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What's the last documentary you watched?


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Just finished the Hans Zimmer - Hollywood Rebel documentary. Main takeaways:

 

  • Hans has the best samples, according to Nolan.
  • He was an absent father who worked all the time.
  • Life isn't as long as you think it is. You can live a playful life or you can live a life that excludes playfulness, and it doesn't get you anywhere. Playfulness gets you somewhere. Did Hans just share the meaning of life?
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Haven't seen the Zimmer doc, but I do think more docs about film composers are a great idea. 

 

As long as the interviews are actually interesting and not, you know, just ass-kissing - which is unfortunately is what I think a JW documentary would be. 

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The only one I've watched is the Ennio Morricone one, which is absolutely terrific and highly recommended whether you're particularly a fan or not.

On 03/06/2023 at 10:18 PM, Edmilson said:

Haven't seen the Zimmer doc, but I do think more docs about film composers are a great idea. 

 

As long as the interviews are actually interesting and not, you know, just ass-kissing - which is unfortunately is what I think a JW documentary would be. 

I do think you might be right on the JW documentary, I'm not sure it'll give us masses of insight. With the Ennio one, I learned lots about him as well as go to enjoy bits of all those marvellous scores. I'm not saying it was a no holds barred expose (I don't want that either!) but dug deep enough to feel valuable.

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We need something like a BBC HardTalk but for John Williams:

 

 

"Mr. Williams, would you like to apologize to the Holst estate for lifting the ending chords from Mars?"

"Do you think it's acceptable for film composers to steal from other composers as widely as you have done?"

And probably the hardest of all...

"How much music exactly did William Ross contribute to Chamber of Secrets?"

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2 minutes ago, Loert said:

We need something like a BBC HardTalk but for John Williams:

 

 

"Mr. Williams, would you like to apologize to the Holst estate for lifting the ending chords from Mars?"

"Do you think it's acceptable for film composers to steal from other composers as widely as you have done?"

And probably the hardest of all...

"How much music exactly did William Ross contribute to Chamber of Secrets?"

 

He'd brush of any critical question with anecdotes about cookies and dead composers.

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While I love the fact that NRK (the main Norwegian broadcaster) screened the "Hollywood Rebel" documentary two nights ago, I already saw it when it premiered on BBC a few months back. It's OK, but for a hardcore fan like myself, it mostly flirts with the subject; kinda superficial, neglecting to go much into his glorious work in the late 80s and 90s. But I suppose that is true for all film music documentaries airing on mainstream media. There's rarely much for the fan.

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At the overall documentry "Score" a few years ago Hans Zimmer almost seemed upset talking about Williams' "Jaws" score "Everybody says it's just two notes. It isn't just two notes. It is a sophisticated symphonical composition." Watching that, I thought, he wanted to make Williams a compliment.

 

But after watching the "Hollywood Rebel" I think, Zimmer himself wrote some themes with just two notes like the Joker theme from Dark Knight and probably he just wanted to point out "That is how you really write a two note theme!"

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Or he's saying JW is a genius for writing a two-note theme, therefore he also has to be a genius. I had to smile when one of his collaborators talks about him trying to write a one-note theme for the Joker. :)

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1 minute ago, Jurassic Shark said:

Or he's saying JW is a genius for writing a two-note theme, therefore he also has to be a genius. I had to smile when one of his collaborators talk about him trying to wrote a one-note theme for the Joker. :)

The guy who scored The Birds did one better! 

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6 hours ago, Loert said:

"Mr. Williams, would you like to apologize to the Holst estate for lifting the ending chords from Mars?"

"Do you think it's acceptable for film composers to steal from other composers as widely as you have done?"

And probably the hardest of all...

"How much music exactly did William Ross contribute to Chamber of Secrets?"

 

"Were they really *all* dead?"

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  • 1 month later...

I saw the 1976 IMAX documentary, Flight.  It started off so corny but ended up being really good.  It begins with a silly scene of an over the top hot air balloon pilot but ends with very good pre Star Wars special effects of planetary exploration.  This was probably mind blowing to 1976 audiences.  

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  • 4 weeks later...

I think the last documentary I watched was Tim's Vermeer, which was pretty interesting!

 

 

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22 hours ago, Naïve Old Fart said:

Any good? :)

 

Boring* and interesting at the same time.

 

 

 

 

 

* rehearsal, rehearsal, rehearsal, ...

 

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I really want to see this, but three things put me off:

1/ I dislike LET IT BE with a passion.

2/ I'm not sure if I could sit through all the minutae of a band fiddling around. I'd rather hear the finished product.

3/ Yoko Ono.

 

Still, it's probably worth it, just for the rooftop concert.

I'll buy it, eventually.

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  • 2 months later...
  • 1 month later...

I'm currently watching the documentary 'The Andy Warhol Diaries' on Netflix in the hope of learning a bit more about Andy Warhol... a figure I've always found strange and highly overrated... and I still believe that. The guy made paintings with a soup can and a photocopy of Marilyn Monroe, then 'industrialized' his work because every big star of the time wanted 'their' painting done by Andy Warhol. I think he made a mockery of everyone. I wasn't a fan, and I'm not becoming one.

 

But well, some things are interesting, although, for me, there will always be an aura of discomfort surrounding this character, who was a great social misfit, almost an extraterrestrial, and who was praised by a certain New York establishment, although I still don't know why. He wasn't someone who championed a social cause, nor was he a role model or a hero; he was rather 'ordinary' at his core and not particularly adept at being happy. Ultimately, Andy Warhol marketed himself as a product, and his art remains a compelling reflection of the widespread cultural unease and disillusionment prevalent during a troubled era—specifically, the tumultuous 1960s and 1970s—an experience I personally didn't live through due to my younger age.

 

Not for everyone.

 

image.jpeg

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