Un(der)sung Concert Music in Film

[eschiss1]

Sometimes I think I catch unusual music in the movies. Shostakovich symphony 6 was probably undersung in 1988 when a fragment of the Largo appeared for a moment in the movie Running on Empty (but then the character waking up in that scene was a musician hoping to go to Juilliard, and it felt appropriate- in a couple of ways really). Some even better examples are almost coming to mind but not quite.  A silly one is coming to mind from last year, though - the main character of last year's film An Education was a cellist, and of course we had to have a scene of her rehearsing with her orchestra; and it turns out, in the credits, that the very brief excerpt of what they were playing was from the Adagio from the Elgar/Payne symphony no.3.  An Education, which is based on a true story they say, is set in the 1960s.

Am I the only person who sees a problem there? (The producers' fault, of course- I don't think the author of the original book claimed to have been playing the Elgar/Payne!)

[JimL]

IIRC there is a fragment of the opening tutti of de Beriot's VC 8 in the film The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

[Hovite]

Am I the only person who sees a problem there?

No, you are not the only person to see a problem:

"The school orchestra play an extract from Elgar's 3rd Symphony. This work was left unfinished at the composer's death in 1934 and was not completed and performed until 1998, so unavailable (and unsuitable) for a 1961 school orchestra."

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1174732/goofs

From the same page:

"When Jenny invites David to the concert, she indicates that the composer is Elgar. David replies, 'I'm afraid Elgar and the Jews don't get along'. This may imply either Jews don't like Elgar (hard to prove) or that Elgar was anti-Semitic. However there is no evidence of Elgar being anti-semitic"

Has someone confused Elgar with Wagner?

[eschiss1]

No, you are not the only person to see a problem:

"The school orchestra play an extract from Elgar's 3rd Symphony. This work was left unfinished at the composer's death in 1934 and was not completed and performed until 1998, so unavailable (and unsuitable) for a 1961 school orchestra."

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1174732/goofs

Ah. I did not even see that page, but should have looked- thanks. (I thought of that particular problem the moment the movie was over, last November. Some of the other goofs mentioned just passed me right by including, I think, that about Elgar and Judaism- and thanks for helping set that straight.)

[chill319]

A particular pet peeve is costume films, too numerous to mention, where the music is off by a few centuries. Susato and Thomas à Becket, that sort of thing.

[TerraEpon]

A particular pet peeve is costume films, too numerous to mention, where the music is off by a few centuries. Susato and Thomas à Becket, that sort of thing.

You're meaning source (diagetic) music here, such as, say, something taking place in the early 1800s, and showing a string quartet playing Mozart?

[thalbergmad]

A bit like playing Wagner for Excalibur??

It would not have been such a great film if 5th Century music were used.

Thal

[chill319]

You're meaning source (diagetic) music here, such as, say, something taking place in the early 1800s, and showing a string quartet playing Mozart?

Precisely. Or, at the least offensive end, a Napolean soiree with Lanner in the background.

A bit like playing Wagner for Excalibur??

An interesting point. I guess Wagner convinced me that where myths are concerned, psychology trumps history.

But I digress. And as somewhat inadequate penance, I will mention that I found the use of Barber's Adagio for Strings in Stone's Platoon to be effective.

[eschiss1]

But I digress. And as somewhat inadequate penance, I will mention that I found the use of Barber's Adagio for Strings in Stone's Platoon to be effective.

Some very small minority of the troops were classical music fans, I am guessing, and the Adagio had been broadcast in their lifetimes (including that of Oliver Stone, himself a vet, though I don't know if he's a classical fan...), so not exactly an anachronism, so I don't follow

[JimL]

Well, some directors, such as Stanley Kubrick and John Boorman, were big users of "found" music.  This may explain the anachronistic use of Elgar's 3rd in An Education.  Not everyone is as musically literate as we.  On the other hand, I remember a film called Ladyhawke, whose setting and subject matter called for a big symphonic score, that was totally ruined by the techno-pop soundtrack that was used instead.

[TerraEpon]

Of course a background score is a completely different thing than music that's supposed to be heard by the characters. And historical movie would be pretty silly if scored by music that's historically accurate (just think about it for a minute). The only reason a 'big symphonic' score seems appropriate in such cases is because that's what we're used to.

[Ilja]

Carmine Coppola (Francis Ford's father - try to say that ten times quickly) threw together quite a few pieces, many of them unsung, to create a soundtrack for Abel Gance's 1927 masterpiece Napoléon. If memory serves, Smetana's Valdstynuv Tabór was in it, and I'm still trying to identify other bits. A good example of 'lending'.

Unfortunately, Francis Ford Coppola allegedly tries to suppress newer screenings of the film because since the 1980s new material has been uncovered by its restorer (Kevin Brownlow) and Coppola Sr's score no longer 'fits' (by the largish margin of about two hours). Carl Davis, and others, have made their own scores since.

[JimL]

Of course a background score is a completely different thing than music that's supposed to be heard by the characters. And historical movie would be pretty silly if scored by music that's historically accurate (just think about it for a minute). The only reason a 'big symphonic' score seems appropriate in such cases is because that's what we're used to.

The entire problem with the score of Ladyhawke is just that.  We're used to leitmotifs, played by strings, brass, winds and percussion, not synthesizers playing music that would be more suitable in soft porn.  I'm sure the producers were trying to confound expectations, but their choice was particularly inappropriate.  I'm not sure what else they could have done to confound expectations, however, so my opinion is that they shouldn't have even bothered to try.  IIRC, critics of the film agreed.  Despite some fine work by, I believe, Rutger Hauer and Michelle Pfeiffer the film fell flat.

[mbhaub]

This past weekend I saw an utterly ridiculous, poorly made, poorly acted movie called "The Brain Eaters". It was part of a Halloween festival of film on AMC. What made it notable though was the music: Shostakovich (symphonies 1 & 5), Prokofieff (Romeo and Juliet, Alexander Nevsky). Of course, the music credit was given to someone else who I never heard of and can't remember. The movie was made about 1960. All of the music was in copyright, but apparently US producers didn't care about Soviet copyright. There wasn't a concert or anything in the film, but I found the music to be incredibly out of place: first rate, truly great music supporting an incredibly bad sci-fi film. Might be worth looking for just to play "name that tune".

[JimL]

From Wikipedia:

'The Brain Eaters is a 1958 science fiction-horror film about alien parasites who invade the small Illinois town of Riverdale and are able to take over any living thing, mind and body, by attaching themselves to their host's back and inserting two mandibles into the base of their spines. The parasites are discovered by a team of local scientists who have been studying a mysterious, three-story-tall, cone-shaped object which appears to have crashed outside the town from some place in outer space. It quickly becomes obvious that the first victims of the parasites are being deliberately directed to infect the town's leading citizens. Next in line were communication functionaries where citizens were given additional parasites so that the town can become a facilitation point for spreading further parasites across the country.

The film was directed by Bruno VeSota and stars Ed Nelson, Alan Frost, Joanna Lee, with a brief appearance by Leonard Nimoy (name misspelled in 10th place in the credits as "Leonard Nemoy").

After the film was released, it was clear that scenarist Gordon Urqhart had based his screenplay on the novel The Puppet Masters by Robert A. Heinlein. Heinlein sued for plagiarism and executive producer Roger Corman, avowing he was unfamiliar with Heinlein's work when presented with the script and during production, but could see the obvious references, settled out of court with a $5000 payment to Heinlein and an accession to Heinlein's insistence he receive no screen credit, as he found the film "wanting".'

A much more accomplished version of The Puppet Masters was recently made, starring, amongst others, Donald Sutherland.