Jazz in movies

[ghost of miles]

Ellington in Cabin in the Sky (1943) and the first Amos 'n Andy film, Check and Double-Check. Also Murder at the Vanities, though I've never seen that one.

Chuck: I'll see if the Cinemat has that flick for rental.

[Rosco]

Anyone remember the 80s comedy flick Throw Mama From the Train, starring Billy Crystal?

Crystal's best friend in the movie was played by... er... Branford Marsalis.

Doesn't pick up a horn at any point, sadly.

[Michael Fitzgerald]

I'm watching The Conversation right now and Hackman is DEFINITELY miming his part. He may have played it and is miming to himself, but no way is he producing the tenor sound we hear while watching him.

Mike

[Rosco]

I'm watching The Conversation right now and Hackman is DEFINITELY miming his part. He may have played it and is miming to himself, but no way is he producing the tenor sound we hear while watching him.

Mike

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Well, then he goes back on my list!

Never seen New York, New York... love DeNiro but Minnelli puts me off. How's Bob's saxophone playing? IIRC he learned to play for the role.

[Rosco]

I can't believe no person responded to this. Not even Sting fans.

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Yeah, they're conspicuous by their absence.

Actually, joeface responded, back at post #40

[RDK]

I'm watching The Conversation right now and Hackman is DEFINITELY miming his part. He may have played it and is miming to himself, but no way is he producing the tenor sound we hear while watching him.

Mike

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Not surprising. Virtually all movie sound is added in post. It's just the way films are made. That's why it's so ridiculous to complain about actors "miming" their instrument playing on screen. They are actors, after all, and not necessarily musicians.

Also, how can anyone complain about them using "Spanisah Key" in a movie? That's not something you see (hear) every day.

[RDK]

Denny Zeitlin did a weird jazzy/electronics score for the '79 (?) remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

[ghost of miles]

Georgie Auld dubbed DeNiro's sax parts for New York, New York (he also plays the bandleader).

The movie has its moments as a tribute to the big-band era, but I was let down a bit when I watched the whole thing--I think Scorsese was doing too much coke when he filmed it. The pacing's off, for starters; but if you're interested in the swing era & its demise post World War II, it's worth a viewing. Godard claims it's MS's best movie, but I think he's being willfully perverse.

Edited August 2, 2005 by ghost of miles

[Rosco]

Not surprising.  Virtually all movie sound is added in post.  It's just the way films are made.  That's why it's so ridiculous to complain about actors "miming" their instrument playing on screen.  They are actors, after all, and not necessarily musicians. 

Also, how can anyone complain about them using "Spanisah Key" in a movie?  That's not something you see (hear) every day.

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I wasn't complaining about using Spanish Key... more, please!... I was complaining about it being so blatantly fake in the context of the scene. I almost couldn't concentrate on the dialogue I was so distracted by it.

I also wasn't complaining about miming as such, just bad miming. Mostly by actors who've plainly never handled an instrument in their lives.

Of course most music is added in post. Though if memory serves, wasn't the music in Round Midnight recorded live? No miming there.

[Michael Fitzgerald]

Yes, 'Round Midnight was exceptional in this regard.

Mike

[Kalo]

PLEASE,  some "free music" fan check out Blue Monday. I can't believe no person responded to this. Not even Sting fans. Someone must have it for rent.

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Actually, this sounded quite interesting to me.

Except that I HATE Sting.

I'll make a point of checking it out.

[Chuck Nessa]

Go Kalo, Go!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Kalo]

I'm watching The Conversation right now and Hackman is DEFINITELY miming his part. He may have played it and is miming to himself, but no way is he producing the tenor sound we hear while watching him.

Mike

←

Not surprising. Virtually all movie sound is added in post. It's just the way films are made. That's why it's so ridiculous to complain about actors "miming" their instrument playing on screen. They are actors, after all, and not necessarily musicians.

←

I also wasn't complaining about miming as such, just bad miming. Mostly by actors who've plainly never handled an instrument in their lives.

Of course most music is added in post. Though if memory serves, wasn't the music in Round Midnight recorded live? No miming there. 

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I haven't had a chance to look at The Conversation again, but at least Hackman's miming himself, which add to the verisimilitude of the performance. Not that that's any guarantee. I recall a bit in Giddins's Armstrong documentary where Louis was miming himself to ghastly effect ( the fact that he couldn't reproduce his own solo is a testament to his truly "jazzical" spontaneity, IMHO).

Has anyone caught the Gjon Mili JATP short, follow-up to his classic Jammin' The Blues?

Buddy Rich isn't even trying to copy his own recorded performance, which is kind of funny but also incredibly annoying; also, I guess, the reason that this flick was not initially released, as far as I know. Anyone know different?

I definitely agree with Rosco about good and bad mimers. Best case scenario, of course, is that the actor CAN play: part of the success of The Buddy Holly Story and the recent Ray Charles bio-pic is the fact that the leads were not only incendiary actors, but could also convincingly play the music for real, which helped to trump the otherwise stultifying conventions of the genre.

Edited August 2, 2005 by Kalo

[Kalo]

Ellington in Cabin in the Sky (1943)

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Cabin in the Sky also featured the great Ethel Waters, as well as Lena Horne, Eddie "Rochester" Anderson (who got to do some singing with that "multiphonic" voice of his), and an obscure trumpeter/singer named Louis Armstrong.

Armstrong's big number "Ain't it the Truth," was cut from the film, but appears in all its glory on the 1996 Turner Classic Movies/Rhino Movie Music CD, along with other goodies.

Recommended.

Edited August 2, 2005 by Kalo

[Kalo]

Anyone remember the 80s comedy flick Throw Mama From the Train, starring Billy Crystal?

Crystal's best friend in the movie was played by... er... Branford Marsalis. 

Doesn't pick up a horn at any point, sadly.

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Branford also appeared in Spike Lee's School Daze(1988), about fraternity life at a historically black college. It caused some controversy at the time for airing some "dirty laundry," as it dealt with, among other issues, color prejudice between various shades of African-Americans.

It's been a long time, but I remember liking Branford's performance. No sax, though, as I recall.

The most memorable scene was when the bourgeois frat boys went to a "townie" fast-food restaurant and had to deal with some "real" homeboys.

Larry Fishburne was in the film, too, in one of his early lead roles.

I fondly remember the time when Spike Lee seemed "promising." For instance, I thought that Do the Right Thing was an amazing movie (though I haven't seen it lately). But it's pretty much been all downhill for Spike for a long time now.

Edited August 2, 2005 by Kalo

[Spontooneous]

IIRC, "School Daze" also had Harold Vick onscreen, playing a tenor solo in Phyllis Hyman's number.

[Kalo]

IIRC, "School Daze" also had Harold Vick onscreen, playing a tenor solo in Phyllis Hyman's number.

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Wow!

I'll have to revisit this picture.

Don't forget that it also featured the great Washington Go Go band EU and their classic '80s tune "Da Butt."

Plus it also featured a "Stepping" contest between the frats!

Edited August 2, 2005 by Kalo

[Chuck Nessa]

Harold Vick onscreen, playing a tenor solo in Phyllis Hyman's number.

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So,,,,,,,,,that was her "number". -_-

[Kalo]

She related to Dick?

[Rosco]

Branford also appeared in Spike Lee's School Daze(1988), about fraternity life at a historically black college. It caused some controversy at the time for airing some "dirty laundry," as it dealt with, among other issues, color prejudice between various shades of African-Americans.

It's been a long time, but I remember liking Branford's performance. No sax, though, as I recall.

I fondly remember the time when Spike Lee seemed "promising." For instance, I thought that Do the Right Thing was an amazing movie (though I haven't seen it lately). But it's pretty much been all downhill for Spike for a long time now.

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Good call. I'd forgotten about Branford being in School Daze. Don't remember much about that movie. I recall it being good up until its cop-out ending which seemed to have drifted in from some other movie.

I find Lee a frustrating talent. For every deft touch there's half a dozen made with a ham fist.

Jazz references in Spike's movies must rival Woody's (or even, as we've discovered, Tom Cruise! )

[Rosco]

Has anyone caught the Gjon Mili JATP short, follow-up to his classic Jammin' The Blues?

Buddy Rich isn't even trying to copy his own recorded performance, which is kind of funny but also incredibly annoying; also, I guess, the reason that this flick was not initially released, as far as I know. Anyone know different?

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Yeah, Rich is definately playing for laughs. At one point, Bird seems to be in on the joke.

I'm willing to overlook the shortcomings of this footage just for the fact that it even exists! Any film record of Bird, Hawk, Prez, Flip, Hank, Ray & Ella has to be cause for celebration. I'm sure this has been the subject of another thread, so I won't dwell on it but there's a funny moment during Ella's scat solo (her lip synching is fairly good), when Flip puts saxophone to mouth, then realizes there's another chorus to go. And what is Bill Harris' mouthpiece about?

Oh, and Parker's miming is less convincing than Forest Whitaker's.

[Kalo]

Good call. I'd forgotten about Branford being in School Daze. Don't remember much about that movie. I recall it being good up until its cop-out ending which seemed to have drifted in from some other movie.

I find Lee a frustrating talent. For every deft touch there's half a dozen made with a ham fist.

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Yeah, I remember that ending as a "bummer" too. The film ends with a sort of pseudo-Brechtian flourish. As I recall, you hear the sound of an alarm clock, and then the Larry Fishburne character looks right into the camera (that is, right at us in the audience) and says, or yells, "Wake up!" It's been a long time, but I seem to recall that the rest of the cast then joins him and yells "Wake up!" into the camera too.

Edited August 3, 2005 by Kalo

[Nate Dorward]

Tell me about it--I remember Mo Better Blues as one of the clunkier "jazz movies" I've ever seen. The things I remember about it are the awful montage with "A Love Supreme", the sequence where a blank-faced Bleek is chewed out by both women in his life, & the headbobbing, cartoony Jewish twins in charge of the club.

I remember Malcolm X & Clockers as OK though I haven't seen them since first release.

[Nate Dorward]

& incidentally re: free jazz on film: I remember that in The Fabulous Baker Boys at the end after the group splits up, the pianist follows his muse & becomes an avantgarde jazz pianist--there's a short clip.

[Rosco]

& incidentally re: free jazz on film: I remember that in The Fabulous Baker Boys at the end after the group splits up, the pianist follows his muse & becomes an avantgarde jazz pianist--there's a short clip.

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Oh yeah, another movie I haven't seen in many years. If memory serves actor brothers Jeff & Beau Bridges are miming to jazz-lite brothers Don & Dave Grusin. Beau's not so hot, but Jeff looks like he knows his way round a keyboard.