The Sound of Music

The Sound of Music (released March 2, 1965)

Directed by: Robert Wise

Starring: Julie Andrews, Christopher Plummer,

Produced by: Robert Wise

Written by: Ernest Lehmen, Based on the libretto by Howard Lindsay and the autobiography by Maria von Trapp

Music by: Richard Rodgers (music/lyrics), Oscar Hammerstein II (lyrics), Irwin Kostal (musical score)

Cinematography by: Ted D. McCord

Distributed by: 20th Century Fox

Ten Things about The Sound of Music

When you have such an intimate relationship with a movie as I have with The Sound of Music, you would find it impossible to remove yourself enough to write a critical essay about it. So I won’t even attempt it. Here are 10 things about the movie that I can relate to you that have occurred to me over the years.

The Von Trapp children in their straight jackets

1. I first saw this movie on the television in my grandmother’s room. She lived with us when I was a kid, and it was on TV one Saturday evening. I remember it being hyped as a big event. This was in the days before cable really had a grip on America, and movies weren’t cycled through the American psyche like fabric softener. I remember being enchanted with the movie immediately. I was probably 6 at the time. Naturally, I wanted to be Marta. (Gretl was younger than me at the time, and I thought Marta was prettier anyway.) The thing I remember though, was that same night my father was watching Caddyshack in the living room. We had just gotten Showtime (our one cable station!) and I was forbidden to go in there while he was watching it. I remember hearing him howl with laughter. And even though I was totally engrossed with The Sound of Music, there was a tiny little part of the back of brain that wondered what verboten things I was missing. I found out later: not much.

My favorite dress of Liesl's.

2. I love the color and texture of fabrics used in this movie, and not just in the costumes. Of course, the costumes were wonderful – very subtle pastels were used for Maria and the children. Lovely plums, charcoals and moss greens for Captain vonTrapp, and brighter, more vibrant colors for Baroness Schrader. And there is a lot of softness to the fabrics of the clothing – velvets, satins, and chiffon are used quite a bit. For instance, in the scene where all the children are scared of the thunderstorm, I remember wishing I could dive into the softness of Maria’s comforters – spiders be damned. I also love the dress Liesl wears in the scene whereshe sings “Edelweiss” with her father. A lovely spring green with eyelet sleeves and collar and beautiful periwinkle flowers embroidered on it.

3. When I was a kid, I though Rolfe was super cute. I suppose he still is. I’ve always liked the blondies. Too bad about the Nazi thing.

My taste was eclectic even as a six-year-old.

4. When I had my first record player, my mother let me listen to her original soundtrack on vinyl. And I did. Over and over. I used to alternate between that and Disney’s Mickey Mouse Disco. (Anyone remember “Macho Duck?”) I have heard of these singalongs they have at the Hollywood Bowl. If I could fully embrace my geekdom I would be all over it.

5. In the scene where Maria and Captain von Trapp finally get together, I always giggle. It was a slow moving part of the movie for me when I was a kid, and my brain wandered. There is a part when the two are standing in the gazebo, singing “Something Good,” and they are standing together in a silhouette. At the very end of the song, Captain von Trapp kisses Maria, and in the shadows his profile looks like a gorilla. You’ll have to watch it yourself to see. But there he is: Gorilla von Trapp. Kosta positively howled with glee when I paused the DVD to point that out.

6. I remember being in college and brining up a reference to the movie in a conversation with a guy and he made fun of me for liking the movie. I was stunned. Not for being made fun of, but because there were people out there who didn’t love this movie. It never occurred to me that it wasn’t a natural, intrinsic part of every American kid’s childhood like Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and The Wizard of Oz.

She's smiling now, but watch the fists, sisters.

7. I always thought it was really mean that the nuns sang, “How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?” at Maria and Georg’s wedding. Seriously, if someone called me a flibbertigibbet and a clown on my wedding day, I’d slap them silly. I don’t care if you are a nun.

8. I noticed something new when I watched it this time: when Maria returns to the Von Trapp family after the Reverend Mother tells her to “Climb Every Mountain,” she is wearing the outfit that the new postulant is wearing in the scene before. I never thought about that before. Earlier in the film when Maria first comes to the Von Trapp household, Captain Von Trapp tells her she must have some new dresses because the one she has one won’t do. She explains that when they enter the convent, they give all their clothes and worldly possessions to the poor. And he asks about the dress she has on, and she says, “… the poor didn’t want this one.” So you see, they keep the continuity by putting the newly donated green dress of the postulant right back on Maria to return to the Von Trapps’ in style. Forgive me, I notice stupid little things like that.

Maria returns from the abbey in a recycled dress
that fits awfully well.

9. For most of my life, I have watched this movie when it was on television. In fact, that was the way I saw it for the first time. And they edited it for TV, you know. So when I see the movie in its uncut entirety it is like a present – there are all these little bonus scenes put in, and most of them are funny! Like the one where Maria tells the Reverend Mother that Sister Bertha always makes her kiss the floor when they have a disagreement, so she has taken to kissing the floor when she sees her coming just to save time. Also, there are several scenes that I thought were important to setting the political mood of the movie. There is an earlier scene between Max and Captain Von Trapp that is cut out where the Captain gives Max a good tongue lashing for not being strong enough in his convictions against the Anschluss. I think cutting scenes like these makes the movie lose some of its tension. (And let’s face it, there isn’t much to begin with!)

that.

Not bad for the fruition of one's work, eh?

10. Today I was struck by how the writers (of the screenplay and the music) must have felt to watch this movie for the first time. What an amazing set of goose bumps they must have gotten hearing Julie Andrews belt out that opening song. Good Lord, what a set of pipes that woman has. My husband and I have been working with a partner to write for a potential kids cooking show, and there has been some interest. And I don’t want to jinx it, so that’s all I’m going to say about it save this: I too, think about what it would be like to see my words said by actors on a screen, no matter what size. Just to know that the creative work that came out of your brain is actually entertaining people is a big part of what keeps me working at it.

~Anna

Achtung - You vill like this movie!

My wife’s eyes glittered with delight after she reached her hand the box which contains all the movie titles on little slips that we select once-a-week. From her enchanted expression I could only surmise she had randomly picked something close to her heart.

She did.

The Sound of Music remains one of her “favorite things” and so she was overjoyed to share the picture with me again. I had actually watched it for the first time in my life after her repeated insistence that we do so last year some time. I must admit it was not as odious a chore I initially thought it would be. Rogers & Hammerstein’s music needed to grow on me a little more, and happily it has.

You wouldn't know it, but there's a 70 piece
orchestra hiding under the bed.

I must first confess that I do not go running to the theater to catch every musical produced. There is something inherently weird about characters in film breaking out into song with an accompanied 70-piece orchestra hiding somewhere behind the hay bales or china cabinet, but I guess to truly enjoy such things one must be willing to suspend one’s reality just enough to understand (if done right) the music flows naturally from the story line and helps develop the characters. So much for my humble take on matters I know little about.

While waiting to warm up to the music, I certainly had no problem feasting my eyes on the landscape.Austria and the Alps being Austria and the Alps, this was not a very difficult thing to establish on film – a visualmedia. And in adroitly marrying the breathtaking scenery with Julie Andrews’ opening number, the creators made it a sure bet that they had a winning picture on their hands. I believe this movie attains its status in no small part because the lush backgrounds are so perfectly in sync with the music.

Rolfe: the Nazi menace.

While taking several liberties about the von Trapp family story, The Sound of Music did convey a fin de siècle sense of the Austrian Empire, though in truth it had ended well before the events portrayed in the movie. The oncoming Nazi menace was also handled well, hovering as it did in the background (for instance, in guise of the character, Rolfe) and waiting to strike.

The von Trapp children come across at times as a little too cutesy for my taste, but then this is considered a family movie and it was planned and written and in the earlier part of the sixties, before that decade went culturally out-of-control.

The music, as I said, is beginning to grow on me and I can certainly hear some of the tunes in my head now as I type this. I am not wowed by all the songs and that is probably a sacrilegious thing to say to SOM fans, but there you go.

I did enjoy the background scenery at the beginning of the “Do-Re-Mi” number as it was shot across the Salzach Valley with the Castle Hohenwerfen prominently displayed. Three years later, that same castle would end up in a much more sinister guise. It would become the Schloss Adler, the central set-piece for the war picture, Where Eagles Dare.

If I had to pick a song in the show that stayed with me it would have to be “Edelweiss”. Simple and charming, its lingering effects on one’s musical memory are natural. But I guess that’s what makes classical musicals so classic. Sadly, another tune runs through my head unaccountably from time to time, and seemingly out of nowhere, the lyrics: “High on a hill was a lonely goatherd….” will make its uncomfortable presence felt. Damn you, The Sound of Music!

Oh-da-lay-hee-hoo!

--kak

Up Next: Gladiator (2000)

Mrs. Miniver

Mrs. Miniver (released June 4, 1942)
Directed by: William Wyler
Starring: Greer Garson, Walter Pidgeon, Teresa Wright, Dame May Whitty, Reginald Owen, Henry Travers, Richard Ney, Henry Wilcoxon
Produced by: Sidney Franklin
Written by: Jan Struther (book), George Froeschel, James Hilton, Claudine West, Arthur Wimperis
Music by: Herbert Stothart
Cinematography by: Joseph Ruttenberg
Distributed by: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

K.I.S.H.

Keep it Simple, Hollywood

I really like old movies. There is something straightforward about them: what you see is what you get. Today’s moviegoer is too sophisticated for his or her own good.  They expect fancy plot compositions, bigger and better special effects, and unexpected plot twists. And it is getting harder and harder to fool the audience.  Pulp Fiction, Memento, The Crying Game, The Sixth Sense, The Matrix, all of these have set the bar in Hollywood for the next generation. But let’s rewind for a minute and focus on a time when we didn’t have to try to dupe the audience with a lot of cleverness.

Mrs. Miniver was the Best Picture winner for 1942, and the United States was poised to enter World War II in Europe. I know my husband is going to talk all about the war, because that’s his thing, so I’ll leave him to that. What I want to focus on is the story itself: about a family trying to hang together through an extremely difficult time.  The Miniver family lives on the Thames on the outskirts of London, in what they dub a “middle class household.” Oh please, if that is middle class, then I grew up poor white trash. The house was huge, they had 2 servants, for crying out loud. The Miniver family consisted of Mr. Miniver (Walter Pidgeon), Mrs. Miniver (Greer Garson), adult son Vincent (Richard Ney), and young children Judy (Clare Sandars), and Toby (Christopher Severn).  I found out from my husband after we watched the film that Greer Garson actually married Richard Ney, her onscreen son after this film. He was only 11 years her junior, but the marriage didn’t last long. Apparently he was abusive and made some disparaging remarks about her age in public. Jackass. On the bright side it ruined his career.

This movie was also adapted from a book, although it was not from a true novel. The author, Jan Struther, originally wrote about Mrs. Miniver in a newspaper column.  These columns were based largely on her own life, and became wildly successful in the face of World War II. When they were collected and published, they became popular in the United States as well, and Struther actually did a book tour after the book’s release. Both Churchill and FDR credit the movie as being the tipping point of American sympathy and our hastening to go to war in Europe.  And they didn’t even have to show any blood.

And even while the movie didn’t have a tightly written plot, I still enjoyed watching it.  It was almost like watching a series of newspaper articles – little vignettes woven together to create a greater picture, and that was satisfying. Over these smaller stories looms the threat of war, which is woven in several places: Vin enlists with the RAF, Mr. Miniver runs his boat back and forth across the channel saving soldiers from Dunkirk, and of course, the family eventually must take to their air-raid shelter at night as the Battle of Britain roars overhead. After hearing what falling bombs actually sound like, I now understand why my uncle never went to the fireworks on the 4^th of July – they are eerily similar.

I haven’t mentioned the main love story of the film yet. It is between young Vincent (Vin) Miniver and Carol Beldon, who is the daughter of Lady Beldon, of Beldon Manor. They of course hate each other at first, but fall in love, and when Vin enlists in the RAF, you just know that he is going to die. Hmmm, I guess old movies do have plot twists after all! Anyway, the most interesting thing is that I found Carol (played by Teresa Wright), bears a striking resemblance to Ellen Page, star of Juno, and the recently released, Whip It.  What do you think? You really have to see her talk and see her facial expressions mannerisms to get the full effect, but I think some of it comes through in the pictures.

And finally, a word on the vile demon child TOBY! How did they find the ugliest child on earth and why would they immortalize him on film? I think he must be the spawn of a human woman and one of those flying monkeys from The Wizard of Oz. Ugly little thing, and a total spaz to boot.

~Anna

“MRS. MINIVER”

BOMBS AND ROSES

William Wyler and the folks at MGM did not for a minute even try to hide the fact that with the United States now at war (the Battle of Midway and this film opened on the same day) the American people needed some good solid propaganda to get them in the mood to concurrently face Hitler and the Japanese warlords. The U.S.’s direct involvement in the European war was still several months away (Operation Torch – The Invasion of North Africa, Nov ’42) but in the meantime an uplifting film featuring the long-suffering English, hunkering down and taking whatever the evil Hun could dish out at them was perfect fodder for Hollywood. In fact, Hollywood was handed a plum (or a rose?) as they bought the rights from authoress Jan Struther, who created the fictional character of Mrs. Miniver who first appeared in a newspaper series dating back to 1937.

Amid the bucolic scenes of English country life (reminiscent to me of the shots in Alfred Hitchcock’s Suspicion) we meet the Minivers, your typical mid-level British family who slowly come to realize the maelstrom of world events is about to come crashing down atop their beautiful country home, “Starlings” located somewhere outside of London with the peaceful meandering Thames in their backyard. However, before the calamitous event takes place, we are made privy to another war in smaller scale taking place in the Miniver home. Vincent – Vin (played by Richard Ney), their oldest child of three has just returned from Oxford where his head is stuffed with ideas about the odious class divisions in English society. He has it out with a neighbor’s daughter, Carol Beldon (Theresa Wright) a member of the upper class he so despises but in true Hollywood fashion, as the film plays out, falls head-over-heels for her.

There is another subplot brewing in the form of an annual flower competition held in the village whose first prize for most beautiful rose is taken every year by Carol’s aristocratic grandmother, Lady Beldon (May Whitty). It is a forgone conclusion that she will win it this year again just because she is landed gentry and wins it every year, but the introduction of an outstanding rose, grown by the village stationmaster and church bell-ringer, James Ballard (Henry Travers) adds to the complications as he has decided to enter it in the competition. In the film’s first scene, we see him offering to name the flower after Mrs. Miniver (Greer Garson). It is the perfect allegory as Kay Miniver is offered up to audiences as the quintessential English lady: beautiful, sophisticated, charming, reserved and levelheaded. She is everyman’s ideal of what a proper woman and mother should be. (Her one fault I will elucidate on later.) And what flower most represents the English than that of the rose?

Beneath all this polite melodrama is the running theme of class division in England and how world events – i.e., the War, was swiftly breaking down hundreds of years of aristocratic/commoner partition. I suppose when you’re hunkering down in a foxhole, there are no atheists, nor for that fact, lords or ladies. Everyone’s in it together. I am not sure how much of this class division in England was known to American audiences at the time, but if Hollywood filmmakers could make people of the U.S. understand what challenges the English were facing at the time, it would possibly be conceived as a sympathetic and good thing.

As far as the legendary British “stiff upper lip” attitude goes, the film does an admirable job highlighting that trait. Kay Miniver’s quiet disarming of a Luftwaffe pilot who was shot down and forced himself into her house at Lugar-point to steal some bread and clothes was supposed to show your prototypical English courage.

I similarly enjoyed the fantasy featuring her husband Clem Miniver, played by Walter Pigeon (with a distinct lack of a British accent) as he calmly(!) evaluates the damage done to his partially bombed-out house while puffing on his pipe and murmuring asides to himself. Yes, this movie is a total flight of the imagination, but one must see it in the context of its times. The British had to be shown to be courageous and enduring and holding the line against the Germans until the Arsenal of Democracy could arrive. Winston Churchill had glowing things to say about this film precisely because he understood the power of its message.

Even though you know this film is aiming directly for your heart, one marvels at the power of the finale at the flower competition when Lady Beldon unselfishly gives away her first place award and bestows the top prize to the Miniver Rose instead. Even more emotional is the scene where she awards herself second prize and the crowd stands and gives her a rousing ovation. It is a scene that is certain to create a lump in your throat. Soon after though, the real tear-jerking begins and leads way to the uplifting conclusion with the vicar’s powerful sermon ringing in our ears. Given the times, I can easily see why the Academy swooned over this picture.

Finally, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the creepy little kid, Toby. The youngest of the Miniver clan, this strange little character blurts out all sorts of disturbing lines and looks rather half-crazed with his wild, staring eyes and unkempt hair. I enjoyed making fun of him throughout the film. Sorry, it’s the ne’er-do-well in me, and I found it odd that Mr. & Mrs. Miniver, in all other aspects a perfect screen couple, allows this unpleasant little tyke to act up the way he did without any hint of chastisement.

One last thought: the title is something of an enigma to me. Does it refer to the title character, or perhaps the flower that was named after her?

--kak

Up next: The French Connection (1971)