
"Amadeus" had this pretentious overtone of a grand philosophical question,
while basically presenting a bunch of silly cartoon characters. IB, on the
other hand, was trying to get at the troubles and conflicts within Beethoven
that might account for some of his bizarre behavior. I thought IB was much
more successful, particularly with the climactic scene/flashback during
the 9th symphony.
--Jim
K. W. Jeter
mel...@dmu.ac.uk (Matthew Elgin) wrote:
>Unless, of course, you've never had any interest in classical music or
>its masters, and you happen to stumble on this brilliant film,
I've seen better.
>which by
>fabrication introduces you into the marvelous world of classical music
>from where you are left to explore the music and facts for yourself.
If people did get turned on to classical music by AMADEUS, fine; this
merely demonstrates that a good result can come from an evil
enterprise. But frankly, Disney's FANTASIA did more to promote
classical music, and that film did so without slandering the dead.
KWJ
Paula
>: Another movie that I thought wove the music into the story well was
>: Immortal Beloved.
>
>No, again. It sucked. A poor immitation of Amadeus. Beethoven looked
>like Beethoven, only in looks. His acting was average at best (think of
>Mozart in Amadeus, then you will realize it). The story development
>wasn't engaging that much. The matching of music to the movie wasn't so
>convincing sometimes (sorry, IMHO). I'd rather listen to the soundtrack
>without watching the movie itself. And again, I'd rather 'watch' Amadeus
>to get the full impact of its soundtrack.
A poor imitation of Amadeus?? Where did you get that idea? I found it
to be nothing like Amadeus. The scoring on Immortal Beloved was
wonderful...it presented the music in a visual format, which for me,
enhanced my appreciation of the music. I don't see an co-relation of
Amadeus with Immortal what so ever, over and above being about a
composer. I think with Immortal they managed to present a glimpse into
the mind of the compuser...with overlappings of the score with the
visuals of what "may" have taken place they succeeded in bringing the
viewer to an understanding of the sort of person Beethoven was. Even
with his tyrannical outbursts, his treatment of his brother, friends,
people in general, you feel you understand him. As an artist myself I
have some understanding of the nature of the beast within an artistic
mind such as Beethoven's...and I think the director of Immortal
presented it well...you come away with a love-hate relationship
towards the composer. I should also mention that I found Gary
Oldman's performance as Ludwig to be very well done. I think he
captured the angst and passion of the man well. As for as Amadeus as
comparison of acting stature...I agree that Amadeus was well done,
they are both fine movies...I just perfer Immortal for its passion an
story.
ding ian kristopher
On 23 Jun 1996, Seongwook Kwon wrote:
> No, again. It sucked. A poor immitation of Amadeus. Beethoven looked
> like Beethoven, only in looks. His acting was average at best (think of
> Mozart in Amadeus, then you will realize it). The story development
> wasn't engaging that much. The matching of music to the movie wasn't so
> convincing sometimes (sorry, IMHO). I'd rather listen to the soundtrack
> without watching the movie itself. And again, I'd rather 'watch' Amadeus
> to get the full impact of its soundtrack.
>
Yeah, right... Tom Hulce a better actor than Gary Oldman?! (Okay, so
maybe this belongs in a movie newsgroup now... )
Ian Ding
John Edwards
>>skeptical about the accuracy of his version of the events. It is natural
>>to assume, under the circumstances, that Salieri would introduce
>>distortions.
>
>Shaffer, who felt free to libel someone who perhaps comes closest to
>being the most saintlike individual in the history of music. It is a
>matter of historical record that Salieri did not conspire to suppress
>Mozart's music, but actually did a great deal to promote Mozart's
>music after Mozart's death -- a point that Shaffer conveniently
>disregards.
>
>sophomoric. It's a shame that for many people it represents some sort
>of "true" story.
>
>KWJ
>
>
the play (as anyone familiar with both can attest).
Salieri (the character, not the historical personality) is most certainly
the storyteller. When approaching any narrative, one must take the
prejudices of the narrator into account (not everything the narrator says
can be credible--to the audience _or_ the author!)
---
John Edwards
JDT
"NCB" <bim...@dreamscape.com> wrote:
>It was one of my favorites also, though it was extremely innacurate, even
>unfathomable at times.
>I thought Immortal Beloved was one of the worst movies I have ever seen.
>The accuracy of that I am unsure of.
>> However I don't know if it was historically accurate or not, any Mozart
>> experts out there?
>>
>> Another movie that I thought wove the music into the story well was
>> Immortal Beloved. That movie was also enthralling. Whomever made the
>> musical choices for the different scenes made some wonderful choices.
The idea of comparing and contrasting Salieri and Mozart to the
former's detriment is not new with Peter Shaffer. One of the Big
Names in 19th Century Russian lit wrote a novella on that theme - I'm
not a Russian lit type and don't have references handy, but it was of
the Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky rank (Russian Lit Majors help me out here!!).
Either Tschaikowsky of Rimsky wrote and opera based on this theme (I
do not know the Opera but read of this many years ago). The novella
introduces a conspiracy theory to that effect that Salieri poisoned
Mozart. To the best of my knowledge, this was just a literary device
and not based on any real hard evidence. I'd be interested to hear
more of this.
Jon Teske
Seongwook Kwon
Subject: Re: The Movie Amadeus
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
References: <31CCA2...@west.net> <4qithi$8...@newsbf02.news.aol.com> <4qkgh9$e...@newz.oit.unc.edu> <Pine.A32.3.91.960624...@ux7.cso.uiuc.edu>
Distribution:
ding ian kristopher (i-d...@students.uiuc.edu) wrote:
: Yeah, right... Tom Hulce a better actor than Gary Oldman?! (Okay, so
: maybe this belongs in a movie newsgroup now... )
O.K. I admit. I wasn't really engaged in the movie at the time as I
should have been. Maybe, you are right. But, still I think Amadeus was a
much better movie than Immortal Beloved.
IB develops its story mainly by using a narrative (Schindler's and the
three women), resulting in the isolation of movie characters, especially
Beethoven, from the audience. Beethoven was told to us by a third person
most of the time.
Amadeus also starts with a narration, if I remember correctly. But,
somehow, I felt the emotions of Salieri and Mozart like mine. There,
narration was just a small part of the movie, and therefore the movie
didn't lose its power to control the emotions of the audience.
I think this wasn't just my impression. Anyway, I guess I am not in a
position to criticize IB unless I re-evaluate it carefully.
pil...@acsu.buffalo.edu
> do not know the Opera but read of this many years ago). The novella
> introduces a conspiracy theory to that effect that Salieri poisoned
> Mozart. To the best of my knowledge, this was just a literary device
> and not based on any real hard evidence. I'd be interested to hear
> more of this.
> Jon Teske
Well, I'm not familiar with the novel you mentioned, and this may be a
little off topic, but Mozart did believe that someone was trying to poison
him. He believed that the anonymous person who had commissioned the
Requiem, was the one who was killing him. Here are some excerpts of the
diaries of Vincent and Mary Novello who went to Salzburg to visit
Constanze in 1829:
[Mary Novello, 6/17/1829]
"Some six month's before Mozart's death he was possessed with the idea of
his being poisoned--'I know I must die', he exclaimed, 'someone has given
me acqua toffana [a slow poison, said to include Arsenic and Lead Oxide;
it was given in small doses, and the victim died only after a considerable
interval] and has calculated the precise time of my death--for which they
have ordered a Requiem, it is for myself I am writing this.' his wife
entreated him to let her put it aside, saying he was too ill, otherwise he
would not have such an absurd idea. He agreed she should and wrote a
Masonic ode [Eine Kleine Freymaurer-Kantate, completed on 11/15/1791]
which so delighted the company for whom it was written that he returned
quite elated: 'Did I not know that I have written better I should think
this is the best of my work... Yes, I see I was ill to have such an
absurd idea of having taken poison, give me back the Requiem and I will go
on with it.' but in a few days he was as ill as ever and possessed with
the same idea."
[Vincent Novello 6/15/1829]
"It was about six months before he died that he was impressed with the
horrid idea that someone had poisoned him with acqua toffana--he came to
her one day and complained that he felt a great pain in his loins and a
general languor spreading over him by degrees--that some one of his
enemies had succeeded in administering the deleterious mixture which would
cause his death and that they could already calculate at which precise
time it would infallibly take place. The engagement for the Requiem hurt
him as much as it fed these sad thoughts that naturally resulted from his
weak state of health.. On one occasion he himself with Sussmayr and Madame
Mozart tried over part of the Requiem together, but some of the passages
so excited him that he could not refrain from tears, and was unable to
proceed..."
Well, I know that this is a little off the topic, but I hope it has been
illuminating for some of you...
Alex G. Piller
pil...@acsu.buffalo.edu
Rick Hayward
In message <4qkgh9$e...@newz.oit.unc.edu>
swk...@email.unc.edu (Seongwook Kwon) writes:
> RD615 (rd...@aol.com) wrote:
> : In article <31CCA2...@west.net>, malcolm oakes <m...@west.net> writes:
> : >Was Amadeus the best movie ever made or what?
> No. But it was one of the best movie ever about classical music and its
> composers. Regardless of...
'Amadeus' is a good play/film - but it *isn't* 'about' music per se,
or Mozart. Take it for what it is - a fiction.
RH--
Rick Hayward, Wakefield, West Yorkshire
rick.h...@zetnet.co.uk
AMRourk
Jon Teske ( chac...@idsonline.com ) wrote:
>The idea of comparing and contrasting Salieri and Mozart to the
>former's detriment is not new with Peter Shaffer. One of the Big
>Names in 19th Century Russian lit wrote a novella on that theme - I'm
>not a Russian lit type and don't have references handy, but it was of
>the Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky rank
I'm not sure if there is also a novella on the subject, but Alexander
Pushkin wrote a narrative poem, "Mozart and Salieri", that seems to have
been one of the inspirations for Peter Shaffer's play. In it, Salieri
muses on the unfairness of musical genius being given to the frivolous
Mozart, then poisons him as they sit at dinner... but with a motive
slightly different from Shaffer's Salieri. Pushkin's character kills
Mozart because, he says, "he has no heir", because Mozart has not come to
raise the art of music permanently to a higher plane, but rather to act as
God's unwitting agent in taunting mankind with music more perfect than we
have ever heard before, or will ever be able to create again... and
leaving us with a collective ontological thirst, inspired by Mozart's
music, that will never be slaked. I don't have a copy of the poem
handy, but that passage presents a striking contrast to Shaffer's
small-minded, envious, petty Salieri (and I do remember that a footnote in
my copy of Pushkin points out that the poisoning rumor is a canard, with
no historical basis, and that apparently Salieri was a friend and
benefactor to Mozart.)
David M Pickering
Excerpts from netnews.rec.music.classical: 24-Jun-96 Re: The Movie
Amadeus by K. W. Je...@europa.com
> merely demonstrates that a good result can come from an evil
> enterprise. But frankly, Disney's FANTASIA did more to promote
> classical music, and that film did so without slandering the dead.
Igor Stravinsky, however, was less than thrilled with the "Jurassic
Park" treatment of "Le Sacre du Printemps".
Dave
dp...@andrew.cmu.edu
http://www.psy.cmu.edu/~dp3u/dave.html
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Sometimes I think the surest sign that intelligent life exists
elsewhere in the universe is that none of it has tried to contact us."
--Calvin & Hobbes
K. W. Jeter
John Edwards <jted...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>Salieri (the character, not the historical personality) is most certainly
>the storyteller.
In the play AMADEUS, the _character_ Salieri is in fact the narrator;
he addresses the audience directly across the footlights. I don't see
any essential difference between this and the film version.
The point of my earlier post was that the story we see in both the
play and film version of AMADEUS is "told" to us by the playwright
Shaffer, through the medium of a fictional character Salieri. I use
the word "fictional" here, inasmuch as the so-called Salieri we see in
the play and the film bears little if any resemblance to the real
Salieri that can be discerned from the historical record. Salieri's
genuine acts of friendship toward Mozart and his efforts to promote
Mozart's music after Mozart's death are documented; as much as the
past can be known, we know these things. Shaffer didn't just fudge a
few details for the sake of dramatic impact; he completely inverted
the relationship between Salieri and Mozart, for the sake of his trite
philosophical point, and in a way which slanders a worthwhile
individual. I still maintain that this is a shoddy thing to do and it
further reduces whatever negligible value could be found in AMADEUS,
either film or play.
(And it's not just the portrayal of Salieri that's at fault; Shaffer's
portrayal of Mozart as some kind of giggling idiot is completely
ludicrous.)
>When approaching any narrative, one must take the
>prejudices of the narrator into account (not everything the narrator says
>can be credible--to the audience _or_ the author!)
How true. In AMADEUS, _nothing_ the narrator _or_ the author says can
be taken as credible.
KWJ
K. W. Jeter
chac...@idsonline.com (JDT) wrote:
>The idea of comparing and contrasting Salieri and Mozart to the
>former's detriment is not new with Peter Shaffer. One of the Big
>Names in 19th Century Russian lit wrote a novella on that theme -
Pushkin, actually.
>Either Tschaikowsky of Rimsky wrote and opera based on this theme
I believe it was Rimsky-Korsakov.
>The novella
>introduces a conspiracy theory to that effect that Salieri poisoned
>Mozart. To the best of my knowledge, this was just a literary device
>and not based on any real hard evidence.
It's based on something Mozart said when he was ill and dying. The
genuine pathos here is that Mozart was so delusional at this point
that he would make such an accusation against Salieri.
KWJ
DEVATHLETICSUPPORT
In article <4ql5ur$s...@atheria.europa.com>, je...@europa.com (K. W. Jeter)
wrote:
> John Edwards <jted...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>
> >Since the whole story is told by Salieri, the viewer is free to be
> >skeptical about the accuracy of his version of the events. It is natural
> >to assume, under the circumstances, that Salieri would introduce
> >distortions.
>
> The story is _not_ told by Salieri; it is told by the playwright Peter
> Shaffer, who felt free to libel someone who perhaps comes closest to
> being the most saintlike individual in the history of music. It is a
> matter of historical record that Salieri did not conspire to suppress
> Mozart's music, but actually did a great deal to promote Mozart's
> music after Mozart's death -- a point that Shaffer conveniently
> disregards.
Very true.
>
> The play AMADEUS is really a piece of junk, irredeemably trite and
> sophomoric. It's a shame that for many people it represents some sort
> of "true" story.
Not true (although I haven't seen the play, I assume you're speaking of
the play as movie and vice versa). There are many "authentic" touches to
the film, though, as you say, the main plot is fiction (and was
represented as such). Most of Mozart's dialog was his real dialog, if you
take away the Salieri "plot" you have a fairly good representation of
Mozart's character and his life story.
It may not be the best movie of all time, but it is very good. However, it
undoubtedly is the movie with the best music/soundtrack of all time. The
playing of the musical selections is some of the best ever, in particular
the slow movement of the piano concerto played at the end of the film.
-Owen
James Kahn
>(And it's not just the portrayal of Salieri that's at fault; Shaffer's
>portrayal of Mozart as some kind of giggling idiot is completely
>ludicrous.)
It's been argued that Shaffer intended this to be the character
Salieri's hallucination in his old age. In other words, the whole
story played out in the movie is not intended to be a depiction
of what happened, but within the movie is depicted as Salieri's
imagination. I think this is ambiguous, so I don't think
it rescues Shaffer from the criticism of historical inaccuracy
regarding Mozart, and obviously doesn't as far as Salieri is concerned.
--Jim
====================================================================
ka...@troi.cc.rochester.edu Department of Economics
http://kahn.econ.rochester.edu University of Rochester
Rochester, NY 14627
K. W. Jeter
rick.h...@zetnet.co.uk (Rick Hayward) wrote:
>'Amadeus' is a good play/film - but it *isn't* 'about' music per se,
>or Mozart. Take it for what it is - a fiction.
If Peter Shaffer had written a play about the rivalry between two
sheep farmers in 19th Century Tasmania named Smith and Grabowsky, that
would be fine. But he didn't; instead, he named his characters Mozart
and Salieri and appropriated a few historical incidents from their
lives for the purpose of telling his fictional story. And naturally
he did that because he was trading on the audience's interest in the
lives of the real Mozart and Salieri. Which, again, would be fine if
he had respected the essential nature of the relationship between
Mozart and Salieri. But Shaffer didn't; instead, he twisted and
distorted history and invented things that didn't happen, and did so
in a basically dishonest and slanderous way. And for what? For the
sake of making his trite, pseudo-philosophical point.
There's a Russian term that Vladimir Nabokov tried to introduce into
the English language, for its sheer usefulness. The word is
"poshlost," which basically means "pretentious rubbish." AMADEUS is a
perfect example of poshlost.
KWJ
Owen Hartnett
In article <4qmltd$r...@atheria.europa.com>, je...@europa.com (K. W. Jeter)
wrote:
>"H. Krehbiel" <kreh...@desy.de> wrote:
>
>>I enjoyed the movie while fully aware of
>>its inaccuracies.
>
>To describe Shaffer's portrayal of Salieri as an inaccuracy is overly
>polite. It's slander of a decent and worthwhile person who, in fact,
>performed many acts of friendship to Mozart. To slander the dead for
>the sake of making some trite pseudo-philosophical point is an evil
>enterprise.
Although slandered, Salieri was also wrested from obscurity. Much more
notice has now been made of Salieri since that time resulting in the
increase in the number of his recorded works, as you also noted below. So,
a little silver lining in this slander?
>
>> I think it describes the self-feeling (a better english word?) of WAM quite
>>well, and the feelings which He might have aroused in any mediocre composer.
>
>Actually, there's enough of Salieri's music available on CD now that
>we can determine for ourselves that Salieri, while no Mozart, was far
>from being a "mediocre composer." The devastating contrast between
>Salieri's music and Mozart's that is made in AMADEUS is again a
>concoction of the playwright.
While musical judgements are subjective, you must admit that there is a
devastating contrast between the posthumous popularity of the two
composers. Maybe that's what the movie Salieri was railing about?
>
>>What I found disturbing is that P.S. did not give credit to important
figures in Mozart's life,
>>e.g. da Ponte.
>
>A historically accurate biography of Mozart would be an interesting
>film, all right. But we certainly didn't get it from Shaffer and
>company.
But we did get a fine and entertaining movie, with a wonderful soundtrack,
gloriously played. We didn't get the usual, boring, documentary that
usually fails miserably as a movie.
-Owen
Julie A Dunn
in many ways, i'm convinced that a movie that told the story of mozart's
life *exactly* as it happened, would not have been nearly as successful
as _amadeus_ was. to be perfectly honest, had _amadeus_ been a strictly
biographical movie, i probably would not have the love for classical
music that i developed mostly from watching that movie. i first saw the
movie when in high school, when i knew next to nothing about any
composers. now, the majority of my cd collection is classical.
i guess the point i'm trying to make is that it doesn't matter that
_amadeus_ isn't quite accurate. it's wonderful movie-making, and if it
instills more than a passing interest in classical music in its viewers,
like what happened to me, those viewers will eventually find out the
fallacies in the movie. others may watch it and never think of it
again. but those people would never have found out the true story of
mozart anyway because it is something that doesn't pique their interest.
see what i mean?
just my $0.02 :)
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
/ Julie A Dunn | Carnegie Mellon Sophomore, Psychology \
\ sim...@cmu.edu | http://www.contrib.andrew.cmu.edu/~julied/ /
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Margaret Mikulska
>
>The idea of comparing and contrasting Salieri and Mozart to the
>former's detriment is not new with Peter Shaffer. One of the Big
>not a Russian lit type and don't have references handy, but it was of
A guy called Pushkin ... it is one of his plays from the cycle "Little
Tragedies".
>Either Tschaikowsky of Rimsky wrote and opera based on this theme (I
>do not know the Opera but read of this many years ago).
Rimski-Korsakov. A short one-act work in the form of a conversation
between Mozart (tenor) and Salieri (baritone). There is a geat Russian
recording of it - on Melodiya LP. Let's hope it will get issued on CD.
>The novella [play]
>introduces a conspiracy theory to that effect that Salieri poisoned
>Mozart. To the best of my knowledge, this was just a literary device
>and not based on any real hard evidence. I'd be interested to hear
>more of this.
Actually, the story about Salieri poisoning Mozart popped up shortly
after Mozart's death. BTW, those who believe it point out that the
Russian and the Austrian courts had a lot of ties and suggest that
Pushkin, being close to the court, had some inside information about the
matter. Anyway, although we can discount the poisoning hypothesis, it
was definitely not Pushkin's literary device.
-Margaret
John Edwards
ka...@picard.cc.rochester.edu (James Kahn) wrote:
>In <4qp5qu$o...@atheria.europa.com> je...@europa.com (K. W. Jeter) writes:
>
>>(And it's not just the portrayal of Salieri that's at fault; Shaffer's
>>portrayal of Mozart as some kind of giggling idiot is completely
>>ludicrous.)
>
>It's been argued that Shaffer intended this to be the character
>Salieri's hallucination in his old age. In other words, the whole
>story played out in the movie is not intended to be a depiction
>of what happened, but within the movie is depicted as Salieri's
>imagination. I think this is ambiguous, so I don't think
>regarding Mozart, and obviously doesn't as far as Salieri is concerned.
>--Jim
>====================================================================
>ka...@troi.cc.rochester.edu Department of Economics
>http://kahn.econ.rochester.edu University of Rochester
> Rochester, NY 14627
Why not? If a fictional character is demented, his or her musings,
fantasies, statements of fact, opinions on other characters, etc., must
naturally be judged in light of that fact. When we take into account the
fact that many of the events narrated by Salieri could not have been
witnessed by him, it is all the more clear that this narrative has been
highly embellished by the *narrator* (who cannot, repeat, cannot be
identified in his opinions, judgments, etc., with the author of the
piece). Indeed, many of Mozart's most bizarre behaviors are witnessed in
scenes to which Salieri himself could not have been witness (e.g. the
Mozarts at home, the rehearsal for _Die Zauberfloete_, etc.). So as far
as I can tell, this interpretation of the film makes the charge of
"historical inaccuracy," for all it's worth (which isn't much) evaporate
with regard to Shaffer's supposed portrayal of Mozart.
With regard to the portrayal of Salieri, I can only repeat that an author
of fiction (or drama, or screenplay) cannot be held responsible for
fidelity to "historical fact" in the same way as can a historian.
---
John Edwards
Seongwook Kwon
K. W. Jeter (je...@europa.com) wrote:
And naturally
: he did that because he was trading on the audience's interest in the
: lives of the real Mozart and Salieri. Which, again, would be fine if
: he had respected the essential nature of the relationship between
: Mozart and Salieri.
No. It is fine because it was a fiction, not a documentary. The director
is entitled to whatever he feels necessary to make the movie the version
he wants. Freedom of expression that should be guaranteed in any art
form.
Why would you think that it was the director's intention - or duty in your
case - to portray Mozart as he was. If you want facts, go find it in
another place, not in a movie.
John Edwards
>(And it's not just the portrayal of Salieri that's at fault; Shaffer's
>portrayal of Mozart as some kind of giggling idiot is completely
>ludicrous.)
Again, is it Shaffer's portrayal of Mozart, or is it Shafer's portrayal of
the (fictional character) Salieri's _perceptions_ of Mozart? This is not
splitting hairs. There is no reason that the audience must accept
Salieri's version of the events which transpired in Vienna as factual, or
accept Salieri's description of Mozart's character as accurate. All we
see in the film is a narration filtered through Salieri the character.
He, being at least somewhat unstable as well as resentful of Mozart, not
only may but must be regarded skeptically when it comes to his story.
Of course, all this leaves open the issue of whether the Salieri of
_Amadeus_ is "historically accurate" or not. Granting for the sake of
argument that the real Salieri was not much like the film or play version
(and there seems to be good reason to believe he was not), it is still
necessary to recognize that no matter how many historical names and places
an artist chooses to utilize, he or she is not responsible to the "facts"
of history--in so far as these can even be determined!--in the same way
that a historian is responsible. What objectors to films like _Amadeus_
(or _JFK_, or _Nixon_, or whatever) persistently fail to recognize is the
difference between narrative art and historiography. Failure to
differentiate these two radically different forms of discourse, with their
radically different aims, audiences, and responsibilities, is a serious
error with very detrimental effects on criticism.
---
John Edwards
K. W. Jeter
swk...@email.unc.edu (Seongwook Kwon) wrote:
>It is fine because it was a fiction, not a documentary.
Labelling something as fiction is no excuse; it's still slander of
people who actually lived and who were totally different from those
characters seen in the AMADEUS play and/or movie.
>The director
>is entitled to whatever he feels necessary to make the movie the version
>he wants. Freedom of expression that should be guaranteed in any art
>form.
So who's arguing otherwise? Of course, Shaffer _et al_ have the right
to make whatever artistic presentation they wish. But the audience,
myself included, has the right to criticize the result. My disdain
for AMADEUS goes way beyond its historical inaccuracies.
>Why would you think that it was the director's intention - or duty in your
>case - to portray Mozart as he was.
Because it would have been more interesting than the trite,
pseudo-philosophical claptrap that Shaffer and the director did come
up with.
>If you want facts, go find it in
>another place, not in a movie.
I often do. But nevertheless, AMADEUS is a play and a film that
trades upon its representation of historical figures, and thus its
historical accuracy is a legitimate issue of criticism. Shaffer made
the artistic decision to base his characters upon real people; if he
didn't want people to comment upon the historical accuracy of his
representation of those people, he should have given other names to
his "fictional" characters -- but then he wouldn't have gotten such a
large audience for his shabby little melodrama.
KWJ
K. W. Jeter
John Edwards <jted...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>Again, is it Shaffer's portrayal of Mozart, or is it Shafer's portrayal of
>the (fictional character) Salieri's _perceptions_ of Mozart? This is not
>splitting hairs. There is no reason that the audience must accept
>Salieri's version of the events which transpired in Vienna as factual, or
>accept Salieri's description of Mozart's character as accurate. All we
>see in the film is a narration filtered through Salieri the character.
>He, being at least somewhat unstable as well as resentful of Mozart, not
>only may but must be regarded skeptically when it comes to his story.
The net result of your logic is to absolve Shaffer of any
responsibility for the play that we _know_ that he wrote.
>What objectors to films like _Amadeus_
>(or _JFK_, or _Nixon_, or whatever) persistently fail to recognize is the
>difference between narrative art and historiography.
What defenders of films like AMADEUS persistently fail to remember is
that there is plenty of narrative art that _doesn't_ distort
historical fact and that _doesn't_ slander people who actually
existed.
>Failure to
>differentiate these two radically different forms of discourse, with their
>radically different aims, audiences, and responsibilities, is a serious
>error with very detrimental effects on criticism.
One can be very well aware of the difference between narrative art and
historiography, and still consider AMADEUS to be a piece of slanderous
junk.
KWJ
James Kahn
In <4qq74h$k...@mtinsc01-mgt.ops.worldnet.att.net> John Edwards <jted...@worldnet.att.net> writes:
>ka...@picard.cc.rochester.edu (James Kahn) wrote:
>>It's been argued that Shaffer intended this to be the character
>>Salieri's hallucination in his old age. In other words, the whole
>>story played out in the movie is not intended to be a depiction
>>of what happened, but within the movie is depicted as Salieri's
>>imagination. I think this is ambiguous, so I don't think
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>>it rescues Shaffer from the criticism of historical inaccuracy
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>>regarding Mozart, and obviously doesn't as far as Salieri is concerned.
>>^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>Why not? If a fictional character is demented, his or her musings,
>fantasies, statements of fact, opinions on other characters, etc., must
>naturally be judged in light of that fact. When we take into account the
>fact that many of the events narrated by Salieri could not have been
>witnessed by him, it is all the more clear that this narrative has been
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>highly embellished by the *narrator* (who cannot, repeat, cannot be
>identified in his opinions, judgments, etc., with the author of the
>piece)...
This was not clear to me, which was precisely why I used the term
"ambiguous" above. Had it been clearer, I would have had
no criticism.
>With regard to the portrayal of Salieri, I can only repeat that an author
>of fiction (or drama, or screenplay) cannot be held responsible for
>fidelity to "historical fact" in the same way as can a historian.
I completely agree with this (think of Shakespeare, after all), but
that doesn't mean that an author of fiction is 100 percent immune
from criticism on these grounds, and _certainly_ doesn't invalidate
my preference for a clearer distinction between fact and fiction in
works that mix the two.
John Edwards
je...@europa.com (K. W. Jeter) wrote:
>What defenders of films like AMADEUS persistently fail to remember is
>that there is plenty of narrative art that _doesn't_ distort
>historical fact and that _doesn't_ slander people who actually
>existed.
>
I defy _anyone_ to point out an example of a work of fiction, cinema,
drama, etc., which deals with historical events in an aesthetically
satisfying manner _without_ distorting "historical fact" to some degree.
It is not possible to do this. Narrative, like any overtly aesthetic form
of discourse, has certain formal, sensual, emotional, etc. requirements
which are not met by the purely causal flow of events in the lived history
of our world. Historiography, however good, can only be of limited
aesthetic value (because aesthetic value is not its aim). Shakespeare
(e.g. in _Henry V_) could hardly be called a historian, but we learn more
about his subjects, although in a different way, than we would from
reading history. This is because history is necessarily particularistic:
It deals with particular people enacting particular events at a particular
time. Art which uses history as a starting point must universalize the
particular; this is not possible without some measure of distortion.
My Old Testament professor used to insist on a distinction between the
"literature of knowledge" and the "literature of power." If you want to
study biology, you don't turn to Genesis; if you want to study
ornithology, you don't read Keats's "Ode to a Nightingale"; and if you
want to study musicology, you don't use _Amadeus_ as a primary source.
---
John Edwards
Steve Lee
> Was Amadeus the best movie ever made or what?
What.
David M Pickering
Excerpts from netnews.rec.music.classical: 25-Jun-96 Re: The Movie
Amadeus by J...@idsonline.com
> former's detriment is not new with Peter Shaffer. One of the Big
> Names in 19th Century Russian lit wrote a novella on that theme - I'm
> not a Russian lit type and don't have references handy, but it was of
> the Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky rank (Russian Lit Majors help me out here!!).
> introduces a conspiracy theory to that effect that Salieri poisoned
> Mozart. To the best of my knowledge, this was just a literary device
> and not based on any real hard evidence. I'd be interested to hear
> more of this.
The writer was Alexandr Pushkin. Rimsky-Korsakov wrote a one-act opera
based on Pushkin's work. Btw, it was Pushkin who first put forward the
proposal that Salieri poisoned Mozart though, AFAIK, there is not a
shred of hard evidence to support this allegation.
K. W. Jeter
>"Amadeus" was just a very very good movie.
Whether it is or isn't is a matter of opinion. But what's _fact_ is
that it slanders an innocent person.
>Well written,
Not in my opinion. Both the dialogue and the plot are the substance
of melodrama.
>beautifully acted,
Again, not in my opinion. What isn't scenery-chewing is buffoonery.
>the costumes, sets and locations were incredible,
Hollywood certainly does know how to spend money.
>the
>cinematography was first class.
In the service of a wretched enterprise.
>And the soundtrack wasn't bad either!
Slathering on Mozart extracts would probably help any movie.
KWJ
Owen Hartnett
wrote:
>ow...@ids.net (Owen Hartnett) wrote:
>
>>Although slandered, Salieri was also wrested from obscurity. Much more
>>notice has now been made of Salieri since that time resulting in the
>>increase in the number of his recorded works, as you also noted below. So,
>>a little silver lining in this slander?
>
>This is a further demonstration that a worthwhile result can come from
>an evil enterprise.
>
>Actually, though, Salieri was a fairly important figure in the musical
>world of his time. With the amount of music that's being rescued from
>obscurity these days, it would be reasonable to expect that Salieri
>would have eventually shown up on CD, with or without the attention
>brought to him by AMADEUS.
Probably not to the level that the movie brought him to, though.
>>But we did get a fine and entertaining movie,
>
>If you enjoyed it, that's great; I didn't. The film mainly aroused in
>me a desire to stand on Tom Hulce's throat until he stopped moving.
>
Actually, I think that Mozart was a Hulce-type personality. Hulce's
obnoxiousness was obviously deliberate, and a take on what Mozart's
personality may have been like. It isn't the picture of Mozart I had in
mind, but it obviously was inspired by Mozart's letters and dialogs.
>>with a wonderful soundtrack,
>>gloriously played.
>
>Was there a dearth of great Mozart recordings _before_ AMADEUS?
No, but surely you're not saying that we should stop playing Mozart
because everyone has already done it better?
Besides, millions of people, who would've never have listened to Mozart
otherwise, got exposed by some really great performances.
>
>>We didn't get the usual, boring, documentary that
>>usually fails miserably as a movie.
>
>Actually, there's been a spate of documentaries recently, i.e. CRUMB
>and HOOP DREAMS, that have succeeded quite well as movies. There's no
>reason to rule out of hand that a historically accurate biography of
>Mozart, done with the same glossy production values as AMADEUS,
>couldn't also be a success, artistically _or_ commercially.
Usually when Hollywood tries to do it, though, we get similar to those
onerous Liszt and Chopin biographies that can really make one nauseous.
-Owen
K. W. Jeter
>In <4qsnn4$n...@atheria.europa.com> je...@europa.com (K. W. Jeter)
>writes:
>>>Igor Stravinsky, however, was less than thrilled with the "Jurassic
>>>Park" treatment of "Le Sacre du Printemps".
>>>Dave
>>>dp...@andrew.cmu.edu
>>I had read that he was mainly annoyed with the cuts made in the music,
>>and that the dinosaurs really didn't bother him that much.
>>KWJ
>Of course, Stravinsky couldn't have had any opinion about a "Jurassic
>Park" treatment of his piece, as he died long before the book (much
>less the movie) came out.
>Peggy Harrison
Oh, come on. Dave was obviously using the "Jurassic Park" term as a
contemporary -- and perfectly appropriate -- reference to the use of
the Rite of Spring music to help depict a bunch of dinosaurs dying out
due to catastrophic climate changes. I really doubt if anyone here
needs to be informed that Stravinsky was dead before Michael Crichton
wrote the book of that name.
KWJ
K. W. Jeter
>>See, he liked the movie. Why try and convince him otherwise?
>>
>>dshe...@panix.com
>Why? Because he posted that statement. Why would he post it if he
>didn't expect to hear a variety of opinions on the subject?
Well put.
If people here wished to read only postings from other people who
share their enthusiasm for AMADEUS, they should start a thread
soliciting only positive comments about AMADEUS. And I would neither
read nor bother people with postings to such a thread.
KWJ
K. W. Jeter
>That business at the end about the Salieri's
>commissioning the Requiem is pure hogwash. It was commissioned by
>someone else.
Count Walsegg-Stuppach, actually. He intended to pass the Requiem off
as his own composition, which was the reason for the secrecy about it
being commissioned from Mozart.
KWJ
John Edwards
>
>>I defy _anyone_ to point out an example of a work of fiction, cinema,
>>drama, etc., which deals with historical events in an aesthetically
>>satisfying manner _without_ distorting "historical fact" to some degree.
>
>Nobody's arguing with an artist's right to amplify, embellish, invent,
>etc., in regard to matters of historical record.
To quote from your previous post, to which I was responding: ". . . there
is plenty of narrative art that _doesn't_ distort historical fact. . . ."
It is this point against which I was arguing in the above. There is
neither plenty nor, indeed, any aesthetic narrative which, using history
as a basis, does not distort that history. It's not possible. Life as
lived is not a story; it is only through the _distorting_ faculty of
memory that we make it a story.
>But AMADEUS is
>hardly a matter of simple artistic distortion; in fact, it's a
>180-degrees-around _inversion_ of the historical record. It takes a
>complicated human relationship, that between the actual Mozart and
>Salieri, and turns it around and reduces it to trite melodrama.
This is the third or fourth time I have encountered the word "trite" in
your criticism of the film. Would you care to delineate precisely those
aspects of the film you find trite, and why you feel this way? Or would
you prefer to keep throwing the term around without any attempt to justify
or clarify your use of it? :)
---
John Edwards
Matthew Elgin
: I'm not sure if there is also a novella on the subject, but Alexander
: Pushkin wrote a narrative poem, "Mozart and Salieri", that seems to have
: been one of the inspirations for Peter Shaffer's play.
Inspirations? I had a browse on the web yesterday to see if I could find
the poem. I did, you can find it at -
http://www.princeton.edu/~egurarie/MOZ_SAL.html
After reading it I would say inspiration is rather a soft word for Peter
Shaffer's play - bloody ripoff comes closer the mark! Have a look anyway,
see what you think.
Matt.
BTW when was the last time you believed the things you saw on the silver
screen?
Rick Hayward
je...@europa.com (K. W. Jeter) writes:
> rick.h...@zetnet.co.uk (Rick Hayward) wrote:
> >'Amadeus' is a good play/film - but it *isn't* 'about' music per se,
> >or Mozart. Take it for what it is - a fiction.
> If Peter Shaffer had written a play about the rivalry between two
> sheep farmers in 19th Century Tasmania named Smith and Grabowsky, that
> would be fine. But he didn't; instead, he named his characters Mozart
> and Salieri and appropriated a few historical incidents from their
> lives for the purpose of telling his fictional story. And naturally
> he did that because he was trading on the audience's interest in the
> lives of the real Mozart and Salieri. Which, again, would be fine if
> he had respected the essential nature of the relationship between
> Mozart and Salieri. But Shaffer didn't; instead, he twisted and
> distorted history and invented things that didn't happen, and did so
> in a basically dishonest and slanderous way. And for what? For the
> sake of making his trite, pseudo-philosophical point.
This thread is coming close to the top of the crap rating.
By all means dislike the film/play, but for God's sake understand it
for what it is - a fiction, and dispense with the anal-retentive
nonsense about 'accuracy' and the inviolability of the historical
relationship/characters. If Schaffer had claimed to have written a
historical text, you would be quite entitled to question it in terms
of historical accuracy. But he didn't, and anyone who allows the
film/play to become confused with Mozart and the music which we
listen to to-day has severely limited imagination and understanding.
The use of historical characters as dramatic devices is as old as the
hills. By your criteria, Shakespeare shouldn't have written :
Titus Andronicus
Julius Caesar
Timon of Athens
Macbeth
Coriolanus
Henrys IV, V, VI and VIII
Richards II and III
King John
Antony and Cleopatra
Browning! : scrub 'Fra Lippo Lippi'! Mussorgsky! : that Boris Godonov
was very naughty! And Mallory! : get your facts right and stop that
supernatural nonsense!
Die Meistersinger? A travesty! We Beckmessers like things *right*!
... and as for the Bible ...
Discuss the drama.
Discuss Mozart
Discuss music
... but keep a sense of proportion.
RH --
Rick Hayward, Wakefield, West Yorkshire
rick.h...@zetnet.co.uk
Sharps5
informally in the writing of opera.
Laurent Planchon - Anacad
: In <4ql5ur$s...@atheria.europa.com> je...@europa.com (K. W. Jeter) writes:
: >The play AMADEUS is really a piece of junk, irredeemably trite and
: >sophomoric. It's a shame that for many people it represents some sort
: >of "true" story.
: It must have been raining in Portland, OR when he wrote this.
Certainly. It is anyway ALWAYS raining is this !@#$%^ city ... I can
understand that one can get really depressed. Sometimes I really wonder
what I am doing here.
Laurent Planchon , originally from France, and lost in the Far-Wet Oregon.
<laur...@mentorg.com>
Aloysia
>
> Also, Salieri was a teacher to the great Beethoven. Coaching him
> informally in the writing of opera.
Obviously wasn't very successful . . . :-)
Aloysia
--
1ÄŸ
Richard Wang
John Edwards <jted...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>I defy _anyone_ to point out an example of a work of fiction, cinema,
>drama, etc., which deals with historical events in an aesthetically
>satisfying manner _without_ distorting "historical fact" to some degree.
>It is not possible to do this.
And yet it should be possible to avoid completely fracturing the truth
just for the sake of satisfying narrative.
>time. Art which uses history as a starting point must universalize the
>particular; this is not possible without some measure of distortion.
As KWJ has pointed out, though, we're not talking about "some measure of
distortion" with a universalization of the particular as its object. If
a screenwriter finds himself obliged to stretch a few points in order to
produce a dramatically coherent script, so be it. But one may object
when stretching gives way to shredding and tearing; and what we have in
_Amadeus_ is a deliberate and categorical misrepresentation of history
--
Richard Wang rw...@fas.harvard.edu
"Well, that was a cleverly crafted piece of non-claptrap which never once
made me want to retch."--Sideshow Bob
John Edwards
>. . .what we have in
>
>--
>Richard Wang rw...@fas.harvard.edu
>"Well, that was a cleverly crafted piece of non-claptrap which never once
>made me want to retch."--Sideshow Bob
I hardly see the purported distortions of _Amadeus_ as "deliberate
. . misrepresentation." Is the Forman/Shaffer team out to sell
something? Is this propaganda? Was Salieri so well-known and
well-loved in 1984 (when the film was released) that the filmmakers had to
rush to Mozart's defense and concoct an elaborate, expensive work of
cinema to discredit the now-beatified Salieri? If any of this were true,
then the film's "inaccuracies" might be described as "deliberate . . .
misrepresentation." But Shaffer's play and screenplay (as has now been
pointed out by myself and others _ad infinitum_ in this forum) does not
claim to _represent_ facts and therefore cannot be accused of
_misrepresenting_ them.
It is the fault of the audience, not the filmmakers, if the difference
between fiction and historiography has not been perceived.
---
John Edwards
John Edwards
>As a movie about a composer envious of another composer, it's quite
>good. But why call them Mozart and Salieri if they have very little in
>common with the historical figures?
Why did Rachmaninov use a melody by Paganini for his Rhapsody, instead of
writing a new tune of his own? Because of the familiarity of the theme,
of course, which provides a point of entry for audiences. We might think
of Shaffer's play/screenplay as a "variation" on the familiar "themes" of
envy, rebellion against God, or mediocrity vs. genius (flame me if you
must, but there is no justification for characterizing Salieri's music as
anything but "mediocre," and the quality of his music bears no comparison
whatever to the quality of Mozart's music).
Several other posters have made the point I have been trying to make all
along, though they have done it more succinctly. :) That point is as
follows: Fictional narratives and their creators have at best very limited
responsibilty to "historical accuracy" (insofar as that is even a definite
entity). Their responsibility is to the form, beauty, and meaning of
their narratives, which are always unrelated to, and often at odds with,
"historical accuracy." The use of "historical accuracy" to judge a work
of art is a reflection of a deep-seated inability or unwillingness on the
part of the critic to judge the work on its own terms.
---
John Edwards
David Bluestone
David
K. W. Jeter
>Why did Rachmaninov use a melody by Paganini for his Rhapsody, instead of
>writing a new tune of his own? Because of the familiarity of the theme,
>of course, which provides a point of entry for audiences.
Nonsense. Rachmaninov used the Paganini melody because some melodies
are better material than others for development, and Rachmaninov
judged this one to be particularly useful for that purpose. If
familiarity were the only criterion, Rachmaninov could certainly have
picked a melody that was much more familiar to his audience. And in
fact, this Paganini melody is better known because of its association
with Rachmaninov's rhapsody than it would be otherwise.
>We might think
>of Shaffer's play/screenplay as a "variation" on the familiar "themes" of
>envy, rebellion against God, or mediocrity vs. genius (flame me if you
>must, but there is no justification for characterizing Salieri's music as
>anything but "mediocre," and the quality of his music bears no comparison
>whatever to the quality of Mozart's music).
It's not flaming to point out that subjective judgments regarding
music are, in the last analysis, a matter of opinion. You like it or
you don't. But the language of your judgments in this regard strike
me as overly harsh. A composer can certainly be less than Mozart --
and no one here has made a claim for Salieri being Mozart's equal --
and still be quite a few cuts above "mediocre."
A review by Robert McColley, of a CD recording of some of Salieri's
concertos, recently appeared in Fanfare magazine. I'll just quote a
few lines from that:
"Melody was [Salieri's] forte, almost always accompanied with economy
and simplicity, but never with mere musical cliches. Whatever one
makes of Salieri, he was in his way stretching the limits of classical
compositional technique every bit as much as his most famous
contemporaries."
Now, I'm not quoting this as an appeal to some kind of authority that
would outweigh anyone's negative opinion about the quality of
Salieri's music. I'm merely doing so to point out that as more
opportunities are being presented for people to become familiar with
Salieri's music, a considerable deal of revision is going on with the
general estimation of his worth as a composer. And as to whether the
quality of his music bears "no comparison whatever" to Mozart's -- I
think you overstate your case here, in the same manner that Peter
Shaffer did in AMADEUS by portraying Salieri as a completely worthless
hack.
KWJ
K. W. Jeter
>To quote from your previous post, to which I was responding: ". . . there
>is plenty of narrative art that _doesn't_ distort historical fact. . . ."
>It is this point against which I was arguing in the above. There is
>neither plenty nor, indeed, any aesthetic narrative which, using history
>as a basis, does not distort that history.
I think you've misread my comment. I didn't say "plenty of narrative
art _which uses history as a basis_." My point was that creative
artists are always free to invent fictional characters and give them
whatever natures they wish, rather than giving them the names of
people who actually existed and distorting the natures they had.
Certainly Peter Shaffer is capable of this; he didn't name the
psychiatrist in EQUUS Sigmund Freud, did he?
>This is the third or fourth time I have encountered the word "trite" in
>your criticism of the film. Would you care to delineate precisely those
>aspects of the film you find trite, and why you feel this way? Or would
>you prefer to keep throwing the term around without any attempt to justify
>or clarify your use of it? :)
I use the word "trite" in reference to examples of narrative art that
I feel oversimplify the complex nature of relationships between people
-- whether based on historical figures or completely fictional -- and
reduce those people and those relationships to tediously familiar
melodrama. Mozart was not some giggling idiot savant; he was much
more complex than that. Salieri was not a string-pulling hack; he
was, by all reliable accounts, more complex than that. The
relationship between Mozart and Salieri, as can be documented by
Salieri's promotion of Mozart's music after Mozart's death, would have
had to have been more complex than what Shaffer depicts in AMADEUS.
To see Salieri shaking his fist at God and swearing eternal vengence
(I'm paraphrasing here) -- oh, puh-leeze, as Joan Rivers would say.
Why not just go ahead and give Salieri a Snidely Whiplash moustache
while you're at it, that he can twist the ends of while concocting his
fiendish plans? That's what I mean by trite. :)
KWJ
Rick Hayward
swk...@email.unc.edu (Seongwook Kwon) writes:
> If you want facts, go find it in another place, not in a movie.
Tersely and precisely put. Well done.
RH--
Rick Hayward
> historiography, and still consider AMADEUS to be a piece of slanderous
> junk.
Looks as if one can also be totally oblivious to the nature of art
and history and also reach that conclusion!
RH --
Rick Hayward
je...@europa.com (K. W. Jeter) writes:
> But Keats' ode _adds_ to our knowledge of what a nightingale is;
Does it *******s! (speaking tolerantly as an ornitholigist who loves poetry):-)
Again - the bird is purely a vehicle which the poet uses to explore
his particular inner world. If you can list three distinctive
scientific facts (other than that it's a bird, sings and hangs around
trees) about the Nightingale, based on information in this poem, I
will cease participation in this thread (can't say fairer than that).
I actually believe that Keats should be dug up and displayed in
public for the fraud that he was - inventing the idea that the
Nightingale doesn't die, and pretending that you can *talk*
meaningfully to a bird!
RH--
Frank Eggleston
> mikulska@astro (Margaret Mikulska) wrote:
>
> >As a movie about a composer envious of another composer, it's quite
> >good. But why call them Mozart and Salieri if they have very little in
> >common with the historical figures?
>
> Several other posters have made the point I have been trying to make all
> along, though they have done it more succinctly. :) That point is as
> follows: Fictional narratives and their creators have at best very limited
> responsibilty to "historical accuracy" (insofar as that is even a definite
> entity). Their responsibility is to the form, beauty, and meaning of
> their narratives, which are always unrelated to, and often at odds with,
> "historical accuracy." The use of "historical accuracy" to judge a work
> of art is a reflection of a deep-seated inability or unwillingness on the
> part of the critic to judge the work on its own terms.
>
> ---
>
> John Edwards
>
>
>>>>
This very point is made much more clearly in the stage version of "Amadeus"
which is obviously told from "Salieri"'s bias, rather than in the movie which
tells it as "real" from "Salieri"'s presumed-real old-age. Movies by their
nature always seem more real than stage plays which "obviously" wouldn't
be really happening on the stage in front of you. I think the problem is in
the nature of the medium in which something which is presented successfully
as fantasy on the stage is made apparent fact by transferring it to the movie
form.
Frank Eggleston
eggl...@ncr.disa.mil
Margaret Harrison
Hayward) writes:
>
<snip>
>By all means dislike the film/play, but for God's sake understand it
>for what it is - a fiction, and dispense with the anal-retentive
>nonsense about 'accuracy' and the inviolability of the historical
>relationship/characters. If Schaffer had claimed to have written a
>historical text, you would be quite entitled to question it in terms
>of historical accuracy. But he didn't, and anyone who allows the
>film/play to become confused with Mozart and the music which we
>listen to to-day has severely limited imagination and understanding.
>
>The use of historical characters as dramatic devices is as old as the
>hills. By your criteria, Shakespeare shouldn't have written :
>
>Titus Andronicus
>Julius Caesar
<good examples snipped>
>Discuss the drama.
>Discuss Mozart
>Discuss music
>
>... but keep a sense of proportion.
>
Good points. I would only add that in the play Amadeus the narrative
is much more evidently the distorted remembrances of Salieri. I think
the movie does more "damage" in the distortion sense, because the story
is presented much more straightfowardly and realistically. In the
play, events are very stylized, and the themes (the short-term triumph
of mediocrity over genius, but genius's eventual triumph; the short
life of fame--you add some) are much clearer.
--
Peggy Harrison
(Peg...@ix.netcom.com)
"Music for a while shall all your cares beguile"
Margaret Harrison
writes:
>A review by Robert McColley, of a CD recording of some of Salieri's
>concertos, recently appeared in Fanfare magazine. I'll just quote a
>few lines from that:
>
>"Melody was [Salieri's] forte, almost always accompanied with economy
>and simplicity, but never with mere musical cliches. Whatever one
>makes of Salieri, he was in his way stretching the limits of classical
>compositional technique every bit as much as his most famous
>contemporaries."
>
>Now, I'm not quoting this as an appeal to some kind of authority that
>would outweigh anyone's negative opinion about the quality of
>Salieri's music. I'm merely doing so to point out that as more
>opportunities are being presented for people to become familiar with
>Salieri's music, a considerable deal of revision is going on with the
>general estimation of his worth as a composer. And as to whether the
>quality of his music bears "no comparison whatever" to Mozart's -- I
>think you overstate your case here, in the same manner that Peter
>Shaffer did in AMADEUS by portraying Salieri as a completely worthless
>hack.
>
>KWJ
>
Sorry, I've heard my share of Salieri. To me, his music is pleasant,
but in no way memoranble. I don't care what some reviewer wrote. Maybe
you can equate the best of Salieri with some youthful Mozart.
How's this for an analogy?
Salieri is to WA Mozart as Telemann is to JS Bach.
Discuss.
JDT
Did Not!
Did so!
Did Not!
Great Taste!
Less Filling!
Jon Teske
Rick Hayward
je...@europa.com (K. W. Jeter) writes:
> dshe...@panix.com (David Sherman) wrote:
> >"Amadeus" was just a very very good movie.
> Whether it is or isn't is a matter of opinion. But what's _fact_ is
> that it slanders an innocent person.
Not fact - but I doubt that a 200 year old stiff will be as worried
as you about it.
K. W. Jeter
reassessment of Salieri's music:
From an earlier (1994) review by David Johnson in Fanfare magazine, of
a recording of Salieri's opera overtures:
"I was enormously impressed and continually absorbed by what I
heard . . . After hearing this dazzling display of overture-fireworks
I am tempted to give Antonio Salieri his place in the Classical
pantheon that has been so long denied him."
[The review also describes the play and film AMADEUS as displaying "a
smug ignorance of Salieri's actual accomplishments (not to mention
Mozart's actual personality)"]
Again, I'm not quoting these lines in an attempt to alter your
negative opinion of Salieri's music. But it should be clear that your
opinion of Salieri as "mediocre" is not a universal one.
KWJ
Lionel Tacchini
> composers. Regardless of...
The best one I've seen so far was "Mit meinen heissen Traenen", a 4 and a half
hour film on Schubert. Unfortunately, I don't know how much truth there is in
it, nor do I know whether this film was ever seen outside Austria and Germany.
Has anyone seen this film who could point out errors or flagrant distortions
made in it ?
As a film, it's brilliant, but as a biography ?
Lionel Tacchini.
John Edwards
>Good points. I would only add that in the play Amadeus the narrative
>is much more evidently the distorted remembrances of Salieri. I think
>the movie does more "damage" in the distortion sense, because the story
>is presented much more straightfowardly and realistically. In the
>play, events are very stylized, and the themes (the short-term triumph
>of mediocrity over genius, but genius's eventual triumph; the short
>life of fame--you add some) are much clearer.
>
>
>--
>Peggy Harrison
>(Peg...@ix.netcom.com)
>"Music for a while shall all your cares beguile"
This is a good point, and one which has been commented on by the film's
critics. I would have to say that the conventions of the cinema are less
conducive to the "stylization" you refer to than are those of the theater.
And, let's be frank, sad though it may be, motion-picture audiences are
not always sophisticated enough to appreciate the more abstract nature of
a highly "stylized" piece. That said, I think both approaches work quite
well, and I actually enjoy the film more than the play (though I am also
quite a bit more familiar with the former). I like the fact that
_Amadeus_, unlike so many film versions of plays, is not just a recorded
version of the play, but has been rethought and reworked for its new
medium.
Still, it is very important to bring out the "distorted remembrances"
bit--this is really the fabric of the narrative, and I admit that there
may be some difficulty recognizing the distortion in the highly realistic
atmosphere of Forman's film.
But then, maybe we've moved beyond the appropriate territory for a
classical music newgroup? :)
---
John Edwards
Aloysia
>
> In <4qithi$8...@newsbf02.news.aol.com> rd...@aol.com (RD615) writes:
> >In article <31CCA2...@west.net>, malcolm oakes <m...@west.net>
> writes:
> >
> >>Was Amadeus the best movie ever made or what?
> >>
> >>Comments?
> >>
> >>Malcolm Oakes
> >>
> >>
> >Well I don't know if I would go that far, but I did enjoy it quite a
> bit. However I don't know if it was historically accurate or not, any
> Mozart experts out there?
> >
>
> I don't think it was particularly accurate, though there surely was a
> Mozart-Salieri rivalry. That business at the end about the Salieri's
> commissioning the Requiem is pure hogwash. It was commissioned by
> someone else.
>
> chance.
>
> >Another movie that I thought wove the music into the story well was
> >Immortal Beloved. That movie was also enthralling. Whomever made the
> >musical choices for the different scenes made some wonderful choices.
> >
> >Randall Davis
> >rd...@aol.com
>
> On the other hand, I absolutely hated Immortal Beloved. It had, I
> thought, a much worse hogwash-to-fact ratio than Amadeus. Plus, I
> thought it wasn't a good movie, even on its own terms. What especially
> annoyed me is that the truth about Beethoven is wonderfully
> interesting, so I got very angry at the movie-makers for making stuff
> up.
>
> I did like the music, but I guess I'd rather spend the two hours with a
> CD in the case of that movie.
The commission, I think would have been better in the movie if
Salieri somehow convinced the Mr.W guy to go to Mozart. But, then again
that wouldn't be the exact truth either . . .
Aloysia
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
I could die laughing . . .
-W.A. Mozart
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Aloysia
>
> In article <4qs14s$4...@atheria.europa.com>, je...@europa.com (K. W. Jeter)
> wrote:
>
> >ow...@ids.net (Owen Hartnett) wrote:
> >
> >>Although slandered, Salieri was also wrested from obscurity. Much more
> >>notice has now been made of Salieri since that time resulting in the
> >>increase in the number of his recorded works, as you also noted below. So,
> >>a little silver lining in this slander?
> >
> >This is a further demonstration that a worthwhile result can come from
> >an evil enterprise.
> >
> >Actually, though, Salieri was a fairly important figure in the musical
> >world of his time. With the amount of music that's being rescued from
> >obscurity these days, it would be reasonable to expect that Salieri
> >would have eventually shown up on CD, with or without the attention
> >brought to him by AMADEUS.
>
> Probably not to the level that the movie brought him to, though.
>
> >>But we did get a fine and entertaining movie,
> >
> >If you enjoyed it, that's great; I didn't. The film mainly aroused in
> >me a desire to stand on Tom Hulce's throat until he stopped moving.
> >
> Actually, I think that Mozart was a Hulce-type personality. Hulce's
> obnoxiousness was obviously deliberate, and a take on what Mozart's
> personality may have been like. It isn't the picture of Mozart I had in
> mind, but it obviously was inspired by Mozart's letters and dialogs.
>
> >>with a wonderful soundtrack,
> >>gloriously played.
> >
> >Was there a dearth of great Mozart recordings _before_ AMADEUS?
>
> No, but surely you're not saying that we should stop playing Mozart
> because everyone has already done it better?
>
> Besides, millions of people, who would've never have listened to Mozart
> otherwise, got exposed by some really great performances.
>
> >
> >>We didn't get the usual, boring, documentary that
> >>usually fails miserably as a movie.
> >
> >Actually, there's been a spate of documentaries recently, i.e. CRUMB
> >and HOOP DREAMS, that have succeeded quite well as movies. There's no
> >reason to rule out of hand that a historically accurate biography of
> >Mozart, done with the same glossy production values as AMADEUS,
> >couldn't also be a success, artistically _or_ commercially.
>
> Usually when Hollywood tries to do it, though, we get similar to those
> onerous Liszt and Chopin biographies that can really make one nauseous.
>
> -Owen
There are some funny things about T. Hulce in the "Celebrity
Chronical" on the Internet. It's about some guy who met Mr. Hulce in the
bathroom (true story!)
Aloysia
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
I could die laughing . . .
-W.A. Mozart
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Aloysia
Tom Hulce lives in Seattle. . .
Aloysia
Aloysia
>
> In <4qv27h$j...@atheria.europa.com> je...@europa.com (K. W. Jeter)
Good analogy. I think Telemann was just a bit more significant
than Salieri. But I have not listened to much of Salieri's music, either.
Any good recs?
Aloysia
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
I could die laughing . . .
- W.A. Mozart
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
K. W. Jeter
>I hardly see the purported distortions of _Amadeus_ as "deliberate
> . . misrepresentation." Is the Forman/Shaffer team out to sell
>something?
Yes, obviously; first the play, and then the movie. To engage in
slander for commercial rather than ideological purposes doesn't seem
much more defensible to me.
>Is this propaganda?
Certainly not on Shaffer's and Forman's parts, but it doesn't take
much discernment to see why a story portraying composers as idiots and
evil schemers would appeal to Saul Zaentz, the man who put up the
money for the film. Zaentz is of course the figure whose exploitation
of John Fogerty, one of the truly original figures in American popular
music, led to a nearly decade-long creative silence on Fogerty's part
and a particularly nasty court battle for Fogerty to regain control of
his own music.
>But Shaffer's play and screenplay (as has now been
>pointed out by myself and others _ad infinitum_ in this forum) does not
>claim to _represent_ facts and therefore cannot be accused of
>_misrepresenting_ them.
Of course it can be so accused. The characters in the play and film
are named Mozart and Salieri; the play and the film appropriate
incidents from the real Mozart's life; and the play and film trade on
discredited rumors about Salieri's involvement in Mozart's death.
Quacks like misrepresentation, swims like misrepresentation, flaps its
wings like misrepresentation; it's misrepresentation.
KWJ
K. W. Jeter
>I don't care what some reviewer wrote.
But as I made clear in my post, I wasn't quoting the reviewer in order
to change anyone's mind about the quality of Salieri's music. You
like it or you don't. I was merely presenting the evidence that far
from there being no reason to consider Salieri as anything but a
mediocre composer, there is in fact ample reason for open-minded,
unprejudiced people to listen to Salieri's music and make up their
minds for themselves.
>Maybe
>you can equate the best of Salieri with some youthful Mozart.
Hey, like most people I consider DIE ZAUBERFLOETE to be a masterpiece,
but there's parts of it when, frankly, I'd rather be listening to
Salieri.
>How's this for an analogy?
>Salieri is to WA Mozart as Telemann is to JS Bach.
>Discuss.
Nobody ever represented Telemann as having murdered J. S. Bach.
KWJ
K. W. Jeter
>How's this for an analogy?
>Salieri is to WA Mozart as Telemann is to JS Bach.
Actually, your analogy might have a germ of truth to it. Telemann was
also dismissed as a facile hack for a long time, and then, beginning
in the sixties, a critical reassessment of his work started. The
result of which is that hardly a month goes by without new recordings
of his music. And Telemann is certainly much more highly thought of
now than before this general reassessment began.
If the same process holds true for Salieri, we can look forward to
dozens, if not hundreds, of new recordings of his music. A happy
thought, at least for some of us.
KWJ
Steve Lee
Hayward) wrote:
> and pretending that you can *talk*
> meaningfully to a bird!
Of course, you can talk meaningfully to a bird.
It is probably not the best way to spend your time, or the most productive
or successful activity. But you can do it.
Steve Lee
peg...@ix.netcom.com(Margaret Harrison) wrote:
> Good points. I would only add that in the play Amadeus the narrative
> is much more evidently the distorted remembrances of Salieri. I think
> the movie does more "damage" in the distortion sense, because the story
> is presented much more straightfowardly and realistically. In the
> play, events are very stylized, and the themes (the short-term triumph
> of mediocrity over genius, but genius's eventual triumph; the short
> life of fame--you add some) are much clearer.
Maybe it was because I saw an excellent production of the play long before
the film came out, but I believe the play was a better play than the movie
was as a movie. Shaffer did a fine job adapting it for the screen, and
they did a good job of making the film. It just lost some important
things in translation. I agree with what you said above.
Steve Lee
peg...@ix.netcom.com(Margaret Harrison) wrote:
> In <4qsnn4$n...@atheria.europa.com> je...@europa.com (K. W. Jeter)
> writes:
> >
> >>Igor Stravinsky, however, was less than thrilled with the "Jurassic
> >>Park" treatment of "Le Sacre du Printemps".
> >
> >
> >>Dave
> >>dp...@andrew.cmu.edu
> >
> >I had read that he was mainly annoyed with the cuts made in the music,
> >and that the dinosaurs really didn't bother him that much.
> >
> >KWJ
> >
>
> Of course, Stravinsky couldn't have had any opinion about a "Jurassic
> Park" treatment of his piece, as he died long before the book (much
> less the movie) came out.
Dave was speaking of the film FANTASIA from 1940. "Le Sacre" is
illustrated with battling dinos.
K. W. Jeter
>This thread is coming close to the top of the crap rating.
Pity it's gotten you hot under the collar; I'm actually rather
enjoying it.
>By all means dislike the film/play, but for God's sake understand it
>for what it is - a fiction, and dispense with the anal-retentive
>nonsense about 'accuracy' and the inviolability of the historical
>relationship/characters.
And just where in this discussion has anyone talked about the
relationship between historical figures and characters based upon them
as being "inviolable?" If you'd take the time to read the postings
rather than setting up and knocking down rhetorical straw men, you'd
see that from the beginning the discussion, at least on the part of
the anti-AMADEUS faction, has been about the _degree_ of distortion
that Shaffer _et al_ engage in, and the shabby results therefrom.
>If Schaffer had claimed to have written a
>historical text, you would be quite entitled to question it in terms
>of historical accuracy.
Actually, I'm quite entitled to criticize AMADEUS on the basis of it
being trite, shallow and melodramatic -- all faults which Shaffer
might have been able to avoid by sticking more closely to the
historical record and writing a play which dealt with Mozart and
Salieri as the complex individuals which they were, and by dealing
with the complex relationship that undoubtedly existed between them.
It's not a question of whether Shaffer or any other creative artist is
allowed to distort historical fact in telling a story; it's a question
of the results that come from that process.
The dogmatic defenders of AMADEUS seem to insist upon viewing any
criticism of their beloved play and film as an attack upon the
_general_ artistic technique of basing characters upon historical
figures -- and of course it's no such thing. By doing so, you're
constantly swinging your punches at an opponent who's not even in the
ring with you. It's been stated over and over in this discussion that
there's nothing wrong with basing characters upon historical figures;
but merely because that's a valid artistic technique does not mean
that every time it's used there's a worthwhile result.
>The use of historical characters as dramatic devices is as old as the
>hills
[many repetitious examples snipped out here]
Yes, that's certainly a fine list of instances where basing characters
upon historical figures has had great results. Too bad we can't add
Shaffer's AMADEUS to the list.
Let's see if I can make this clear to you by use of a couple of
cinematic examples.
It's my understanding that the real-life father and son depicted in
the film IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER, when framed by the British
government on terrorism charges, did not actually serve their prison
sentences together; that they in fact had very little contact with
each other except through correspondence. But through that
correspondence they achieved a reconciliation with each other before
the father's death. Now, it would have been very difficult, perhaps
even impossible, for the filmmakers to have shown that reconciliation
and its emotional impact if they had stuck strictly to the facts. So
they made the artistic decision to distort the facts and depict the
father and son serving their sentences not just in the same prison,
but in the same cell. By doing so, they were able to show the
_essence_ of this dearly bought reconciliation between an estranged
father and son, in a profoundly moving and dramatic way. That's art;
that's drama; that's story-telling; that's _not_ a 180-degree
inversion of the historical record, as is seen in AMADEUS.
Another example: my wife has a particular disdain for Oliver Stone's
THE DOORS, due to a particular costuming error. The mini-skirted
girls running around in the movie all have the wrong shoes on.
Factually, mini-skirts back in the sixties weren't worn with
stilleto-heeled shoes, ala Alicia Silverstone in CLUELESS; the shoes
were generally flatter and cuter, with little stacked heels. The best
place to see this is probably in old BRADY BUNCH re-runs or if you
have any old fashion magazines with photos of Rudi Gernreich's star
model Peggy Moffitt. In the sixties, only prostitutes wore
mini-skirts with the kind of high heels you see in THE DOORS. (I'm
sure there were some exceptions.) My contention is that with all the
money available on a high-budget Oliver Stone production, the
costuming department was probably perfectly aware of what shoes would
have been historically accurate. But Stone himself may have made an
artistic judgment to go with the inaccurate high-heeled shoes because
otherwise people in the audience who might not have been around during
the sixties, or who don't remember them in that kind of detail, would
have been looking at the actresses and saying "Where'd they get those
clunky shoes?" They would have been distracted by this detail while
Stone would have been trying to make some dramatic point in the movie.
But again, the historically inaccurate costuming would still have been
in keeping with the _essence_ of the period being depicted.
Similarly, rock concerts back then -- even Doors concerts -- were
generally not the wild orgiastic scenes depicted in the movie. (How
sedate they would seem in this day of mosh pits and stage diving!)
But Stone showed them that way in the movie as an artistic and
dramatic means of capturing the excitement that people felt at those
events. He used a distortion of historical detail to show the
_essence_ of what happened back then, not to contradict or invert the
historical record, as Shaffer _et al_ did in AMADEUS.
This is the point that people have been trying to make in this
discussion. It's a matter of degree, of intent, of results. If you
disagree, if you feel that Shaffer and Forman's intent and results
were other than what I feel them to be, then fine, argue that point.
But don't carry on in high dudgeon over an issue that isn't being
debated here.
>Die Meistersinger? A travesty! We Beckmessers like things *right*!
I'm not sure what the appropriateness of this allusion is. But since
Beckmesser was a champion of rigid orthodoxy, I would think that the
term applies more fittingly to those who have a knee-jerk response to
anyone who voices a dissenting opinion.
KWJ
Seongwook Kwon
: rick.h...@zetnet.co.uk (Rick Hayward) wrote:
: >This thread is coming close to the top of the crap rating.
: Pity it's gotten you hot under the collar; I'm actually rather
: enjoying it.
(A LOT of blah, blah..... and blah snipped)
: KWJ
YAWoooooN :(. You bore me.
Seongwook Kwon
swk...@email.unc.edu
http://www.unc.edu/~swkwon/
Try some Korean music at my homepage.
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
% %
% In the beginning, God said, Let there be music: %
% and there was music. %
% And God saw the music, that it was good. %
% %
% From 'The Creation' by F. J. Haydn :) %
% %
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
Jeff White
Aloysia
> But then, maybe we've moved beyond the appropriate territory for a
> classical music newgroup? :)
>
> ---
>
> John Edwards
Oh yes we have. Post that seem to be five pages long that I never
bother to read . . .
Aloysia
--
Aloysia
>
> Geez people! Go easy! You are bashing the greatest film about classica music ever! I can't believe how sophomoric some of you are. The film does
have huge inac
So true I couldn't say it better.
Rick Hayward
peg...@ix.netcom.com(Margaret Harrison) writes:
> I would only add that in the play Amadeus the narrative
> is much more evidently the distorted remembrances of Salieri. I think
> the movie does more "damage" in the distortion sense, because the story
> is presented much more straightfowardly and realistically.
All that I can say is that I never for one moment considered the
Mozart and Salieri of the film to be 'historical' characters; the
Mozart that I listen to has none but the most superficial
relationship to the dramatic device employed in both film and play.
I apologise for my irascibility on this point - it just seems so
blazingly *obvious*!!!!!
Rick Hayward
je...@europa.com (K. W. Jeter) writes:
> Of course it can be so accused. The characters in the play and film
> are named Mozart and Salieri; the play and the film appropriate
> incidents from the real Mozart's life; and the play and film trade on
> discredited rumors about Salieri's involvement in Mozart's death.
> Quacks like misrepresentation, swims like misrepresentation, flaps its
> wings like misrepresentation; it's misrepresentation.
Fee fo fi fum. I smell the 'Boycott Borders' literalist-conspiracy
mentality here ;-)))
Rick Hayward
sl...@ctc.net (Steve Lee) writes:
The key word was 'meaningfully'.:-)))
Rick Hayward
je...@europa.com (K. W. Jeter) writes:
> rick.h...@zetnet.co.uk (Rick Hayward) wrote:
> >This thread is coming close to the top of the crap rating.
> Pity it's gotten you hot under the collar; I'm actually rather
> enjoying it.
Oh no - not 'hot'!! (Yaaawn ....zzzz
zzzzzz
zzzz
zzzzz .....)
> >By all means dislike the film/play, but for God's sake understand it
> >for what it is - a fiction, and dispense with the anal-retentive
> >nonsense about 'accuracy' and the inviolability of the historical
> >relationship/characters.
> And just where in this discussion has anyone talked about the
> relationship between historical figures and characters based upon them
> as being "inviolable?"
I believe you used the word 'slander' and have exuded much hot air
about the historical Mozart and Salieri - No ???
> If you'd take the time to read the postings
... oh, but I have, I have ...
> rather than setting up and knocking down rhetorical straw men
... 'twas not I that erected the said straw images ...
> you'd
> see that from the beginning the discussion ... has been about the
_degree_ > of distortion that Shaffer _et al_ engage in, and the
shabby results
^^^^^^^^^^^^^
> therefrom.
.... if you see what I mean, O babe and suckling ....
> Actually, I'm quite entitled to criticize AMADEUS on the basis of it
> being trite, shallow and melodramatic
Absolutely. I'd defend your right to be wrong.
> -- all faults which Shaffer
> might have been able to avoid by sticking more closely to the
> historical record between them.
... but you see what I mean ...
> It's not a question of whether Shaffer or any other creative artist is
> allowed to distort historical fact in telling a story; it's a question
> of the results that come from that process.
... two adjacent paragraphs betray an inconsistency ...
> >The use of historical characters as dramatic devices is as old as the
> >hills
> [many repetitious
... but relevant ... (come to think of it, there wasn't any repetition)
> examples snipped out here]
> Yes, that's certainly a fine list of instances where basing characters
> upon historical figures has had great results.
> Let's see if I can make this clear to you by use of a couple of
> cinematic examples....
> That's art;
> that's drama; that's story-telling;
... Now you're learning!!
... but then ...
> that's _not_ a 180-degree
> inversion of the historical record, as is seen in AMADEUS.
... you keep on using the play's relationship to the historical
record as the basis of criticism - like this.
> But don't carry on in high dudgeon over an issue that isn't being
> debated here.
... then don't mention the question of historical accuracy if you
don't want to enter that debate. (Not 'high dudgeon' BTW. Another
example of over-reaction. More a mild irritation).
> >Die Meistersinger? A travesty! We Beckmessers like things *right*!
> I'm not sure what the appropriateness of this allusion is.
Hammer ..
> But since
> Beckmesser was a champion of rigid orthodoxy
... Hammmer ... hammer
> I would think that the
> term applies more fittingly
... hammer, hammer, hammer ...
> to those who have a knee-jerk response to
> anyone who voices a dissenting opinion.
... don't equate obtuse repetition with originality ...
Hammer.
Alan Swindells
It was shown a while ago in the UK (subtitled). Unfortunately I missed a
good deal of it (it was shown in three parts over three weeks) but what
I saw presented a rather one sided picture, with an apparant emphasis on
Schubert壮 alleged sexual inadequacy. It did present a good picture of
just how insanitary Vienna was at that time, though. Both Schubert and
Mozart (pace Amadeus, the movie) could be said to have died from a Vienna-
induced disease.
Regards: Alan
--
* alan...@argonet.co.uk *
Nature, and Nature's laws lay hid in night:
God said 'Let Newton Be!' and all was light.
It did not last: the Devil howling 'Ho!
Let Einstein Be!' restored the status quo.
David Sherman
>dshe...@panix.com (David Sherman) wrote:
>>"Amadeus" was just a very very good movie.
>Whether it is or isn't is a matter of opinion. But what's _fact_ is
>that it slanders an innocent person.
>>Well written,
>Not in my opinion. Both the dialogue and the plot are the substance
>of melodrama.
>>beautifully acted,
>Again, not in my opinion. What isn't scenery-chewing is buffoonery.
>>the costumes, sets and locations were incredible,
>Hollywood certainly does know how to spend money.
>>the
>>cinematography was first class.
>In the service of a wretched enterprise.
>>And the soundtrack wasn't bad either!
>Slathering on Mozart extracts would probably help any movie.
>KWJ
Still raining in Portland I see. In the importal words of Ed Norton,
"Shee, what a grouch!"
Aloysia
K. W. Jeter wrote:
>
> peg...@ix.netcom.com(Margaret Harrison) wrote:
>
> >That business at the end about the Salieri's
> >commissioning the Requiem is pure hogwash. It was commissioned by
> >someone else.
>
> as his own composition, which was the reason for the secrecy about it
> being commissioned from Mozart.
>
> KWJ
Thank you for the name! I've always remembered him as the Mr. W
guy!
K. W. Jeter
rick.h...@zetnet.co.uk (Rick Hayward) wrote:
>the
>Mozart that I listen to has none but the most superficial
>relationship to the dramatic device employed in both film and play.
Let's see; a character named Mozart is depicted living in the time and
place that the real Mozart did, interacting with characters named
after other historical figures who lived in that time and place, and
is shown composing Mozart's DIE ZAUBERFLOETE and Mozart's
Requiem . . . and of course the author Peter Shaffer meant all this to
be taken as no more than a "superficial relationship" between his
character and the historical figure of Mozart.
Right.
I can only speculate as to what would constitute for you a
_substantive_ relationship between a fictional character and a
historical figure.
>it just seems so
>blazingly *obvious*!!!!!
What's blazingly obvious, with or without the exclamation marks, is
that some of the defenders of AMADEUS would rather go on about
abstract notions of artistic technique -- none of which were ever at
issue here -- rather than deal with the actual criticisms of the play
and movie that have been presented.
KWJ
K. W. Jeter
I can't say that I didn't expect the discussion to reach this level.
You can't defend your position, you misrepresent other people's
positions, and then when you're called upon these things, you stamp
your tiny feet and wave your little fists in the air and indulge in a
lot of cute comments that are intended, within your limited means, to
be insulting. If you think you can provoke me into being as uncivil
as yourself, you're wrong.
It's really a shame that you let yourself get so emotional here. As
both my old fencing instructor and my debate coach used to say, first
you lose your temper, then you lose the match. Thanks for providing
such inadvertantly eloquent evidence that I've won this one.
And now, because I really do enjoy educating people like you -- the
neediest always have a claim on my sympathies -- here's a few specific
comments on your posting.
rick.h...@zetnet.co.uk (Rick Hayward) wrote:
>Oh no - not 'hot'!!
But of course, your previous use of quintuple exclamation marks and
phrases such as "for God's sake" indicate otherwise. What do you do
when you're really upset? Throw yourself out the window?
>> And just where in this discussion has anyone talked about the
>> relationship between historical figures and characters based upon them
>>as being "inviolable?"
>I believe you used the word 'slander'
Exactly so, and I'd be happy to use it again. But I asked a specific
question about a specific word, and your answer isn't responsive to
that question. If you don't have the grace to admit that you're
wrong, and that no-one other than yourself used that word in this
discussion, don't try to confuse the issue by pointing to some other
word that you mistakenly think is equivalent.
>> If you'd take the time to read the postings
>... oh, but I have, I have ...
Then you really have no excuse for misrepresenting other people's
positions.
>... 'twas not I that erected the said straw images ...
Would you care to point out one that you feel I set up?
Are you sure you understand what's meant by the phrase "knocking down
straw men?" It refers to the practice of rhetorically attacking
positions that aren't at issue in a discussion, in the hope of scoring
some kind of point off your opponent. But it never works. When you
say that someone has claimed that the relationship between fictional
characters and historical figures is "inviolable," when no-one has
claimed that, it's a "straw man." Knocking it down achieves nothing.
>.... if you see what I mean, O babe and suckling ....
That's a nice coat you've borrowed, but it's a few sizes too large for
you.
>Absolutely. I'd defend your right to be wrong.
As I would defend yours. Civil discourse, including refraining from
the misrepresentation of other people's positions, is one of the ways
we defend that right.
>> -- all faults which Shaffer
>> might have been able to avoid by sticking more closely to the
>> historical record between them.
>... but you see what I mean ...
>> It's not a question of whether Shaffer or any other creative artist is
>> allowed to distort historical fact in telling a story; it's a question
>>of the results that come from that process.
>... two adjacent paragraphs betray an inconsistency ...
Of course there's no inconsistency in my statement. If you think
there is, point it out. Try to be specific.
> [many repetitious
>... but relevant ... (come to think of it, there wasn't any repetition)
> examples snipped out here]
Your examples were repetitious in the sense that, if your argument was
correct, one example would suffice. Piling on evidence in support of
a fallacious argument achieves nothing.
>> That's art;
>> that's drama; that's story-telling;
>... Now you're learning!!
I hardly needed to learn what was my position from the beginning of
this discussion. But you haven't shown much evidence of being able to
learn.
>... you keep on using the play's relationship to the historical
>record as the basis of criticism - like this.
Because you persist in misrepresenting my position on the issue.
>> But don't carry on in high dudgeon over an issue that isn't being
>> debated here.
>... then don't mention the question of historical accuracy if you
>don't want to enter that debate.
But there is no debate going on about historical accuracy. Everyone
here, yourself included, agrees that AMADEUS distorts the historical
record about Mozart and Salieri. The debate has been about the
degree, the nature and the effect of that distortion.
>(Not 'high dudgeon' BTW. Another
>example of over-reaction. More a mild irritation).
Cf. my previous comments about your quintuple exclamation marks and
excited phrasing.
>>>Die Meistersinger? A travesty! We Beckmessers like things *right*!
>> I'm not sure what the appropriateness of this allusion is.
>Hammer ..
>> But since
>> Beckmesser was a champion of rigid orthodoxy
>... Hammmer ... hammer
>> I would think that the
> term applies more fittingly
>... hammer, hammer, hammer ...
>> to those who have a knee-jerk response to
>> anyone who voices a dissenting opinion.
>... don't equate obtuse repetition
Slow learners always need their lessons repeated to them.
>with originality ...
Do you really believe that the word "dissenting" means the same as
"original?" If person A states postion A, and person B states
position B, we say that B is _dissenting_ from A's position. B's
position may or may not be original, but that doesn't have anything to
do with whether it's a dissenting opinion or not.
Perhaps you should keep a dictionary near your computer. It might
help with the words you don't understand.
>Hammer.
This is a better straight line than I think you intended it to be.
The person being nailed always objects to the hammer being used.
Best wishes,
KWJ
K. W. Jeter
From: swk...@email.unc.edu (Seongwook Kwon)
> :(. You bore me.
There's a witty response. Do you really think I care?
KWJ
K. W. Jeter
Aloysia <us...@host.edu> wrote:
> Thank you for the name! I've always remembered him as the Mr. W
>guy!
You're welcome.
Best wishes,
KWJ
call...@mail.utexas.edu
miga...@maroon.tc.umn.edu (Larisa Migachyov) wrote:
> In that case, you should really sue Pushkin, the great Russian poet, for
> slander (in fact, I'm surprised that the Salieri family did not do so),
> as his play "Mozart and Salieri" was what started the whole avalanche of
> dirt piled on Salieri's reputation.
Ummm... but wasn't Salieri raving about having killed Mozart before he
died? People dismissed it as the senile attempts of an old man trying to
regain a reputation, but still. And there were rumors almost as soon
after Mozart died that he had met with foul play at the hands of various
people, which is what gave rise to those awful theories like the one
Francis Carr put forth in the odious _Mozart and Constanze_ about 10 years
ago.
Although Pushkin may well have given Shaffer his inspiration, I do not
think it is fair (or accurate) to say that it's all Pushkin's fault that
Salieri became associated with the so-called murder theories (It was the
18th-century! People died young all the time! And he had been sickly all
his life besides! What IS it with these people?!?). This was nothing new
under the sun when Pushkin took it up. (It's an opera, too. The Pushkin,
that is...)
If I were the ghost of Antonio Salieri, I would consider any publicity
good publicity. More people who aren't music majors know who he is now
than they did 20 years ago, after all. :)
I enjoy Amadeus immensely. It's what roused me from my complacent belief
that Mozart was "light" back when I was 17 and knew everything. The
performances are great, and the movie itself is just beautiful. It
inspired me to learn more about Mozart, and I soon discovered that it was
not very accurate at all. I don't know how many other people it so
inspired, but I do know that I still spend more time than is probably
prudent telling people what's wrong with it as a factual movie. As to
whether the movie was presented as a "true" biography, I venture to say
that, had it been made about people nowadays, it would have borne the
legend, "Based on a true story." Yet I think that would have clashed with
the atmosphere Milos Forman wanted to create. :)
That's all...
Larisa Migachyov
Sharps5 (sha...@aol.com) wrote:
: Also, Salieri was a teacher to the great Beethoven. Coaching him
: informally in the writing of opera.
Not only to Beethoven, but also to Schubert and Liszt, if I remember
correctly. It's a shame that he should have been so slandered by
Pushkin, Shaffer, and everyone else, as he certainly had done nothing to
deserve such a reputation.
-Larisa