Jim Asher's Blog - Posts Tagged "benjamin-britten"
The Now & Here of Freedom
My daughter was pleased and perhaps a bit surprised when I told her that I enjoyed Wes Anderson’s blend of realism and fantasy in his new movie Moonrise Kingdom. She knows that I’m not a huge fan of Anderson’s work. As a matter of fact, his The Royal Tenebaums is one of the few films my wife and I walked out on.
Moonrise Kingdom is a magical tale of romance between skilled scout Sam Shakusky and misunderstood romantic Suzy Bishop. When the two run away together on the island of New Penzance, Suzy’s parents, the island’s sole police officer, and Troop 55 of Camp Ivanhoe set out to find (rescue?) the two.
Since I’ve always had a (mostly negative) mix of reactions to Anderson’s works, I wondered what critics had to say about his latest work, so last night I read a number of recent reviews. I wasn’t surprised that many critics declared this to be Anderson’s best film to date. However, I was very surprised to find that very few of the reviewers even mentioned the interplay with and the importance of music in the movie, particularly with the movie’s theme, Benjamin Britten’s The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra.
Britten begins his work with the entire orchestra playing a theme by Henry Purcell and then has the various instrumental groups of the orchestra play variations on this theme. Once the opening theme has been played by the percussion section, Britten deconstructs the entire orchestra. He has individual or small mixes of instruments play variations on a new theme. Finally, he rebuilds the entire group with a lively fugue which ends with the full orchestra in a dramatic mix of the fugue and the opening Purcell theme. This is exactly what Anderson does with his characters on New Penzance: lives are deconstructed and then re-assembled in a climax where universes comingle and collide.
In some ways the contrapuntal nature of Anderson’s Moonrise Kingdom and Britten’s Young Person’s Guide reminded me of one of my all-time favorite movies, Robert Altman’s Nashville. Certainly, Altman’s opus focused on a much more complex fugue, but it too swelled to a clash of universes in a hyperbolic climax. In each of their works, Anderson, Altman and Britten emphatically express a universal truth of synthesis and synergy, that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
Paradoxically, though, these same works also convey the prominence and magnitude of the distinct individual. Aren’t we each at the center of our own personal universe or kingdom as we comingle and collide on a daily basis with the universes/kingdoms of others? I know that I am at the center of my universe, and the “here and now” belongs solely to me and me alone. This solipsistic concept, reflected by the idiosyncratic characters of Anderson’s Moonrise Kingdom, reminded me of a poem by E. E. Cummings (where the “here and now” is proclaimed to be the “now and here of freedom”) :
let’s,from some loud unworld’s most rightful wrong
climbing,my love(till mountains speak the truth)
enter a cloverish silence of thrushsong
(and more than every miracle’s to breathe)
wounded us will becauseless ultimate
earth accept and primeval whyless sky;
healing our by immeasurable night
spirits and with illimitable day
(shrived of that nonexistence millions call
life,you and i may reverently share
the blessed eachness of all beautiful
selves wholly which and innocently are)
seeming’s enough for slaves of space and time
—ours is the now and here of freedom. Come
Of course, since I enjoyed Moonrise Kingdom, my daughter thinks that it’s time I take a second look at Anderson’s The Royal Tennenbaums – and maybe I will – once she agrees to take another look at my favorite, Robert Altman’s Nashville.
Note: There was one more bit of genius with music in Moonlight Kingdom, and I’ll talk about that in my next entry.
Moonrise Kingdom is a magical tale of romance between skilled scout Sam Shakusky and misunderstood romantic Suzy Bishop. When the two run away together on the island of New Penzance, Suzy’s parents, the island’s sole police officer, and Troop 55 of Camp Ivanhoe set out to find (rescue?) the two.
Since I’ve always had a (mostly negative) mix of reactions to Anderson’s works, I wondered what critics had to say about his latest work, so last night I read a number of recent reviews. I wasn’t surprised that many critics declared this to be Anderson’s best film to date. However, I was very surprised to find that very few of the reviewers even mentioned the interplay with and the importance of music in the movie, particularly with the movie’s theme, Benjamin Britten’s The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra.
Britten begins his work with the entire orchestra playing a theme by Henry Purcell and then has the various instrumental groups of the orchestra play variations on this theme. Once the opening theme has been played by the percussion section, Britten deconstructs the entire orchestra. He has individual or small mixes of instruments play variations on a new theme. Finally, he rebuilds the entire group with a lively fugue which ends with the full orchestra in a dramatic mix of the fugue and the opening Purcell theme. This is exactly what Anderson does with his characters on New Penzance: lives are deconstructed and then re-assembled in a climax where universes comingle and collide.
In some ways the contrapuntal nature of Anderson’s Moonrise Kingdom and Britten’s Young Person’s Guide reminded me of one of my all-time favorite movies, Robert Altman’s Nashville. Certainly, Altman’s opus focused on a much more complex fugue, but it too swelled to a clash of universes in a hyperbolic climax. In each of their works, Anderson, Altman and Britten emphatically express a universal truth of synthesis and synergy, that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
Paradoxically, though, these same works also convey the prominence and magnitude of the distinct individual. Aren’t we each at the center of our own personal universe or kingdom as we comingle and collide on a daily basis with the universes/kingdoms of others? I know that I am at the center of my universe, and the “here and now” belongs solely to me and me alone. This solipsistic concept, reflected by the idiosyncratic characters of Anderson’s Moonrise Kingdom, reminded me of a poem by E. E. Cummings (where the “here and now” is proclaimed to be the “now and here of freedom”) :
let’s,from some loud unworld’s most rightful wrong
climbing,my love(till mountains speak the truth)
enter a cloverish silence of thrushsong
(and more than every miracle’s to breathe)
wounded us will becauseless ultimate
earth accept and primeval whyless sky;
healing our by immeasurable night
spirits and with illimitable day
(shrived of that nonexistence millions call
life,you and i may reverently share
the blessed eachness of all beautiful
selves wholly which and innocently are)
seeming’s enough for slaves of space and time
—ours is the now and here of freedom. Come
Of course, since I enjoyed Moonrise Kingdom, my daughter thinks that it’s time I take a second look at Anderson’s The Royal Tennenbaums – and maybe I will – once she agrees to take another look at my favorite, Robert Altman’s Nashville.
Note: There was one more bit of genius with music in Moonlight Kingdom, and I’ll talk about that in my next entry.
