movies from redbox

I've decided in future to rent my newly-released DVDs from Redbox. I like their rental system more than Blockbuster or Netflix, and if you don't see a lot of films they're cheaper than either. The only disadvantage is that they only keep new films for a fairly short period, but once they're old enough to be out of that system I can probably find them in one of the local public libraries, of which we have a plethora.

I've caught up by watching four recent movies.

The Ghost Writer. This is a thriller, which means that the surprise ending, in order to keep it a surprise until it's revealed, doesn't really make any sense in terms of anything that's happened earlier. But that's OK, because the movie is directed with such skill and cold suspense. True, that director, Roman Polanski, The Worst Person In The World, might make a couple pennies off the dollar I spent renting this. But I figure it's worth it because another couple pennies might go to its star, Pierce Brosnan. In an interview when the film was released, Brosnan, referring to the fact that Polanski finished the post-production under incarceration, said of the movie and the director, "It's in the can; he's in the can." A joke like that is worth a reasonable tip, don't you think?

The Young Victoria. I know too much about this period. Gorgeous sets and costumes, and a generalized fidelity to events, didn't save it from clanging anachronisms all the way through, starting with Victoria walking into a room and saying "hello," and a more specific confusion about events. (Anyone using this movie to learn about the Bedchamber Crisis is going to be very confused.) To remind myself of what the cheerful young Victoria would turn into, I followed it with a library rental of the older film Mrs. Brown. Of which my chief reaction was an explosion of indignity when a title card reading "1866" was followed by a scene of Disraeli addressing the House of Commons as Prime Minister. Disraeli didn't become Prime Minister until 1868! Bah.

Me and Orson Welles. Where did the improbably self-confident young man who is the center of this story come from? He just sort of pops up out of nowhere. But at least he manages to juggle two girlfriends without coming across as a total jerk. No, the total jerk in this movie is Orson Welles, whom everybody assures themselves is a genius, because that's the only way they can tolerate his behaving like an egocentric slimeball. The genius is not apparent; the other part is. As I much preferred the take on Diego Rivera in Cradle Will Rock over that of Frida, I also preferred Cradle Will Rock's version of Welles, who there is at least brilliantly eccentric and amusingly fallible. Here, our hero lasts a week with Welles's stage company; it's surprising that it's that long.

A Single Man. Another movie with an improbably self-confident young man who pops up out of nowhere. This is a film with an absolutely clear and straightforward message about the meaning of life, and that message is: You live for a while, and then you die. That's it. None of the rage or despair of Philadelphia, it's just bleak. Should appeal to fans of Mad Men if it's not too coherent for them.

in search of the wild encore

Perhaps the most challenging part of writing classical music reviews professionally is identifying encores. A good professional review should do that whenever possible. Sometimes they're announced from the stage; sometimes not. Sometimes you can make out what the performer is saying; sometimes not. Sometimes you already know the piece; sometimes not. If not, it helps to have good reference sources and to be able to keep the piece firmly in mind until you can consult them.

I'm not always the best contestant at "name that tune." Once I reviewed a visiting orchestra which played two encores. I recognized both pieces, but couldn't remember which ones they were, and I couldn't get back to my record collection easily. I ended up calling the host orchestra's publicity department and asking them, and boy did I feel stupid when they told me.

Other times research is triumphant. Once a string quartet said they were playing a scherzo by Arriaga. I'd certainly heard of Arriaga, but I didn't know his quartets, yet I didn't feel my review would be complete unless I identified which quartet it came from. The next morning I checked that a local library had a CD of his three quartets, so I rushed over and checked it out to listen to the scherzi. It wasn't the First Quartet. It wasn't the Second. It was the Third.

At the orchestra concert I reviewed last week, the soloist played an unannounced encore which sounded to me like Ysäye or Wieniawski or someone of that ilk. It was the conductor who mentioned after intermission that it was a caprice by Wieniawski. A good start. On the violinist's web page I found a list of his repertoire. It included some of the Op. 18 waltz-caprices by Wieniawski and nothing else by that composer, so that gave me more identification. I didn't have time to check further.

At last weekend's concert, the encore was announced but I couldn't make out what was said. I managed to buttonhole the first violinist afterwards and ask him. He said it was a waltz by Dvořák, and I gathered it had originally been written for something else and arranged by the composer for string quartet. That was a start, but I thought I could go further. Could it perhaps be one of the large set of songs called Cypresses which Dvořák had arranged for quartet? Perhaps, but I thought if it were, the violinist would have said so. When I got home, I idly leafed through the Dvořák section of one of my most useful reference books, Barlow and Morgenstern's Dictionary of Musical Themes. Suddenly the main theme of the piece jumped out at my eye. (It's useful to be able to read music, though I don't read it very well.) It was a waltz in A for piano, Op. 54 No. 1. A quick check in one of my other most useful reference books, The Da Capo Catalog of Classical Music Compositions, confirmed that Dvořák had arranged the piece for string quartet in 1880, and my research was complete. And now so is the review.