The Longevity of Classic Films

Lincoln Spector

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Mar 10, 2005, 8:12:19 PM3/10/05

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I just posted this on my web site (www.bayflicks.net):

Let's assume, for the moment, that sound movies existed in 1601, and that
the first production of Hamlet was recorded for posterity. Remember that the
title role was tailored to a particular actor, Richard Burbage, just as
surely as was the role of Charles Foster Kane. And if we had such a movie,
we would know exactly how Burbage played the part.
But would we have any other Hamlets? Would Olivier, Burton, or Branagh (to
say nothing of Jack Benny) have undertaken the task of making this great
part their own? What about the countless unknown but talented actors who've
performed the part on stage? After all, what actor or director would dare
recreate and reinterpret the part of Kane?

And how would Burbage's Hamlet look today? Would we accept what would
probably be a very different acting style? Accents that might sound more
Appalachian than British? Men in drag? Hamlet, in all likelihood, would be
an obscure work enjoyed by a devoted few, not the vibrant, living
masterpiece that we have today.

What I'm getting at is this: Perhaps film as an art is too whole, too fixed,
too complete for individual works to last. I'm not talking about the
technical issues-fading dyes and rotting nitrate-but the very nature of a
recorded narrative story told through photography, acting, and editing.

This isn't easy for me to say. It goes against my gut feelings. But I can't
ignore the argument, either.

We cinephiles want each great movie to be a moment frozen in time. We get
angry when a favorite is re-edited, panned and scanned, or colorized. And
heaven forbid that anyone should ever remake anything! This is an attitude
unique to film. Stage plays are redirected with every production, often with
the text altered and cut. Novels get recast and redesigned by every reader.
No one complains when someone rerecords Beethoven's 9th or Louie Louie.

The movies we love are more available now than ever. I used to cross the bay
for a chance to watch Singin' in the Rain or Grapes of Wrath; now I own them
(and I might still cross the bay to see them in 35mm). But fewer and fewer
people are interested in old movies. In 1973, The Los Angeles International
Film Festival and the then new American Film Institute conducted a survey to
create a list of the 50 greatest American films. Seven of the top ten were
silent. When AFI compiled a similar list of the 100 Greatest American Movies
in 1998, only one silent, The Birth of a Nation, made the top 50.

As film as an art enters its second century, is there anything we can do to
keep the classics alive? We can hope I'm wrong, of course. But perhaps we
should be a little more tolerant of remakes and altered versions-with one
important provision: That the original remain available.

We don't have Burbage's Hamlet, but we can always compare Welles' Kane with
the Adam Sandler remake.

--

Lincoln Spector
www.bayflicks.net

Chuck Klaus

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Mar 10, 2005, 9:42:23 PM3/10/05

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LS Says: Let's assume, for the moment, that sound movies existed in

1601, and that the first production of Hamlet was recorded for

posterity. And if we had such a movie, we would know exactly how
Burbage played the part.

CK Replies: But who would have directed?

LS: Would Olivier, Burton, or Branagh have undertaken the task of

making this great part their own?

CK: Has more than one actor taken on the role of Willy in "Death of a
Salesman?"

LS: And how would Burbage's Hamlet look today?

CK: How does George Arliss look in anything today?

LS: Hamlet, in all likelihood, would be an obscure work enjoyed by a

devoted few, not the vibrant, living masterpiece that we have today.

CK: Tell it to the Groundlings. Did only those in the boxes laugh at
Falstaff?

LS: What I'm getting at is this: Perhaps film as an art is too whole,

too fixed,
too complete for individual works to last. I'm not talking about the
technical issues-fading dyes and rotting nitrate-but the very nature of
a
recorded narrative story told through photography, acting, and editing.

CK: Has opera endured? Here we have the same charecters, the same
"scripts," the same music presented by the same forces as two centuries
ago. Can we make similar statements about designed enviorments such as
architechture, or of the fixed nature of sculpture or paintings? It is
our ability to comprehend differences in the conventions of the
original era of a creation and correctly locate these works in their
historical context that give these items much of their communicative
ability and richness. The idea of a "dated" art that becomes too fixed
to last seems to have at its very core a limited consumer view, and not
a concern with lasting artistic achievement or communicative value.

LS: We cinephiles want each great movie to be a moment frozen in time.

We get
angry when a favorite is re-edited, panned and scanned, or colorized.

CK: And we wouldn't want a Leonardo to be abridged or tinted either. A
snappy hour and a half version of Wagner's "Die Goetterdaemmerung" goes
against the point of the original, and doesn't allow us to experience
the work as intended -in its entirety.

LS:And heaven forbid that anyone should ever remake anything! This is

an attitude unique to film.

CK: Not so. Each performanced-based art always has to deal with the
legacy of performances that preceed current incarnations. In the era of
reproduced art sufh as recordings or film, we have the ability to view
generations of performers side by side. Even in purely stage
competition, unaided by "preserved performances," Bernadette Peters was
fighting the legacy of Ethyl Merman in the revival of "Annie, Get your
Gun." Lovers of Beethoven Symphonies still turn to Furtwangler or
Toscanini performances as benchmarks.

LS: Stage plays are redirected with every production, often with

the text altered and cut.

CK: And perceptive critics and audience members rightly bitch and moan
about inferior new stagings and cuts.

LS: No one complains when someone rerecords Beethoven's 9th.

CK: Not so. Classical critics and consumers complain about the
re-recordings of works with dozens and dozens of extant versions; but
they would really complain if someone cut the score to ribbons.

LS: But fewer and fewer people are interested in old movies. In 1973,

The Los Angeles International Film Festival and the then new American
Film Institute conducted a survey to create a list of the 50 greatest
American films. Seven of the top ten were silent. When AFI compiled a
similar list of the 100 Greatest American Movies in 1998, only one
silent, The Birth of a Nation, made the top 50.

CK: Does this perhaps demonstrate that Americans as well as many others
are simply showing ignorance about their cultural history? Does this
reflect our intense training as consumers, but our poor preparation as
historians?

LS: As film as an art enters its second century, is there anything we

can do to
keep the classics alive?

CK: Education might be a start. Placing a new societal priority on
possessing knowledge, and creating a meritocracy rewarding intellegence
might help as well.

LS: But perhaps we should be a little more tolerant of remakes and

altered versions-with one important provision: That the original remain
available.

CK: Film still functions within the marketplace. The version that
dominates the marketplace is generally the version that is discussed
and valued. What we need to do is to recognize that film is work which
deserves to function as an entity with value beyond the marketplace. It
is art, and film is an historical artifact of great richness as well.

LS: We don't have Burbage's Hamlet, but we can always compare Welles'

Kane with
the Adam Sandler remake.

CK: Worse things will happen; yet if the originals endure, and are
somehow preserved and studied, these works of beauty and power need not
be lost. Someday, if we are capable of enlargeing society's scope of
concerns, we might be lucky enough to have a population which will
respond to artistic achievement more than the commercial value of
artifacts. Van Gogh's "Sunflowers" should earn our attention not for
the fact that the painting sells for $70 million, but because it tell
us something important about beauty, and about the soul of an
extraordinary human being.

Regards,

Chuck Klaus

danel...@yahoo.com

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Mar 10, 2005, 11:20:22 PM3/10/05

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LS wrote:

"But perhaps we should be a little more tolerant of remakes and
altered versions-with one important provision: That the original remain
available."

Then what do you do when confronted by the fact -- a rarity, I grant
you -- that some remakes are BETTER than the original? "The Maltese
Falcon" was filmed three times -- in 1931, then again as "Satan Met a
Lady" in 1936, and finally in the Humphrey Bogart classic "The Maltese
Falcon" in 1941.

I've seen the Ricardo Cortez and Warren William versions. Give me
Bogie every time.

Dan N.

Tony

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Mar 10, 2005, 11:41:02 PM3/10/05

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Well it might have been tailored for him but that wasn't Burbage playing
Charles Foster Kane. He was far too old by the time the movie was made.

--
http://www.chapelhillnoir.com
home of The Camera-ist's Manifesto
The Improved Links Pages are at
http://www.chapelhillnoir.com/links/mlinks00.html
A sample chapter from "Haight-Ashbury" is at
http://www.chapelhillnoir.com/writ/hait/hatitl.html

"Lincoln Spector" <Notr...@myemailaddress.com> wrote in message
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R H Draney

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Mar 11, 2005, 1:55:46 AM3/11/05

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Lincoln Spector filted:

>
>Let's assume, for the moment, that sound movies existed in 1601, and that
>the first production of Hamlet was recorded for posterity. Remember that the
>title role was tailored to a particular actor, Richard Burbage, just as
>surely as was the role of Charles Foster Kane. And if we had such a movie,
>we would know exactly how Burbage played the part.
>But would we have any other Hamlets? Would Olivier, Burton, or Branagh (to
>say nothing of Jack Benny) have undertaken the task of making this great
>part their own? What about the countless unknown but talented actors who've
>performed the part on stage? After all, what actor or director would dare
>recreate and reinterpret the part of Kane?

Right now I'm picturing Sir Laurence Harvey's Hamlet, in the film "The Magic
Christian"....r

lokke...@yahoo.com

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Mar 11, 2005, 3:26:12 AM3/11/05

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Or Ringo's interpretation of Hamlet: To be, or not to be ... Yeah,
Yeah, Yeah ...

DREW CALDWELL

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Mar 11, 2005, 5:24:17 AM3/11/05

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or austin powers yeah baby yeah

http://community.webtv.net/DREW-56/NEXTWEEKPRODUCTIONS

Harlett O'Dowd

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Mar 11, 2005, 6:43:52 AM3/11/05

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<danel...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1110514822....@l41g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...

Which version did you see first? I think that has a real bearing on which
version of a film you prefer - and why most people who see remakes - knowing
(an) earlier version already - will find the remake wanting.

But with few exceptions, myself being one of them, I think most people who
see the Novarro BEN-HUR *after* growing up with the Heston version will find
the silent interesting, even impressive but not as good as the *real*
version.

Bob Birchard

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Mar 11, 2005, 7:12:59 AM3/11/05

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Lincoln Spector wrote:

I have speculated on this aspect somewhat in my book "Cecil B. DeMille's
Hollywood" in writing about William C. deMille's reaction to seeing the 1915
"Carmen" in 1935. looking back at films which are, as you say, frozen in time,
is a relatively recent phenomenon--for all intents and purposes dating back only
about fifty years to the time when movies were first available on television. I
was a kid in the late 1950s when the major studio pictures first started turning
up on TV, and i can tell you that seeing a 1930 film in 1960 was like seeing
ancient history. Nothing changes faster than the passing fancies of fashion.
We are not aware of it so much as we live through it on a day to day basis, but
it becomes immediately evident when we confront a film. But film has had a
subtle effect, that media watchers really haven't explored in any depth.
Nothing is more dated that the acting styles of the past. Look back at early
reviews of the films of Josef von Sternberg--critics considered these films to
be "realistic" today we would consider them highly stylized. When Dietrich's
early 1930s films were first seen on TV her performances were so radically
different from what was current in the 1950s--and indeed radically different
from what Dietrich herself would do in the later 1930s and 1940s--that it was
easy to misunderstand what we were seeing. Many people today (though it is less
true now than it was even a few years ago) laugh at silent screen
performances--it is not so much, I think, that they find these performance
ludicrous as that they find them unfamiliar. Today we are surrounded by images
and sounds of the past in a way that has never been possible until quite
recently in human history and as a result we have an exposure to past styles
that earlier audiences simply could not have. I'm certain that were a print of
Richard Burbage's Hamlet turn up today, it would seem incredibly strange. But
as we became more familiar with it through repeated screenings and the
availability of other performances from the period we would come to accept the
conventions of the time just as we have come to accept the conventions of the
1930s (and perhaps to a lesser extent the 1920s).

--
Bob Birchard

Now available from the University Press of Kentucky
“Cecil B. DeMille’s Hollywood”
by Robert S. Birchard
I.S.B.N. # 0-8131-2324-0
http://kentuckypress.com/viewbook.cfm?Category_ID=1&Group=42&ID=1113

mikeg...@gmail.com

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Mar 11, 2005, 8:26:32 AM3/11/05

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>Nothing changes faster than the passing fancies of fashion.

I caught two seconds of Working Girl last night-- what is that hair?
Melanie Griffith looks like a space alien with that big hair! No
wonder actresses have a harder time staying stars, compared to Harrison
Ford whose wardrobe would be fine today.

Stephen Cooke

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Mar 11, 2005, 8:48:02 AM3/11/05

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On 11 Mar 2005 lokke...@yahoo.com wrote:

> Or Ringo's interpretation of Hamlet: To be, or not to be ... Yeah,
> Yeah, Yeah ...

Peter Sellers made a recording of his impression of Sir Laurence Olivier
performing A Hard Day's Night as if it were a Shakespeare soliliquy. Very
funny, worth tracking down.

swac
On the flipside...Dr. Strangelove "singing" She Loves You.

Frederica

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Mar 11, 2005, 11:17:04 AM3/11/05

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"Bob Birchard" <bbir...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:42318C13...@earthlink.net...

> I have speculated on this aspect somewhat in my book "Cecil B.
DeMille's
> Hollywood" in writing about William C. deMille's reaction to seeing the
1915
> "Carmen" in 1935. looking back at films which are, as you say, frozen in
time,
> is a relatively recent phenomenon--for all intents and purposes dating
back only
> about fifty years to the time when movies were first available on
television. I
> was a kid in the late 1950s when the major studio pictures first started
turning
> up on TV, and i can tell you that seeing a 1930 film in 1960 was like
seeing
> ancient history.

It's very weird when it changes within your own lifetime, although I suppose
that you can become more used to it as you get more lifetime under your
belt. I remember when all those teddibly British films (The Lion in Winter,
Becket, etc.) were simply the last word in great, great acting. I find them
absolutely unwatchable now, because they really are the last word in great,
great acting.

At any rate, I don't particularly object to remakes, never have. I really
like the idea of seeing a movie, even a classic movie, played with different
actors. Every actor puts something different into the role. I would have
loved to see Mary Pickford in SUNSET BLVD. That doesn't mean I also don't
want Gloria Swanson.

Frederica

bigsil...@aol.com

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Mar 11, 2005, 11:49:31 AM3/11/05

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Lincoln Spector wrote:
>
> What I'm getting at is this: Perhaps film as an art is too whole, too
fixed,
> too complete for individual works to last. I'm not talking about the
> technical issues-fading dyes and rotting nitrate-but the very nature
of a
> recorded narrative story told through photography, acting, and
editing.
>

>

> The movies we love are more available now than ever. I used to cross
the bay
> for a chance to watch Singin' in the Rain or Grapes of Wrath; now I
own them
> (and I might still cross the bay to see them in 35mm). But fewer and
fewer
> people are interested in old movies. In 1973, The Los Angeles
International
> Film Festival and the then new American Film Institute conducted a
survey to
> create a list of the 50 greatest American films. Seven of the top ten
were
> silent. When AFI compiled a similar list of the 100 Greatest American
Movies
> in 1998, only one silent, The Birth of a Nation, made the top 50.
>

Kenneth Branagh's "Hamlet" will forever be my favorite as will many of
Griffith's films like "Way Down East" and even "BOAN". I love a good
story and when it's told very clearly, I can watch it again and again.
Hitchcock's Manxman" and "Blackmail" are two others that I will never
tire of.

Having said that, I remember many favorite films from days gone by
that are better left just as they are; good memories. More often than
not, revisiting "Cat Ballou", or "Paint Your Wagon" reminds me that
some things are best left simply remembered. These films have not
'lasted' for me, but that does not mean they haven't lasted for
everyone.

Even in this group, our tastes in films varies and that's as it should
be.

Nobody where I work cares about these old films that thrill me, but
some of you sure do.

Rich Wagner

Lincoln Spector

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Mar 11, 2005, 12:09:13 PM3/11/05

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Mar 11, 2005, 1:32:09 PM3/11/05

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"Scott Norwood" <snor...@redballoon.net> wrote in message
news:d0sm78$j2g$1...@reader1.panix.com...
>

> In article <Tf6Yd.7896$C47....@newssvr14.news.prodigy.com>,
> Lincoln Spector <Notr...@myemailaddress.com> wrote:
>>
>>We cinephiles want each great movie to be a moment frozen in time. We get
>>angry when a favorite is re-edited, panned and scanned, or colorized. And
>>heaven forbid that anyone should ever remake anything! This is an attitude
>>unique to film. Stage plays are redirected with every production, often
>>with
>>the text altered and cut. Novels get recast and redesigned by every
>>reader.
>>No one complains when someone rerecords Beethoven's 9th or Louie Louie.
>
> I'm not sure I agree entirely with the premise of this statement.
> The reason why we don't get upset about new performances or new
> arrangements of a pice of music is that the music itself is just
> a collection of notes on a piece of paper and isn't a complete work
> in and of itself--much of the artistry is in the interpretation of
> the work, as demonstrated by the arrangement and the performance
> itself.

That's true with classical music, but popular music is usually introduced as
a recording, and that's how we know it. Nevertheless, few people were
offended when Joe Cocker covered "A Little Help from My Friends" (actually,
I was offended by it, but that's when I was young and stupid).

>
> By contrast, a film is itself an end product, inclusive of the
> script, direction, performance, editing, music, costumes, etc. To
> re-make a classic film is more like re-painting an existing Van
> Gogh. Not repainting the scene, but creating a new painting based
> on the old one in an attempt to improve upon it. There's nothing
> intrinsically wrong with doing this, but the desire to do so
> generally shows a lack of creativity, compared with creating an
> entirely new and original work.

A huge number of films are based on books, plays, and history, but we don't
decry them as unoriginal--only films based on other films. Story tellers in
every medium retell existing stories, reinterpreting them for their own time
and place. This doesn't show a lack of creativity.

> Occasionally, remakes actually
> turn out to be better than the originals (e.g. the 2001 version of
> "Ocean's Eleven"), although that is very rare.

It's not that uncommon. Maltese Falcon, Ben Hur, and Some Like It Hot are
among the many remakes generally considered classics (and seldom called
remakes).

When a masterpiece is remade, the chances of it being better than the
original is unlikely, not because it's a remake, but because the original is
a masterpiece. It takes both incredible skill AND incredible luck to make a
masterpiece. Nevertheless, a remake of a masterpiece can still be good, and
add something to the original work's depth and appreciation. A good example
is the recent Manchurian Candidate. It's very good, but not as good as the
original (that would have taken a miracle). But knowing the original adds to
your enjoyment of the remake, because it has some plot twists that you're
not expecting.

>
> As for older films--different films appeal to me for different
> reasons. Some are truly great on their own merits, but others are
> interesting primarily as historical objects. It would be a stretch
> to classify "Birth of a Nation" as a film which has great artistic
> merit today, but anyone with an interest in film history or history
> in general should be able to appreciate it for what it is--a product
> of its time and the sensibilities of its creators. Whether or not
> those sensibilites are generally agreeable with those held by most
> of us today is a separate issue worthy of discussion, but it does
> not undermine the value of screening the film.

Good point (although I disagree with you on BOAN, which I still find of
artistic value despite attitudes that I find reprehensible--but that's
another discussion). Even if an old film loses its artistic value (and most
don't stand the test of time), it still has historical value.

Lincoln

Frederica

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Mar 11, 2005, 1:44:34 PM3/11/05

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"Lincoln Spector" <Notr...@myemailaddress.com> wrote in message

news:JulYd.17305$Pz7....@newssvr13.news.prodigy.com...

> When a masterpiece is remade, the chances of it being better than the
> original is unlikely, not because it's a remake, but because the original
is
> a masterpiece. It takes both incredible skill AND incredible luck to make
a
> masterpiece. Nevertheless, a remake of a masterpiece can still be good,
and
> add something to the original work's depth and appreciation. A good
example
> is the recent Manchurian Candidate. It's very good, but not as good as the
> original (that would have taken a miracle). But knowing the original adds
to
> your enjoyment of the remake, because it has some plot twists that you're
> not expecting.

I liked both Candidates. The original is so damned WEIRD it simply stays
with you. Weird dated story, weird casting...weird. But it's paced
brilliantly and so well acted! And no moment I spend with Denzel
Washington is wasted.

I wonder if people got upset with Homer when he fiddled with The Iliad?
("That Ajax guy was great! I'M ADDING ANOTHER ONE!")

Frederica

indifference.

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Mar 11, 2005, 2:14:17 PM3/11/05

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"Lincoln Spector" <Notr...@myemailaddress.com> wrote in message

news:Tf6Yd.7896$C47....@newssvr14.news.prodigy.com...

You make some good points, but someone must like all the damn re-makes
because there are so many of them. Not that re-makes are anything new but it
seems like half the 'films' being released todays are re-makes or sequels.
There is such a lack of original ideas that sequels (also nothing new) dont
even get new titles,merely 'Crap II : You Assholes Spent Your Money Once
Maybe You'll Spend It Again, For One Good Weekend At Least"

R H Draney

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Mar 11, 2005, 2:19:55 PM3/11/05

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Frederica filted:

>
>I know rather a lot of people who get very upset about covers versions of
>songs. "No person but the original shall sing <insert pop standard here>!"
>The original isn't necessarily better, it's simply the first one everyone
>heard.

By that logic, the Beatles shouldn't have messed up "Twist and Shout", Matthews
Southern Comfort should have kept their grimy mitts off "Woodstock", and Roger
McGuinn never should have had the audacity to record all those Dylan songs...I
don't agree with any of those statements....

A single artist can achieve mixed results on someone else's material, as Linda
Ronstadt illustrates so well...Taiwan singer Sun Yanzi needn't have bothered
with her tepid rendition of "Hey Jude", but she when she did Shocking Blue's
"Venus", all other versions faded from memory....

Still, there's Hall & Oates redoing "You've Lost That Loving Feeling" so much
like the Righteous Brothers that you have to wonder what was the point, and
closer to home, Taco's recording of "Putting on the Ritz"; yes, it's
entertaining, but has anyone here heard it and *not* been seriously creeped
out?...

Tiny Tim doing "Great Balls of Fire" remains a curiosity at best, and a drunken
Jerry Lee Lewis taking on "Somewhere Over The Rainbow" exists, it would seem,
only to frighten small children with....r

jayembee

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Mar 11, 2005, 4:15:22 PM3/11/05

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"Lincoln Spector" <Notr...@myemailaddress.com> wrote:

><danel...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> LS wrote:
>>
>> "But perhaps we should be a little more tolerant of remakes and
>> altered versions-with one important provision: That the original remain
>> available."
>>
>> Then what do you do when confronted by the fact -- a rarity, I grant
>> you -- that some remakes are BETTER than the original? "The Maltese
>> Falcon" was filmed three times -- in 1931, then again as "Satan Met a
>> Lady" in 1936, and finally in the Humphrey Bogart classic "The Maltese
>> Falcon" in 1941.
>>
>> I've seen the Ricardo Cortez and Warren William versions. Give me
>> Bogie every time.
>
> In an earlier version of my article, I mentioned parenthetically that when a
> remake is better than the original, no one calls it a remake--and I used The
> Maltese Falcon as an example.

Actually, I don't think that in the case of something like THE MALTESE
FALCON it's that people don't think of it as a remake (unless they are
simply unaware that there were earlier versions) as much as it is that
people distinguish between remakes of original motion pictures and
different adaptations of work from another medium.

That is, they don't think of Huston's TMF as a remake of either of the
earlier films, but a re-adaptation of Hammett's novel. Other films
awarded the same excuse are things like Lester's THE THREE MUSKETEERS
or Carpenter's THE THING.

More to the point, with regard to your original posting, I'm not sure
that anyone really objects to the principle of remakes. It's just that
more often than not, the remake is terrible, or doesn't present a new
spin to the story.

It also depends on the talent behind the remake. While there are
definitely still people who object to the idea of a KING KONG remake,
the objections to Peter Jackson doing it are fewer and much less
vehement than there were when John Guillermin did it.

-- jayembee

jayembee

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Mar 11, 2005, 4:20:35 PM3/11/05

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"Lincoln Spector" <Notr...@myemailaddress.com> wrote:

>> >Nothing changes faster than the passing fancies of fashion.
>>
>> I caught two seconds of Working Girl last night-- what is that hair?
>> Melanie Griffith looks like a space alien with that big hair! No
>> wonder actresses have a harder time staying stars, compared to Harrison
>> Ford whose wardrobe would be fine today.
>
> Well, arguably a film like Working Girl--very much tied to its time in
> subject matter and, frankly, not that good--would age faster that other
> movies.

My own gut reaction is that nothing seems more dated to me than films
from the mid-to-late 60s depicting what was in vogue then -- in terms
of fashion, speech, and so on.

-- jayembee

Lincoln Spector

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Mar 11, 2005, 4:19:20 PM3/11/05

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"R H Draney" <dado...@spamcop.net> wrote in message
news:d0sr0...@drn.newsguy.com...

> Frederica filted:
>>
>>I know rather a lot of people who get very upset about covers versions of
>>songs. "No person but the original shall sing <insert pop standard
>>here>!"
>>The original isn't necessarily better, it's simply the first one everyone
>>heard.
>
> By that logic, the Beatles shouldn't have messed up "Twist and Shout",
> Matthews
> Southern Comfort should have kept their grimy mitts off "Woodstock", and
> Roger
> McGuinn never should have had the audacity to record all those Dylan
> songs...I
> don't agree with any of those statements....

I don't think Frederica agrees with them, either. I believe she was using it
as an example of some people's attitudes.

Loved your Jerry Lee Lewis "Over the Rainbow" comment. I think I need to
find that recording.

And let's not forget the greatest cover artist in the history of recorded
music, William Shatner.

Lincoln

Bill Coleman

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Mar 11, 2005, 4:35:40 PM3/11/05

to

"R H Draney" <dado...@spamcop.net> wrote in message
news:d0sr0...@drn.newsguy.com...
> Frederica filted:

> By that logic, the Beatles shouldn't have messed up "Twist and Shout",

Most of this I agree with, but personally I think Jerry Lee's version
of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" is a great recording.

Bill Coleman

Message has been deleted

arlen...@earthlink.net

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Mar 11, 2005, 5:03:43 PM3/11/05

to

Maybe you have to be a New Yorker, but I thought the big hair was very
good at defining who she was (Staten Island working class) compared to
who she wanted to be (Manhattan chic). The big hair was one of the
first things to go. Actually, I thought it was pretty funny.

- Arlene

rmj...@aol.com

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Mar 11, 2005, 5:06:24 PM3/11/05

to

I thought Lincoln's post was thoughtful and I thank him for it, now I
diverge a bit:

I recently saw Carl Dreyer's 1928 The Passion of Joan of Arc, and was
stunned by it. I'd never seen a period piece that actually looks like
it could have been a documentary from its time. Lincoln mentioned
Hamlet on film, with Burbage starring...I don't know, but in the
aesthetic arrest I experienced in watching the Dreyer film, Renee
(Maria) Falconetti WAS Jeanne d'Arc, and somehow I'd gone back in
time...This film blew my mind.

Later, after seeing the film I was doing a bit of research on it and
found a quote from Cocteau that echoed what I'd thought (felt) of the
film and couldn't get out of my mind:

Cocteau thought the film "seems like a historical document from an era
in which the cinema didn't exist."

I'm glad I'm no specialized master of early 15th century French
costumes; I believed it all, esp the looks and faces of the
Inquisitorial Black Brotherhood of Authority, and Joan's facial
expressions...the officially-sanctioned insanity of it all.

And I'm not even xtian, never was.

There is NO WAY anyone could remake the Dreyer film, although I can
imagine Peter Greenaway trying it and doing way too much, making it
more surreal than it need be.

-rmjon23 de Los Angeles

Brett Leveridge

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Mar 11, 2005, 5:59:04 PM3/11/05

to

Lincoln Spector wrote:
> popular music is usually introduced as
> a recording, and that's how we know it.

The offense taken at covers of popular songs is really a product of the
singer-songwriter era. Throughout the first half of the 20th century,
popular songs were covered by many different artists. In fact, there
were often several versions of a popular song on the charts simultaneuosly.

Even early in the rock era, bands and artists covered popular tunes (I
remember an album we had in my youth -- Brenda Lee Sings Today's Top
Teen Hits). But since the late sixties, covers have dwindled in frequency.

Brett

manitou910

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Mar 11, 2005, 5:56:24 PM3/11/05

to

indifference. wrote:
>
> You make some good points, but someone must like all the damn re-makes
> because there are so many of them. Not that re-makes are anything new but it
> seems like half the 'films' being released todays are re-makes or sequels.
> There is such a lack of original ideas that sequels (also nothing new) dont
> even get new titles,merely 'Crap II : You Assholes Spent Your Money Once
> Maybe You'll Spend It Again, For One Good Weekend At Least"

OK, people ...:

How about a remake of "THIS IS CINERAMA" in Super-35, but with a
newfangled wide-angle/anamorphic Panavision lens and (of course...)
shot/protected for 1:1.33 TV/video and 1:1.76 HDTV ......?

Charles

[ " couldn't resist......" ]

Lincoln Spector

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Mar 11, 2005, 6:02:45 PM3/11/05

to

<rmj...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:1110578784.4...@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com...

>I thought Lincoln's post was thoughtful and I thank him for it,

You're welcome.

Lincoln

Lincoln Spector

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Mar 11, 2005, 6:02:22 PM3/11/05

to

"jayembee" <jayembe...@snurcher.com> wrote in message
news:i324311n59hq3h88p...@4ax.com...

What about Psycho? That was based on a novel, and the second version was
definately a remake. (Okay, that's an extreme example, since both versions
used the same script and, from the look of it, the same storyboard.)

The fact is that I've heard people complain about the very idea of a TV
remake of Dr. Zhivago and The Music Man, with the assumption sight unseen
that they had to be inferior to the original film versions. (Personally, I
loved the BBC Dr. Zhivago, but thought the Disney Music Man suffered from a
lack of star charisma.)

>
> More to the point, with regard to your original posting, I'm not sure
> that anyone really objects to the principle of remakes. It's just that
> more often than not, the remake is terrible, or doesn't present a new
> spin to the story.

I hear and read these objections all the time.

>
> It also depends on the talent behind the remake. While there are
> definitely still people who object to the idea of a KING KONG remake,
> the objections to Peter Jackson doing it are fewer and much less
> vehement than there were when John Guillermin did it.

Jim Sheridan's a very good director, but people are already complaining
about his Ikiru remake.

Lincoln

Stott

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Mar 11, 2005, 6:07:35 PM3/11/05

to

Bob Birchard wrote:

> . I'm certain that were a print of
> Richard Burbage's Hamlet turn up today, it would seem incredibly strange. But
> as we became more familiar with it through repeated screenings and the
> availability of other performances from the period we would come to accept the
> conventions of the time just as we have come to accept the conventions of the
> 1930s (and perhaps to a lesser extent the 1920s).
>
> --

Sir Ian McKellan did a version of a Macbeth soliloqui, as it might have been
delivered by Edmund Kean, who reportedly did the role with a broad Scots accent . He
did it with a perfectly straight face and it was hillarious- "Out Out brief candle"
became "Oot oot braef kendele"

Stott

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Mar 11, 2005, 7:21:24 PM3/11/05

to

On 11-Mar-2005, Bob Birchard <bbir...@earthlink.net> wrote:

> about fifty years to the time when movies were first available on
> television. I
> was a kid in the late 1950s when the major studio pictures first started
> turning
> up on TV, and i can tell you that seeing a 1930 film in 1960 was like
> seeing
> ancient history. Nothing changes faster than the passing fancies of
> fashion.

The fashion that is most passe is the fashion of behavior. For instance,
in _King Kong_, we could get into the fact all the men wore hats all the
time outside, but watching them push them over their eyes to act nonchalant
in front of the natives is jarring. I stop and wonder whether that was done
for comic effect when the movie was made or whether they assumed that was a
universal behavior.

Martin Hart

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Mar 11, 2005, 7:42:00 PM3/11/05

to

In article <ZgkYd.17283$Pz7....@newssvr13.news.prodigy.com>,
Notr...@myemailaddress.com says...

<SNIP>

> > I've seen the Ricardo Cortez and Warren William versions. Give me
> > Bogie every time.
> In an earlier version of my article, I mentioned parenthetically that when a
> remake is better than the original, no one calls it a remake--and I used The
> Maltese Falcon as an example.
>
> Lincoln

One of these days I'll have to go back through my considerable
collection of AMERICAN CINEMATOGRAPHER and dig out the Aaton ad that
featured director Jean-Luc Goddard. It was claimed that "BEN-HUR II" was
going to be made in Super 16mm. It took years for my stomach to settle
down.

Marty
--
http://www.widescreenmuseum.com
The American WideScreen Museum

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Mar 11, 2005, 9:09:14 PM3/11/05

to

how...@brazee.net wrote:

> I suppose when the well known original is not a movie, it takes an
> extraordinary film to take over being "original", so remakes are remakes of
> the book or play. We don't talk about remakes of Hamlet, for instance.
>
> A remake of _Gone With The Wind_ probably would be considered a remake of
> the movie because it has virtually achieved "original" status. Same thing
> for _Wizard of Oz_. And these are two real popular books.

WOZ is also a special case in that the best-known film version is the
third or fourth film version of the book.

It's also a special case in that it's a musical. If a new film version
was a straight adaptation of the book, I wouldn't call it a remake. If
it was a musical with the same songs as the 1939 version, I *would*
call it a remake.

> Or when the case of the remake being extraordinary. Besides _The Maltese
> Falcon_, we can point to _Lord of the Rings_ here.

In the latter case, I think the animation/live-action disparity
prevents it from being thought of as a remake. Like the Disney
BEAUTY AND THE BEAST not being a remake of Cocteau's.

-- jayembee

jayembee

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Mar 11, 2005, 9:14:39 PM3/11/05

to

Neil Midkiff <nmid...@earthlink.net> wrote:

> jayembee wrote:
>>
>> My own gut reaction is that nothing seems more dated to me than films
>> from the mid-to-late 60s depicting what was in vogue then -- in terms
>> of fashion, speech, and so on.
>

> And, if we may be so personal, how old were you then?

I was born in 1953, so I'm just old enough to have been caught up in
the cultural aesthetics of the time.

> Are we more embarrassed by the choices our generation made when
> we were first finding our own way? The "flower child" look of the
> 1960s is dated but I don't feel it personally since those kids were five
> to fifteen years older. But seeing plaid polyester bell-bottom trousers
> makes me ask "Did WE really wear THAT???"

Yeah, that's pretty much it. Christ, I had a Nehru shirt and beads.:-)
(And the bell-bottoms, though they weren't "plaid polyester".)

-- jayembee

how...@brazee.net

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Mar 11, 2005, 10:00:28 PM3/11/05

to

On 11-Mar-2005, jayembee <jayembe...@snurcher.com> wrote:

> WOZ is also a special case in that the best-known film version is the
> third or fourth film version of the book.
>
> It's also a special case in that it's a musical. If a new film version
> was a straight adaptation of the book, I wouldn't call it a remake. If
> it was a musical with the same songs as the 1939 version, I *would*
> call it a remake.

What do you call _The Wiz_?

how...@brazee.net

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Mar 11, 2005, 10:02:10 PM3/11/05

to

On 11-Mar-2005, "Lincoln Spector" <Notr...@myemailaddress.com> wrote:

> Lincoln
> (who, btw, where's hats all the time outside)

I give up, where's hats all the time outside?

Robert Lipton

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Mar 11, 2005, 10:10:22 PM3/11/05

to

how...@brazee.net wrote:

A mess.

Bob

StormChaser

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Mar 11, 2005, 10:32:50 PM3/11/05

to

I saw Saturday Night Fever recently on DVD. What might have seem realistic
to 70's audience comes across today as vulgar and misogynist.
While it is a good movie overall, it only seem interested in showing glamour
during the dance sequences. The rest of the movie wears its urban grit
like a favorite sweatsuit. If it were done today, it would probably resemble
its sequel, Stayin' Alive: all flash, smoke, and fuzzy characterizations. It
would also star someone like Clay Aiken or a member of N'Sync.

"Neil Midkiff" <nmid...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:w%pYd.17414$Pz7...@newssvr13.news.prodigy.com...

jayembee

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Mar 11, 2005, 11:26:08 PM3/11/05

to

how...@brazee.net wrote:

Without the editorializing of the previous responses... :-)

I think a case could be made for calling it a remake. It's (not to put
too obvious a point on it) very different from the '39, but then, that
is exactly the kind of thing I hope for in a remake -- a different
perspective. It's not quite different enough to be merely "inspired
by", as, say, WEST SIDE STORY is of ROMEO AND JULIET.

-- jayembee

jayembee

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Mar 11, 2005, 11:25:52 PM3/11/05

to

"Lincoln Spector" <Notr...@myemailaddress.com> wrote:

> Lincoln
> (who, btw, where's hats all the time outside)

So do I, just not fedoras. A friend of mine wears a fedora, though not
all the time.

-- jayembee

Archie Waugh

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Mar 11, 2005, 11:44:10 PM3/11/05

to

Um...a giant piece of crap?
Of course, it doesn't have the same songs, and a lot of the songs in it are actually quite charming. But the stage play was so mangled to rework it as a Diana Ross vehicle that it is pretty grotesque. But given that...
We do get the terrific Broadway performances of the late Mabel King and Ted Ross preserved.
A very young (and not-surgically altered) Michael Jackson showing tremendous promise.
The last, best musical performance of Lena Horne in a musical. I was in attendance on opening night in Hollywood at the Cinerama Dome. The audience was 99% black. Diana Ross sang "If You Believe" to mild but polite response. When Lena sang the reprise, the audience was on their feet, cheering and dancing in the aisles. A stunning, unforgettable moment.
That said, the film is mostly a disastrous mess.
Archie Waugh

Scott Norwood

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Mar 11, 2005, 11:51:17 PM3/11/05

to

In article <gXsYd.7825$cN6....@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>,

<how...@brazee.net> wrote:
>
>What do you call _The Wiz_?

Faded Eastmancolor. At least the print that I ran last fall was....

--
Scott Norwood: snor...@nyx.net, snor...@redballoon.net
Cool Home Page: http://www.redballoon.net/
Lame Quote: Penguins? In Snack Canyon?

Stephen Cooke

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Mar 12, 2005, 1:27:51 AM3/12/05

to

On Sat, 12 Mar 2005, Robert Lipton wrote:
> how...@brazee.net wrote:
> >
> > What do you call _The Wiz_?
>
> A mess.

Only if you don't aim properly.

swac

R H Draney

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Mar 12, 2005, 1:27:14 AM3/12/05

to

jayembee filted:

>
>It's also a special case in that it's a musical. If a new film version
>was a straight adaptation of the book, I wouldn't call it a remake. If
>it was a musical with the same songs as the 1939 version, I *would*
>call it a remake.

How about the Jason Alexander version of BYE BYE BIRDIE?...it had *most* of the
same songs as the Dick Van Dyke film, but there were three or four new ones
scattered throughout, and the plot followed the stage version a lot more
closely....

(No star cameo by Ed Sullivan though, alas)....r

Tweek

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Mar 12, 2005, 1:19:43 PM3/12/05

to

> How many people think of Robert Bloch when they think of _Psycho_. What
we
> think of is Hitchcock.

And nobody thinks of Gus Van Sant.

--
Tweek

Eric Grayson

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Mar 12, 2005, 5:40:12 PM3/12/05

to

> How about a remake of "THIS IS CINERAMA" in Super-35, but with a
> newfangled wide-angle/anamorphic Panavision lens and (of course...)
> shot/protected for 1:1.33 TV/video and 1:1.76 HDTV ......?

Nah, do it better than that. Use George Lucas' 800-line blur vision
that he used with the last 3 Star Wars movies. That's even better than
Super 35 (which in the hands of the right DP, can look pretty good...
see Merchant of Venice for such an example).

Eric

Stephen Cooke

unread,

Mar 12, 2005, 5:44:33 PM3/12/05

to

Until just now.

THANKS A LOT!

swac

Richard Lanham

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Mar 12, 2005, 8:43:46 PM3/12/05

to

In article <d0sr0...@drn.newsguy.com>, R H Draney
<dado...@spamcop.net> wrote:

> Tiny Tim doing "Great Balls of Fire" remains a curiosity at best, and a
> drunken
> Jerry Lee Lewis taking on "Somewhere Over The Rainbow" exists, it would seem,
> only to frighten small children with....r

There is a charming version of Over The Rainbow by Gene Vincent. The
main instrument is something like a celeste, or even a "toy" piano. It
sounds as though it's directed straight to the child in anyone's heart.

Rick
I was so naive as a kid I used to sneak behind the barn and do nothing.
- Johnny Carson

Archie Waugh

unread,

Mar 12, 2005, 9:09:48 PM3/12/05

to

R H Draney wrote:

>How about the Jason Alexander version of BYE BYE BIRDIE?...it had *most* of the
>same songs as the Dick Van Dyke film, but there were three or four new ones
>scattered throughout, and the plot followed the stage version a lot more
>closely....
>
>(No star cameo by Ed Sullivan though, alas)....r
>
>

The Alexander version IS much closer to the Broadway play than the Van
Dyke version (which I enjoy nonetheless). It had virtually the entire
original score, plus I believe one additional new song written for
Vanessa Williams.
Archie Waugh

Bruce Calvert

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Mar 12, 2005, 10:04:38 PM3/12/05

to

Another remake that works is Michael Mann's LAST OF THE MOHICANS. The
same basic story is there, but the addition of color, widescreen, a
lush music score, and a 1990s emphasis on liberty, love, and violence
make the new film a good one while not dimishing the 1920s or 1930s
versions at all.

Bruce Calvert

Scar...@searchhawkmail.com

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Mar 13, 2005, 1:36:47 AM3/13/05

to

I first saw PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC about 20 years ago at the TLA in
Philly. They showed it without any musical accompaniment, and the
result was the (THE) most emotionally powerful movie experience I've
ever had.

Yes, Falconetti WAS Joan -- and Joan's passion was intense, and vivid
and real and I think everyone in the theater felt it as intently as
Joan did.

I'm not entirely comfortable comparing it to a documentary though --
it's far more than a simple record of Joan's final hours, and there is
quite a bit of directorial/cinematographic artistry evident throughout
-- you could blow up any frame of this film and hang it on your wall as
a painting.

But Dreyer did go to great pains to ensure historical accuracy. The
sets were built from medieval models of Rouens, the costumes copied
from 14th C. paintings, and the actors appeared without makeup. He
also shot the film in chronological order so that the actors would have
more of a sense that they were reliving the trial.

Dreyer and many critics/historians have bemoaned the fact that the film
lacked sound. Certainly the often lengthy intertitles (dialogue taken
from transcriptions of the real Joan's trial) make the need for sound
almost self-evident. However, I doubt that the film would pack half the
emotional wallop that it does if it were not a silent. Silent film
commands a viewer's full attention in a sense that a talking picture
does not. It also allows for those lengthy close-ups of the actors
which would be unthinkable in a sound film -- and it is precisely these
long close ups that make the film so powerful.

Another silent film which transcends time in its ability to affect
audiences is Eisenstein's BATTLESHIP POTEMKIN -- most particularly the
duly celebrated "Odessa Steps" sequence. I'd seen clips from this
sequence long before I'd ever seen the film (TLA again), but nothing
could have prepared me for the intensity of experiencing it in full and
in context of the film. Watching that scene fills me with an
overpowering sense of outrage -- of furious indignation at the utter
wrongness of destruction of human lives that I am witnessing (I hate to
say "up there on the screen" as that implies a sense of distancing that
doesn't exist).

I later got a copy of the film on video, and this cathartic expression
of emotion only intensifies upon multiple viewings -- especially as I
came to recognize the faces of nearly all of the prime players from the
Steps sequence in the "halcyon days" of the previous sequence.

And, no doubt significantly, Eisenstein's film attempts to create a
documentary style feel as well. As does another great silent film that
still retains all of its power today, King Vidor's THE CROWD.

I'd say there is a greater universality (and universal appeal) to films
that are more realistic -- particularly when it comes to acting styles
-- that will make them more readily accessible to audiences from later
generations/eras. But it doesn't take long for one to familiarize
oneself with the theatrical styles of a given era to the extent where
they no longer seem foreign and/or strange.

But I think that popular culture in general has a short life span.
Prior to the inventions of the movie camera and the phonograph, there
were no means of preserving the performances of actors, dancers,
singers, etc., and so their art (the experience of their art) was lost
to future generations. And even with recording devices, many popular
stars from the 20th Century are largely forgotten today. The
performances remain, but not enough cultural interest to revive them.

It has always struck me as infinitely sad that many of the greatest
actors, actresses, singers, dancers, comedians, etc., are largely
unknown to today's (and even yesterday's) generation -- simply because
the Entertainment Industry only sees fit to continually promote a
handful of films/actors/singers/etc. which some critic (or clique
thereof) has deemed "great."

But the Industry has to be selective in order to survive. I rarely go
to the movies today because I know that only one film out of 100 (if
that!) is going to measure up to the standards set by your average film
from 50, 60, 70 years ago. And if too many people felt like me,
Hollywood would go out of business.

Bill Vermillion

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Mar 13, 2005, 11:05:01 AM3/13/05

to

In article <YvfYd.906$qW....@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net>,
Harlett O'Dowd <chris.c...@worldspan.com> wrote:
>
><danel...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
>news:1110514822....@l41g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
>> LS wrote:

>> "But perhaps we should be a little more tolerant of remakes and
>> altered versions-with one important provision: That the original remain
>> available."

>> Then what do you do when confronted by the fact -- a rarity, I
>> grant you -- that some remakes are BETTER than the original?
>> "The Maltese Falcon" was filmed three times -- in 1931, then
>> again as "Satan Met a Lady" in 1936, and finally in the
>> Humphrey Bogart classic "The Maltese Falcon" in 1941.

>> I've seen the Ricardo Cortez and Warren William versions. Give me
>> Bogie every time.

>Which version did you see first? I think that has a real bearing
>on which version of a film you prefer - and why most people who
>see remakes - knowing (an) earlier version already - will find
>the remake wanting.

>But with few exceptions, myself being one of them, I think most
>people who see the Novarro BEN-HUR *after* growing up with the
>Heston version will find the silent interesting, even impressive
>but not as good as the *real* version.

I saw the Ramon Novarro version many years after the Charlton
Heston version. I liked parts of it better.

When TCM shows [it seems like for a decade now] their promo on
letter-boxing. When Scorcese talks about the chariot race and shows
how P&S ruins it [which it does for that version] I keep thinking
that for ME the Navarro version of the chariot race is more
exciting.

There are remakes and the there are remakes.

On more recent films I just recently watched the remake of
"The Ladykillers". The setting is changed so much you really don't
think of the original with Alec Guiness. Wayons over-the-top
performance didn't help nor did the gratuitous 'humorous' moment
at the end for the under-12 audience with the cat disposing of the
missing finger didn't help. But it doesn't feel like a remake.

Then there are the remakes of foreign films for US audiences - and
from my POV those are the ones that fail more drastically.

While far from the alt.movies.silent threads [ where I'm reading
this ] when you look at Open Your Eyes [Abre Los Ojos] directed by
Alejandro Amedobar and then see Vanilla Sky directed by Cameron
Crowe - it's more like a carbon copy - as so many scenes are
virtually identical in framing and composition.

The US version seems to have the typical exaggerated H'wood approach
with Cruise driving down the streets in a vintage Ferrari compared
to the VW in the original, and then in real live a Mustang vs the
VW. The fall from the building is like a real building in the
original and some somewhat futuristic overly tall edifice in the
copy.

Some remakes are good. Some seem to be just a way to recycled
products that are already owned and/or were good enough the first
time that the story is pre-tested.

Sometimes the remakes change things so much that the believability
of the remake suffers because so much emphasis is placed on the FX
or modernizing the story.

When Kelvin puts his 'wife' in the capsule preparing to jettison her
into space, you realize there is some strong force that you don't
see inside the closed capsule in the Tarkovsky version of Solaris,
but in the Soderbergh version the clear plastic module takes the
imagination away. Perhaps they are targeting to an audience that
doesn't know how to imagine things.

The views of Solaris in the two version make a trip to the surface
believable in the first, but the ongoing electrical disturbances
in the remake would make you think that no one would even attempt
a landing. And the final scenes show you that Kelvin has not left
space but everything his in his mind in the orignal, but you are
sort of left wondering in the Soderbergh remake.

My POV is that the former is a must see if you are an SF fan, while
the latter is a must miss.

Bill

--
Bill Vermillion - bv @ wjv . com

Bill Vermillion

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Mar 13, 2005, 11:05:01 AM3/13/05

to

In article <gXsYd.7825$cN6....@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net>,
<how...@brazee.net> wrote:
>

A virtually unknown Michael Jackson film - which is surprising that
some cable channel isn't running/promoting it with the current MJ
publicity :-)

Scott Dorsey

unread,

Mar 13, 2005, 11:15:14 AM3/13/05

to

The book was lousy, and Mark Twain agrees with me. So how could they
do any worse on film?
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

Bill Vermillion

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Mar 13, 2005, 12:05:01 PM3/13/05

to

In article <w%pYd.17414$Pz7...@newssvr13.news.prodigy.com>,

What strikes me most in films of the late 50's and the 60's is the
music that is not right. This is typically the studio musicians
playing rock music. This was the transitory era when a lot of
people were saying how bad rock was, DJ were breaking rock records
[ this was when 78's were still partially in evidence ], and
parodies such as Freberg's "Old Payola Roll Blues" were being
played. And another parody was "KAOS" - a paradoy on top-40/rock
radio of the time.

I'm probably more sensitive than a great many as I have recordings
that date back from close to 100 years ago to things from the last
year. I used to be a music director in radio [secondary market -
but Mancini called to thank me on turning Romeo and Juliet into
a hit - documented in the book "The Billboard Book of Number One
Hits"] and was fairly well respected in the business. Later I
moved onto being a recording engineer. [Never was able to work on
something that went above #1 on the funk/soul/r&b charts :-)]

But some of the attempts at making a rock sound-track by musician
who evidentally hated the genre really ruins part of the film for
me.

I started collection Spike Jones records and my mother would buy me
the newest ones I'd hear on the radio before I was old enough to go
out shopping on my own.

Bill

Bill Vermillion

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Mar 13, 2005, 12:35:01 PM3/13/05

to

In article <d0smrj$odq$1...@sm-news1.rand.org>,
Frederica <missme...@RATSPAMMERSyahoo.com> wrote:
>
>"Scott Norwood" <snor...@redballoon.net> wrote in message
>news:d0sm78$j2g$1...@reader1.panix.com...
>
>> I'm not sure I agree entirely with the premise of this statement.
>> The reason why we don't get upset about new performances or new
>> arrangements of a pice of music is that the music itself is just
>> a collection of notes on a piece of paper and isn't a complete work
>> in and of itself--much of the artistry is in the interpretation of
>> the work, as demonstrated by the arrangement and the performance
>> itself.

>I know rather a lot of people who get very upset about covers
>versions of songs. "No person but the original shall sing <insert
>pop standard here>!" The original isn't necessarily better, it's
>simply the first one everyone heard.

Way off topic here but related to sound in films. As I was typing
an earlier post the film Blacula was playing on cable in the other
room. What if found almost hilarious was that in one point
the screams sounded exactly like the high pithched violins in
the shower scene in Psycho. They had the same repetitive tempo
and pitch.

Bill Vermillion

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Mar 13, 2005, 12:35:01 PM3/13/05

to

In article <d0sm78$j2g$1...@reader1.panix.com>, Scott Norwood
<snor...@redballoon.net> wrote:

>In article <Tf6Yd.7896$C47....@newssvr14.news.prodigy.com>,
>Lincoln Spector <Notr...@myemailaddress.com> wrote:

>>We cinephiles want each great movie to be a moment frozen in
>>time. We get angry when a favorite is re-edited, panned and
>>scanned, or colorized. And heaven forbid that anyone should
>>ever remake anything! This is an attitude unique to film. Stage
>>plays are redirected with every production, often with the text
>>altered and cut. Novels get recast and redesigned by every
>>reader. No one complains when someone rerecords Beethoven's 9th
>>or Louie Louie.

>I'm not sure I agree entirely with the premise of this statement.
>The reason why we don't get upset about new performances or new
>arrangements of a pice of music is that the music itself is just
>a collection of notes on a piece of paper and isn't a complete work
>in and of itself--much of the artistry is in the interpretation of
>the work, as demonstrated by the arrangement and the performance
>itself.

>By contrast, a film is itself an end product, inclusive of the
>script, direction, performance, editing, music, costumes, etc. To
>re-make a classic film is more like re-painting an existing Van
>Gogh. Not repainting the scene, but creating a new painting based
>on the old one in an attempt to improve upon it. There's nothing
>intrinsically wrong with doing this, but the desire to do so
>generally shows a lack of creativity, compared with creating an
>entirely new and original work. Occasionally, remakes actually
>turn out to be better than the originals (e.g. the 2001 version of
>"Ocean's Eleven"), although that is very rare.

I felt that the remake of O11 stretched the believability to the
point of breaking. Performances in the original were not as
polished as in the 2001 version, but it was more plausible from my
POV. The buring of the money in the coffin in the crematorium
added a bit of humor compared to the remake.

Other remakes/copies that I've like are "My Man Friday"
[Grant/Russell], but I also like the original "The Front Page"
The Lemmon/Mathau was taking advantage of the power of that pair,
but doesn't compare to the orignals IMO. I felt the "Switching
Channels" [Reynolds/Turner] was a waste of film. Updating
the original to be a TV cable network [ Reynolds is a thinly veiled
Ted Turner IMO ] just didni't do it for me. I guess it would
be like re-making Citizen Kane in color, with Rupert Murdoch
being the role model instead of of W.R.Hearst :-) That would be
a bizarre film - with one of today's older male film stars playing
the lead and Brinany Spears playing the part of the singer :-)

>As for older films--different films appeal to me for different
>reasons. Some are truly great on their own merits, but others are
>interesting primarily as historical objects. It would be a stretch
>to classify "Birth of a Nation" as a film which has great artistic
>merit today, but anyone with an interest in film history or history
>in general should be able to appreciate it for what it is--a product
>of its time and the sensibilities of its creators.

What I've noticed is that many scenes in GWTW are duplicates
of those in BOAN.

>Whether or not those sensibilites are generally agreeable with
>those held by most of us today is a separate issue worthy of
>discussion, but it does not undermine the value of screening the
>film.

When watching older films I find I can put myself into the mindset
of viwers of that era - and that really helps with the little
lines that were meaningful when the film was made as they were part
of the vernacular then - but are totally baffling to large parts
of today's audiences. Being aware of history and the changes in
this country [USofA] make these enjoyable to me.

>Similarly, we may not necessarily classify something like Upton
>Sinclair's "The Jungle" as great literature, but it is important
>in its historical context.

In films and writing the same thing is imporant as in comedy -
and that is timing. In this context timing extends over years
and not seconds.

Sometimes even and old joke works well 75 years later.

A few years ago - when I used to drive convertibles - a DJ who
worked at the same station I did saw me driving along with
a woman in the car. He asked who it was.

I used the old vaudeville joke of "that was no lady that was my
wife" and he thought it was hilarious. Usually Joe Miller jokes
lay an egg in this day and age.

Bill

Bill Vermillion

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Mar 13, 2005, 12:45:01 PM3/13/05

to

In article <d0sr0...@drn.newsguy.com>,
R H Draney <dado...@spamcop.net> wrote:

>Frederica filted:

>>I know rather a lot of people who get very upset about covers
>>versions of songs. "No person but the original shall sing
>><insert pop standard here>!" The original isn't necessarily
>>better, it's simply the first one everyone heard.

>By that logic, the Beatles shouldn't have messed up "Twist and
>Shout", Matthews Southern Comfort should have kept their grimy
>mitts off "Woodstock", and Roger McGuinn never should have had
>the audacity to record all those Dylan songs...I don't agree with
>any of those statements....

And there were well over 200 different recording versions of
Yesterday. A friend of mine was given the album copy of
instrumental recording that came in at the radio station in the
1960s. She found one song that she really liked. "Scambled Eggs".

That melody is what later became Yesterday when words were added.

>A single artist can achieve mixed results on someone else's
>material, as Linda Ronstadt illustrates so well...Taiwan singer
>Sun Yanzi needn't have bothered with her tepid rendition of "Hey
>Jude", but she when she did Shocking Blue's "Venus", all other
>versions faded from memory....

At one time it was rare for an artist to write their own material.
And often it was a race to get out other versions of what seemed to
have the possibility of a hit. When I was an MD in radio I once
got a telegram saying NOT to play a certain recording, as the first
recording of the song had not been shipped yet. Part of the
licensing for many songs is that a certain artists will get the
right to make the first recoring.

After the first recording is released you can file for compulsory
licensing to be able to cover the oringal. In the above, the cover
was inadvertantly released prior to the original - probably [I'm
guessing] because the original release date was delayed.

A great song is a great song - and sometimes different artists
renditions reach areas the original artist or composer - never
imagined.

>Still, there's Hall & Oates redoing "You've Lost That Loving
>Feeling" so much like the Righteous Brothers that you have to
>wonder what was the point, and closer to home, Taco's recording
>of "Putting on the Ritz"; yes, it's entertaining, but has anyone
>here heard it and *not* been seriously creeped out?...

I like that version - along with the original - and also the
version in Young Frankenstein.

John Harkness

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Mar 13, 2005, 2:06:34 PM3/13/05

to

On Sun, 13 Mar 2005 17:35:01 GMT, b...@wjv.com (Bill Vermillion) wrote:

>
>Other remakes/copies that I've like are "My Man Friday"
>[Grant/Russell],

That would be the one where they're marooned on a desert island?

John Harkness

Lincoln Spector

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Mar 13, 2005, 2:48:16 PM3/13/05

to

"Tweek" <tw...@comeonletsbereal.com> wrote in message
news:qoGYd.7489$If1.1...@read2.cgocable.net...

Actually, I believe that Universal Studios and Gus Van Sant should be
thanked for creating an interesting experiment (what happens when you remake
a classic using the original screenplay and making a shot-for-shot copy)
when they could have wasted their money and time doing something more
selfish and personally profitable--like making a good movie. :-)

Lincoln

Lincoln Spector

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Mar 13, 2005, 2:54:17 PM3/13/05

to

"jayembee" <jayembe...@snurcher.com> wrote in message
news:2gj431tfqgmr0r1ee...@4ax.com...
> how...@brazee.net wrote:
>
>> I suppose when the well known original is not a movie, it takes an
>> extraordinary film to take over being "original", so remakes are remakes
>> of
>> the book or play. We don't talk about remakes of Hamlet, for instance.
>>
>> A remake of _Gone With The Wind_ probably would be considered a remake of
>> the movie because it has virtually achieved "original" status. Same
>> thing
>> for _Wizard of Oz_. And these are two real popular books.

>
> WOZ is also a special case in that the best-known film version is the
> third or fourth film version of the book.
>
> It's also a special case in that it's a musical. If a new film version
> was a straight adaptation of the book, I wouldn't call it a remake. If
> it was a musical with the same songs as the 1939 version, I *would*
> call it a remake.
>

>> Or when the case of the remake being extraordinary. Besides _The Maltese
>> Falcon_, we can point to _Lord of the Rings_ here.
>
> In the latter case, I think the animation/live-action disparity
> prevents it from being thought of as a remake. Like the Disney
> BEAUTY AND THE BEAST not being a remake of Cocteau's.
This is getting into Anna and the King territory. First, a non-musical film
(Anna and the King of Siam) based on a non-fiction autobiography (although
one considered very biased and of questionable accuracy), then a Broadway
musical (The King and I), then a short-lived TV series (Anna and the King),
then remakes of the non-musical and the musical almost simultaneously--with
the musical remake being animated (and introducing fantasy characters into
what was originally supposed to be a true story).

Lincoln

Lincoln Spector

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Mar 13, 2005, 2:56:37 PM3/13/05

to

<<The last, best musical performance of Lena Horne in a musical.>>

Horne is in it? Maybe I'll have to catch it just for that. One of my
all-time favorite singers.

Lincoln

Lincoln Spector

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Mar 13, 2005, 3:01:31 PM3/13/05

to

"StormChaser" <ring...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:CptYd.1488$qW....@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net...

>I saw Saturday Night Fever recently on DVD. What might have seem realistic
> to 70's audience comes across today as vulgar and misogynist.
> While it is a good movie overall, it only seem interested in showing
> glamour
> during the dance sequences. The rest of the movie wears its urban grit
> like a favorite sweatsuit. If it were done today, it would probably
> resemble
> its sequel, Stayin' Alive: all flash, smoke, and fuzzy characterizations.
> It
> would also star someone like Clay Aiken or a member of N'Sync.

At the time I thought there was a weird disconnect between SNF and the
public reaction to it. The movie seemed to say the whole disco scene was
empty and pointless. But people saw it and said "Wow! That's for me!"

Lincoln

Lincoln Spector

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Mar 13, 2005, 3:04:06 PM3/13/05

to

<how...@brazee.net> wrote in message
news:SYsYd.7826$cN6....@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net...

>
> On 11-Mar-2005, "Lincoln Spector" <Notr...@myemailaddress.com> wrote:
>
>> Lincoln
>> (who, btw, where's hats all the time outside)
>

> I give up, where's hats all the time outside?
Oops. I should have said "who, btw, wears hats all the time outside."

And I'm the professional writer! (Which explains why there are also
professional editors.)

Lincoln

Archie Waugh

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Mar 13, 2005, 4:23:14 PM3/13/05

to

Perhaps they did better because the Mann version isn't really based on the book, but on the much-different John Bladerston-Phillip Dunne screenplay of the 1936.
Archie Waugh

Archie Waugh

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Mar 13, 2005, 4:26:46 PM3/13/05

to

She is indeed...as Glinda. Skip to the last ten minutes to see a class
act literally stomp everyone else in the film to death musically.
Archie Waugh

Archie Waugh

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Mar 13, 2005, 4:27:56 PM3/13/05

to

Whoops: Balderston. Preview is your friend.
AW

Bill Vermillion

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Mar 13, 2005, 6:15:10 PM3/13/05

to

In article <lsKdnUL7WJg...@giganews.com>,
Brett Leveridge <sky...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>Lincoln Spector wrote:
>> popular music is usually introduced as
>> a recording, and that's how we know it.

>The offense taken at covers of popular songs is really a product
>of the singer-songwriter era. Throughout the first half of the
>20th century, popular songs were covered by many different
>artists. In fact, there were often several versions of a popular
>song on the charts simultaneuosly.

>Even early in the rock era, bands and artists covered popular
>tunes (I remember an album we had in my youth -- Brenda Lee Sings
>Today's Top Teen Hits). But since the late sixties, covers have
>dwindled in frequency.

Not 'even in the rock era' but 'particularly in the rock era.

Songs that were targetted to the audience that heard rhythm and
blues were often remade for a different audience. The idea
that a song would cross-over was unheard of then.

Lyrics were slightly changed. Doris Day had a pop cover
of Ray Charles "I Got A Woman". Her lyrics were "I got a sweetie
way over town. He's good to me".

In the '50s this was done often. And rock records of that era
were quite often regional with different hit versions - some
in the East, others in the mid-West, and yet others on the West
Coast.

In the early '50s there were 2 and 3/4 television networks.
CBS and NBC were full-time. ABC network had only evening
programming [1/2 of the 3/4] and DUmont was down to just
about only the Friday Night fights.

ABC had nothing much to offer during the day until August 5, 1957
when DIck Clark's American Bandstand came on the air - and in 6
months was the higher rated daytime TV show.

That was the first time that a pop song could be heard
simulataneously in all parts of the US - and the days of the
regional hits were over - and a new era of pop music started.

Things would never be the same.

unread,

Mar 13, 2005, 8:41:08 PM3/13/05

to

On 13-Mar-2005, "Lincoln Spector" <Notr...@myemailaddress.com> wrote:

> This is getting into Anna and the King territory. First, a non-musical
> film
> (Anna and the King of Siam) based on a non-fiction autobiography (although
>
> one considered very biased and of questionable accuracy), then a Broadway
> musical (The King and I), then a short-lived TV series (Anna and the
> King),
> then remakes of the non-musical and the musical almost
> simultaneously--with
> the musical remake being animated (and introducing fantasy characters into
>
> what was originally supposed to be a true story).

Sort of like _Little Shop of Horrors_.

how...@brazee.net

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Mar 13, 2005, 8:43:40 PM3/13/05

to

The book isn't of such quality that there's much room for diminishment.
Keep the lousy story, drop the prose, add some scenery and you're bound to
have something better.

Morgan Montague

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Mar 13, 2005, 8:53:41 PM3/13/05

to

Mine, too. I have to watch STORMY WEATHER every couple of years to get my
Lena fix. I used to love watching the Dean Martin Show as a kid because she
was an occasional guest. Dean's show had the best guest stars even if you
didn't like him.

Morgan

PS: I once saw a family photo in People Magazine of Lena's extended family.
They are all %^&* gorgeous. I wish my gene people was as gifted.

"Lincoln Spector" <Notr...@myemailaddress.com> wrote in message
news:VV0Zd.9480$C47...@newssvr14.news.prodigy.com...

Morgan Montague

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Mar 13, 2005, 9:00:04 PM3/13/05

to

>>>
>>>>>>Nothing changes faster than the passing fancies of fashion.
>>>>>
>>>
>>>

>>> My own gut reaction is that nothing seems more dated to me than films
>>> from the mid-to-late 60s depicting what was in vogue then -- in terms
>>> of fashion, speech, and so on.
>>>
>>> -- jayembee

Yep. I re-watched one of my favorite comedies from that era last night, THE
PRESIDENT'S ANALYST. My fiance who had never seen the film walked out after
about 1/2 into the film.

The music and the clothes are embracing and parodying the era all at the
same time. The problem, though, now, is that the music is especially
irritating, unless you are in on the joke. I saw the film in its initial
release when I was 13 and loved it then. I get more of the jokes now and
much of the humor is timeless (maybe even timely), but the presentation
falls into camp. Still, I will always be a fan of TPA. Long live Severn
Darden and Godfrey Cambridge and James Coburn and Theodore Flicker.

Morgan

unread,

Mar 14, 2005, 12:57:53 AM3/14/05

to

In rec.arts.movies.past-films Scott Dorsey <klu...@panix.com> wrote:
:>Another remake that works is Michael Mann's LAST OF THE MOHICANS. The
:>same basic story is there, but the addition of color, widescreen, a
:>lush music score, and a 1990s emphasis on liberty, love, and violence
:>make the new film a good one while not dimishing the 1920s or 1930s
:>versions at all.
:

: The book was lousy, and Mark Twain agrees with me. So how could they

: do any worse on film?

I haven't read Twain's essay in many years, but I'm fairly sure that most,
if not all, of his specific examples (e.g. the one with the Indians attempting
to leap out of a tree onto a boat passing underneath) are taken from novels
*other* than _The Last of the Mohicans_; IIRC, it's mostly _The Pathfinder_
that he finds objectionable.

-----
Richard Schultz sch...@mail.biu.ac.il
Department of Chemistry, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel
Opinions expressed are mine alone, and not those of Bar-Ilan University
-----
"I wonder," said Ada, "I wonder if the attempt to discover those things
is worth the stained glass. We can know the time, we can know a time.
We can never know Time. Our senses are simply not meant to perceive
it. It is like -- "

Richard Schultz

unread,

Mar 14, 2005, 12:53:29 AM3/14/05

to

In rec.arts.movies.past-films Archie Waugh <glam...@gte.net> wrote:

: She is indeed...as Glinda. Skip to the last ten minutes to see a class

: act literally stomp everyone else in the film to death musically.

Shouldn't this be in the "films in which a character gets away with
murder" thread?

-----
Richard Schultz sch...@mail.biu.ac.il
Department of Chemistry, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel
Opinions expressed are mine alone, and not those of Bar-Ilan University
-----

"Logic is a wreath of pretty flowers which smell bad."

Richard Schultz

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Mar 14, 2005, 12:59:41 AM3/14/05

to

In rec.arts.movies.past-films how...@brazee.net wrote:

: On 12-Mar-2005, "Bruce Calvert" <silen...@attbi.com> wrote:
:
:> Another remake that works is Michael Mann's LAST OF THE MOHICANS.

: The book isn't of such quality that there's much room for diminishment.

: Keep the lousy story, drop the prose, add some scenery and you're bound to
: have something better.

Although Mann's movie did not in fact keep the lousy story. Having a
matinee idol play the hero meant that he had to drop the part about
Natty Bumppo being the prototype (literally) of the Loner who soon enough
became the cliche of the Western novel and then (much later) movie.

-----
Richard Schultz sch...@mail.biu.ac.il
Department of Chemistry, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel
Opinions expressed are mine alone, and not those of Bar-Ilan University
-----

"Contrariwise," continued Tweedledee, "if it was so, it might be, and
if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't. That's logic."

Stephen Cooke

unread,

Mar 14, 2005, 9:10:42 AM3/14/05

to

On Sat, 12 Mar 2005, jayembee wrote:

> "Lincoln Spector" <Notr...@myemailaddress.com> wrote:
>
> > Lincoln
> > (who, btw, where's hats all the time outside)
>

> So do I, just not fedoras. A friend of mine wears a fedora, though not
> all the time.

I have a porkpie hat, but my hair is too long at the moment to wear it.

Time for a trim, methinks.

swac

Stephen Cooke

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Mar 14, 2005, 9:21:31 AM3/14/05

to

On Sun, 13 Mar 2005, Morgan Montague wrote:

> The music and the clothes are embracing and parodying the era all at the
> same time. The problem, though, now, is that the music is especially
> irritating, unless you are in on the joke. I saw the film in its initial
> release when I was 13 and loved it then. I get more of the jokes now and
> much of the humor is timeless (maybe even timely), but the presentation
> falls into camp. Still, I will always be a fan of TPA. Long live Severn
> Darden and Godfrey Cambridge and James Coburn and Theodore Flicker.

I love Severn Darden, I wish he'd been in more films (I also watched Dead
Heat on a Merry Go Round recently, featuring one of Harrison Ford's finer
performances). Or at least better films (Werewolves on Wheels, anyone?).

Someone should film The Severn Darden Story starring Oliver Platt.

swac

Bill Vermillion

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Mar 14, 2005, 12:05:01 PM3/14/05

to

In article <d137n...@drn.newsguy.com>,

Nilsson was always one of my favorites. His album that Gordon
Jenkins arranged - who wrote some of the most wonderful string
arragnements I have heard - is a joy. "A Touch Of Schmillson In
The Night".

A great comarizon of Jenkins work is "As Time Goes By" - with the
Jimmy Durante arrangement compared to the Harry Nilsson arangement.
THe latter is quite laid back - but both are wonderful.

It would be a very dreary world if there were only version of
so many great recordings.

Often the problem with films being remade as I see it, is they are
made to target a modern audience - who by and large have no idea of
the past or history in general - and some things just don't work
updated to fit modern perceptions.

Someone mentioned The Manchurian Candidate and how they liked both
- but I guess it may have been that I was an adult watching it on
the big screen when the first version came out - and we were quite
aware of 'brainwashing' as it was so often in the press of that
era. To me the story works better that way than the updated
version.

New versions of songs often have more artistic changes than new
vesions of films. But different films made about a specific event
in time seem never to be viewed as remakes - but the story line
is often the same.

Rope and Compulsion use essentially the same story line - and I've
not seen 'Swoon' which is the first to use the real names - and they
aren't remakes. More like different interpretations of the same
melody by different artists.

Brett Leveridge

unread,

Mar 14, 2005, 3:19:19 PM3/14/05

to

Bill Vermillion wrote:
> Nilsson was always one of my favorites. His album that Gordon
> Jenkins arranged - who wrote some of the most wonderful string
> arragnements I have heard - is a joy. "A Touch Of Schmillson In
> The Night".

I have a little Nilsson anecdote (albeit an off-topic one) to share:

A buddy of mine was out having a beer with a pal some years ago, and
when the bartender put that Nilsson/Jenkins disc of standards on, my
buddy turned to his friend and said, "Oh, man, you gotta hear this --
it's a great album."

From behind him there at the crowded bar, a voice was heard to say,
"Why, thank you very much."

My pal turned around, and there was Nilsson in the flesh, having himself
just stopped in for some liquid refreshment.

As Woody Allen says when Marshall McLuhan conveniently crops up in line
at the Beekman theatre in ANNIE HALL, "Boy, if life were only like this."

Brett

Stott

unread,

Mar 14, 2005, 5:06:40 PM3/14/05

to

Scott Dorsey wrote:

> Bruce Calvert <silen...@attbi.com> wrote:
> >Another remake that works is Michael Mann's LAST OF THE MOHICANS. The

> >same basic story is there, but the addition of color, widescreen, a
> >lush music score, and a 1990s emphasis on liberty, love, and violence
> >make the new film a good one while not dimishing the 1920s or 1930s
> >versions at all.
>
> The book was lousy, and Mark Twain agrees with me. So how could they
> do any worse on film?

> --scott
> --
> "C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

The book does stink, but there is the germ of a great plot in it- that is
why it keeps getting made.

Stott

Frederica

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Mar 14, 2005, 5:21:33 PM3/14/05

to

"Stott" <est...@localnet.spamcommode> wrote in message
news:42360AF0...@localnet.spamcommode...

>
> The book does stink, but there is the germ of a great plot in it- that is
> why it keeps getting made.
>
> Stott

Stinky books often make good films. I find Agatha Christie unreadable, but
highly enjoy most of the the filmic versions of her books.

Frederica

Robert Lipton

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Mar 14, 2005, 6:20:11 PM3/14/05

to

Frederica wrote:

That's because she can't string two words together, but she can
construct a clockwork mystery.

Bob