CONGRATS TO "THE ARTIST"

[audreyforever]

I recently finished watching the Golden Globes, and am very proud to be a classic movie lover tonight, considering that The Artist took home the award for Best Musical/Comedy. It is my hope that this film will send shock waves through Hollywood and will do well at the Academy Awards in a little over a month. Hopefully people will begin to see the true brilliance and authenticity in this Silent Movie and more eager directors will decide to make movies reflecting those of Hollywood's Golden Age.

[gagman66]

This is big news! Hopefully with the success of THE ARTIST and HUGO it will get more people into Silent films who have overlooked them. And just as importantly get more of the long awaited major titles on DVD and Blu-ray such as THE BIG PARADE, and the 1926 BEAU GESTE with Ronald Colman.

 

Say, what is the hold up Warner's? Paramount is finally releasing WINGS next week. Now where are THE BIG PARADE, A WOMAN OF AFFAIRS, OLD HEIDELBERG, ANNIE LAURIE, THE CROWD, THE WIND, and SHOW PEOPLE, Etc. Not to mention THE SEA BEAST, THE PATENT LEATHER KID, and LILAC TIME. I have waited 8 years to see the 2004 restoration of THE BIG PARADE debut on TCM or on DVD, and now Blu-ray.

[Sprocket_Man]

Had WINGS (the newly restored print I'm seeing at paramount on Thursday) not been a Best Picture winner (or even the first Best Picture winner), do you honestly believe it would be headed for Blu-ray?

 

The films you name may be worthy of release on disc, but that's only one the basis of artistic and creative merit, whereas the only merit the studios consider woorth the effort is economic.

 

Still, kudos to Paramount for having a high enough regard for the company's history to be willing to take something of an economic bath on the project. I guess there's a point where the embarassment of not doing it outweighs the financial losses they'll take (had the studio a channel like TCM, whose voracious need to be fed hundreds of films a month, requiring Warner's to invest in ongoing restoration of their films, including silents, Paramount might have done it, anyway, but this is obviously a special case).

[audreyforever]

Oh yes I had forgot about Hugo! That looks very interesting, and you know Scorcese...it can't be a bad film!

[phroso]

 

I think I actually like *HUGO* even more than *THE ARTIST.* (Maybe because my expectations were lower.)

 

 

 

 

 

[audreyforever]

Quick Question: Why was the love theme from Vertigo used in that one sequence in The Artist ? I don't have too much against that, but was there a specific reason other than shining light on people like Hitchcock and Hermann?

[gagman66]

Here is the full story from my good friend Christine Letux in Paris:

 

 

 

 

Regarding the quote of Herrmann's Vertigo, I can shed a little light about it. This is a quote from Film Score Monthly:

 

"One such losing battle was the cue “My Suicide,” written to accompany the climax of the film in which George hits rock bottom. The final cut of the film was finished three weeks prior to the last recording date during the first week of April, as Bource was still trying to finish the cue. But “because the priority was to finish everything for Cannes [in May|http://forums.tcm.com/], Michel needed to present [the finished film|http://forums.tcm.com/] to the producers as soon as possible to reassure them of a project difficult to sell without music.” The climactic scene had been temped with Herrmann’s love theme from Vertigo for three months, “and every composer knows what that means,” says Bource. “Generally, you are condemned.” Vertigo remains in the final cut of the film, but Bource insists “Michel didn’t replace ‘My Suicide’ with Herrmann’s love theme. When the DVD comes out, you can put my music on that sequence.” Bource completed the cue on Hazanavicius’ birthday and dedicated it to him, “but we didn’t speak to each other during the last month. Why? Everything is in the title,” he adds, winking."

 

 

http://annhardingstreasures.blogspot.com/

 

 

 

[lzcutter]

> Quick Question: Why was the love theme from Vertigo used in that one sequence in The Artist ? I don't have too much against that, but was there a specific reason other than shining light on people like Hitchcock and Hermann?

 

A common procedure in films is to score the film with a temp score while the real score is being written. The love theme was used in this instance as part of the temp score for *The Artist*

 

From the composer of the score:

 

One such losing battle was the cue 'My Suicide', written to accompany the climax of the film in which George hits rock bottom. The final cut of the film was finished three weeks prior to the last recording date during the first week of April, as Bource was still trying to finish the cue.

 

"But because the priority was to finish everything for Cannes (in May), Michel needed to present (the finished film) to the producers as soon as possible to reassure them of a project difficult to sell without music". The climactic scene had been temped with Herrmann's love theme from Vertigo for three months, "and every composer knows what that means," says Bource. "Generally, you are condemned."

 

"Vertigo remains in the final cut of the film, but Bource insists Michel didn't replace 'My Suicide' with Herrmann's love theme. When the DVD comes out, you can put my music on that sequence. Bource completed the cue on Hazanavicius birthday and dedicated it to him, "but we didn't speak to each other during the last month. Why? Everything is in the title," he adds, winking.

[LonesomePolecat]

I too was glad to see The Artist winning Best Picture and hope this is an Oscar prediction. Best film I saw all year. Glad that it won best actor, too, because that's just the kind of acting that's hard to do but often goes unrecognized.

[audreyforever]

BAFTA Nominations came out today--- The Artist gets 12! The most of any movie this year