[Edna And The Strange 720p Movies
Kody Coste
This film called "The Song of My Heart" as I recall (and I only saw the end of it in the 1950's) troubled me among other things because it featured Tchaikovsky wearing a small moustache...aside from all the make believe and untruths..but all those movies made in the 1940's showed an utter disregard for the facts of a composer's life and romanticised everything about them...I can recall movies about Schumann, Chopin, Rimsky Korsakov, Brahms, this one on Tchaikovsky which appeared at the time. Others in the pop field about Jerome Kern and George Gershwin all suffered from the same malady of not sticking to the facts....had very little to do with reality..Not too long ago I started to see "A Song to Remember" about Chopin...it had barely started...I saw the beginning and knew right away this was going to be a slop of make believe and turned it off.....if it was at least an interesting make believe but no..people have the right to enjoy what they wish...but I would urge Ms Shochat to maybe read a book or two about the composer to get a better perspective..in order to distinguish between fact and fiction...
It is not useless..these are not music enthusiasts ...people with a slight knowledge of music may be satisfied with gross misrepresentations...because they dont know any better..it is either a good movie or a bad movie...those of us who have reviewed these movies have a right to be critical..I have seen good representations of composers...some time ago a life of Verdi was shown as a mini series via BBC..it was quite respectful of the composers life and stayed within the realm of truth and reality while at the same time showing the growth of the composer and his social life with veracity...it was satisfying in every way...and the actor representing Verdi also had a good likeness to the composer giving the series a feeling of veracity...not too long ago I saw a movie on the life of George Gershwin...Rhapsody in Blue...I had not seen it since 1946 when the movie purporting to be the life of the composer first came out....at the time because it was new and fresh and I a child I was very pleased with it being an intro into that composers music....but more recently having read several bios on the composer it was simply unacceptable tripe as Mr. Boyd would say...if you want to show the composers or artists life as it was lived in reality this is possible and not such a difficult an undertaking...if you want to indulge your own subjective fantasies as a director then that is misrepresentation..they are not trying to represent the music...music speaks for itself and as Tchaikovsky said to Madame von Meck when she started to idolize him...do not confuse me with my music...however if you want to create a work of fantasy which still respects the facts of a mans life...that is still possible..and it must be done with conviction...but that is not what is happening here..these are not Art works...there are plenty of analysis of this or that composers work if you want to have a more in depth understanding of the music...but as for these movies I have mentioned in my articles they are nothing but schlock...a movie created to titillate the senses of an unknowing public..it is far easier to make a story up than search ones sources...and we live in a society which is not very cultivated in the arts to begin with...back then it was a simpler age and people were satisfied with less...
if we're having a contest about who can name the WORSE bio/drama about a composer, I would like to suggest "Night And Day." The film purported to be about the life of Cole Porter, starring Cary Grant, Alexis Smith(?).
P.S.: Please do not ask me why films fail composers. Films seem to have a lot more success with novelists, playwrights and the like. But consider this: SCREENWRITERS are in the same sorority/fraternity as novelists and playwrights.. Much more empathy and care is utilized when writing about a member. And I suppose, I know, screen/playwrights are intimidated by composers for reasons I can't fathom. (One being most can't even read music). But composers? The intimidation is there. Same goes for painters. Filmakers never get them right either.
Thanks to Mr. Garganese suggestion I was able to see the German film which came out in 1939..."Es war eine rauschende Ballnacht"...which was supposed to be about Tchaikovsky's life....it is about one hour and twenty minutes long..shown in ten minute segments....well in truth this had little to do with the composers life...if you don't understand German there are no sub titles to help you...so all you get is the gist of the action....in this one there appears to be two love interests....a blonde whom he marries but leaves her on the marriage night to get drunk with some friends...etc..the other is a brunette which appears again at the last scene...throughout there are bits and pieces of Tchaikovsky's music..tho some of the music sung is not his...the attractive blonde he marries is portrayed as being a ballet dancer very normal in appearance...the last scene is somewhat affecting...here as happened the composer is conducting the Adagio Lamentoso from the Pathetique...before he can complete it he gets faint and must retire to an adjoining room...there he dies...as the brunette sheds tears along side of him..and so he dies with the Adagio playing in the background...that was most fitting....other than that this had nothing to do with the composers life...non of the other characters were real...it was a total construct about a man called Tchaikovsky....and some of his music...the person playing the composer sports a mustache at first...is presented as being firm and with a hard edge...it was well acted and directed but that was all...maybe there are restraints about making a movie about a real person...you might have to deal with their heirs...and so here again you had a movie about much ado about nothing...even less here than in the others we had mentioned...
But not as bad as.. the reward for the worse movie Ive ever seen goes to the Tchaikovsky effort from the Soviet Union directed by Talankin...that to me was the low end of cinematography...came out in 1970...never thought I could ever say about anything..."This is the worse movie ever."
Moreover, in the film directed by Forelich, alludes to the relationship between Tchaikovsky and Madame von Meck, some characteristics of the musician can be found, although all of this to the present day is not enough.
The biographical narratives of musicians, detailed (falsely detailed), have created works highly questionable as in the long Italian television film (1982) about the life of Giuseppe Verdi (9 episodes of 70 minutes each):
etc. I have no information of Russian films (Soviet) before the film directed by Talankin of 1969-70. This is quite strange because the Soviet film, has created many biographical films around the artists.
2005 KF "Amur Fall" in Blagoveshchensk Award for his directorial debut (Adel Al-Hadad)
2005 KF "Window to Europe" in Vyborg Prize "Silver Boat" screenwriter of feature films in competition (Yuri Arabs)
Andrew Savostyanov is Tchaikovsky.
But for an artist in general (and his art course) particularly for Tchaikovsky, the transposition of his life is really hard. The director will refer to many things and only an educated public (I mean informed, already introduced) will understand or can imagine. In the films of Russell and Talankin this happens: for this reason they generate many reservations, paradoxically above all by those who know the subject concerned.
The difference between the fictionalized film of 1939 and 1948 and the others mentioned here, lies in being-Russell, Talankin, etc-"paraphrases" artistic (also not good), but not documentary or didascalic reconstructions such as the Italian, around Verdi (1982).
I think we can all name the top 5 BAD Tchaikovsky biopics. I personally would rank the Russell in there, and definitely the Talankin. Academy Award nominations you say? (The Academy must be smoking "funny" cigarettes! Hahahahahah! ) I turn, for a moment, to the documentary form.
Again they do our man no justice. There was one I saw from the BBC which seemed to be accurate and honest, (the name fails me now). It went about asking Russian muscians and singers why they loved Tchaikovsky. I found it somewhat insightful to tell you the truth, so I researched the doc.
One interviewer asked the host of the documentary how HE thought T died. And his off-the-cuff reply was simple and rude. Something to effect that Tchaikovsky had probably performed a sexual favor with his tongue to the posterior of some little, infected (cholera) boy.
This totally turned me off from the host/conductor of the documentary. And if that famed conductor ever comes to Montreal to conduct the MSO I shall boycott. Do they say such things, (especially to the media, for the world to see/read) about heterosexuals who've died of cholera?, (with proper substitutions of course).
As you must know, privately T., was very comfortable with his sexuality, (especially after his marriage debacle). Publicly, the stigma, the family persecution, not to mention a divorce from friends such as von Meck(?) pierced his endurance and would have been insufferable.
Far be it from me to want monopolizing this discussion between us. But there are more debates in the forum with many interventions, so I hope that my extra replication is allowed. Not only to make clear that in the substance (or good part) agree with you, but to give other data for the benefit of users. Are those that I have collected over time and as early as Forum, you and Mr. Albert Gasparo (and still others) have in part mentioned. Perhaps we can now summarize them here.
The reconstruction is credible in its didactic limit, with certain loans to the film by Ken Russell. Interventions made by conductor Hazlewood, verbal and musical. The part documentary was filmed in Russia, in real places, including Klin. The production-subject to copyright-you can easily find on the Internet (keywords: discovering Tchaikovsky).
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