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igor

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  1. Merkel, is that Guybrush Threepwood. Wow, that brings back old memories to me!!! Igor
  2. If the series goes on getting darker and darker (and darker) and the lighting dimmer and dimmer, I'm afraid Film #7 will have to be a radio broadcast. :roll:
  3. Actually no. I'm just half-Lebanese, half-Brazilian, I'm studying in Paris right now, and I hope I can get a scholarship or an assistantship to be able to go to MSU next year, i hope, or the year after that. And the more I think of it, the more itmakes sense to me that I must go. Igor
  4. Madadayo, yeah that was good!!
  5. Played it a year and a half ago. I could play it better now though.
  6. Who are you studying with? Yeah his Creston is my favorite, I've heard quite alot of versions of that Sonata. I've recently got that for myself.
  7. Wow, you guys made me remember all those hours I spent on Kurosawa films. Ran is a particularly dry film(which is good I think). It also reminded me of another film of his, actually one of his last, DREAMS. I don't know if it is my favorite or not by him, but it does have a special place in my heart. For some reason, everytime I have watched this film I am so touched by the end that I can't homd back from crying. Amazing, considering how restrained the movie is, from acting, to dialogue, to camera movement itself. I remember scenes where the cameera stands still for minutes as the action occurs. Impressive! Igor
  8. Aha, we have a classical saxophonist among us. Rousseau you said, QuestionMark Man, unless there is another guy who goes by the same name. I'm actually a saxophonist studying in Paris with Jean-Yves Fourmeau, and I'm trying of finding a way to come over to the States next year. I'm thinking of going to Michigan State University with Joe Lulloff, great teacher it seems. Igor
  9. Look, 'academic' writing can be showy, but just don't bash the article on that basis. Igor
  10. Do we need another one of those threads? Don't you get tired of them? I won't even bother answering the question.
  11. One more idea for those who read the article. When music walks hand in hand with the images, it does not necessarily mean that it is only emplyoing the standard cliches to punctuate what is happening at the same time. Smartly composed music can be quite ambigous itself due to its nature, escaping all encompassing descriptions, and when such good music accompanies the images, it adds another layer which resides in the realm of ideas rather than simply providing exclamation marks, to use the author's words. I am thinking on the lines of Gabriel Yared, Jerry Goldsmith, some of JNH's work, John Williams... I'm sure there are more, but these constitute a good example by themselves. I mean this is one of the reasons Star Wars is more interesting!! The downsides to this approach(according to the author) are the following: The director has less control over this process. Quoting the article, ''The audiovisual incongruity for which we should aim expresses not the psychology of a character but the attitude of the director and composer'' and then, ''Inevitably, the tension or difference between the audience’s interpretation and the director’s intentionality will express and run parallel to the tension between the incongruous audio and visual elements of the film.'' Should the director be absolute God? If the director has so much control, will the composer become a puppet, a vehicle to the ''temp-track'' provided by the director's ideas? Is the director musically competent? Do his ideas make sense in a practical way? How will he involve the composer? How much freedom will the composer have? This is not a counter argument, just a matter of concern, since I think there is a delicate balancing act involving the composer's will, that of the director, and that of the film. There is no question, in narrative scoring, when the composer is tied down to the will of those above him, the results are mostly mediocre. But in the author's defense, part of the excitement is the experiment that results from the incongruities of the counterpoint method he proposes, there is an element of RISK, and it is worth embracing. One more thing, George Lucas asking a different composer to write sad music for a scene will probably lead to banal results, sad is too vague... Another downside is a certain friction between the music and the images and the sound: Happens all the time, there are compromises to be made, and in addition to that, the composer rarely has the finished cut at his disposal, so that person might miss certain nuances. Another downside, following the previous point, is the music totally veering from the film. Another one is redundancy, the ''marching march'' or the ''joyful joy''. I think one can argue for hours whether it can work sometimes or not. In general, I think the greatest downside is that the nature of cinema is exposed. In its nature, it is not a unified art, it depends on so many different elements to come to life (unless it is simplified to the extreme by stripping it of all except ''pure images'') and the slapping of music is sometimes an extra burden. But that is what cinema is, and the result has been the production of great films. In other words, I refer to my previous post. We can easily tolerate both congrous and incongrous counterpoint as long as it leads somewhere. Well, that's enough from me. Igor
  12. Ted, I don't agree he's going nowhere, he is making a point. In general, I don't think his assumptions don't hold ground, it also depends on how they are put to practice. I mean following his method just to make a splash or just to be noticed, it will be simple kitsch in bad taste. But that is another problem, his method may become too obscure or too chaotic, he even admits that, that is what I think you might mean when you say he goes nowhere. Igor
  13. Actually, this is a very interesting article that presents a very interesting point of view on the counterpoint between images and music. It is very valid, and although as mentioned above the ideas are not original, since they come from obvious sources, from Adorno to Hegel passing through Schoenberg, the expressionist school of thought. The premise is based on dialectic synthesis, that means the presence of two seemingly incongruous (not opposing) elements leading to a certain unexpected synthesis. The main weaknesses I can discern while reading through it once are a certain intolerance for other 'conventions' even though some of those he mentions are trully superficial and annoying, a certain ignorance of Williams, and a tendency to use random examples to back his point, some of them very weak. For the first, well it may be unavoidable since he is defending his school of thought, but it sometimes is unnecessary to pursue: for example, Amadeus could have been interesting if scored with Stravinsky. Yes it would show the director's point of view, be more individualistic, less redundant, less psychological and more sociological etc... But that is simply not the goal of the movie. I don't know if this is for the better or the worse, but I know it is pointless. As for the second point, I mean he barely attacks Williams himself, but instead groups everything connected to modern film music under an umbrella carrying his name, supposing that all that Williams writes is transparent music that runs parallalel to the action on the screen. Well he does a lot of that, but he does it well, but at the same time, that is not all he does. I mean, is it wrong to suggest? And last of all, there are few examples that support his thesis, and that is because mainstream commercial movies cannot go for that school of thought. But that is not a testament of the futility of his argument, rather an outlook on all the uncharted waters we still have to discover!! In all it is a good article, but it needs to poisition itself against something to find a place and garner attention since it is in the minority (at least in cinema as an art form), hence the title. 'Living With Williams' just wouldn't work. Igor
  14. I personally think that both music and film work together in both cases.
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