0
Murder and music still hold up in West Side Story
18 December 2005
[indent]1961. It was the year of Breakfast at Tiffany's, the Guns of Navarrone, Yojimbo, The Hustler, 101 Dalmations (the biggest gross of them all), Little Shop of Horrors, La Dolce Vita and Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea.
Patsy Cline released two hits: Crazy and I Fall to Pieces. The Tokens' hit The Lion Sleeps Tonight hit number on on the Billboard Top 40 charts. So did Michael Row Your Boat Ashore (the Highwaymen), Big Bad John (Jimmy Dean), Blue Moon (the Marcels), Hit the Road jack (Ray Charles), Mother-in-Law (Ernie K Doe) and Moody River (Pat Boone).
John F. Kennedy was inaugurated into the White House. America sent up its first two astronauts.
The Soviets erected the Berlin Wall, while America cut ties with Cuba then backed an unsuccessful invasion of Castro's island.
OPEC was formed. The first American advisors went to Vietnam. Mcdonald's opens its first corporate university. The Canadian Bank of Commerce and the Imperial Bank of Canada merged to become the CIBC. The CTV network opened. Tommy Douglas Tommy Douglas resigned as Premier of Saskatchewan to lead the federal New Democratic Party, a new party built from an alliance of the CCF and the Canadian Labour Congress.
In 1961, John Diefenbaker was Canada's Prime Minister. Harold MacMillan was Britain's. David Ben Gurion was Prime Minister of Israel. Nikita Khrushchev was Premier of the USSR. Mao Tse Tung was leader of China.
And in 1961, the film of West Side Story was released, a musical about New York gangs, based on Shakespeare's plot for Romeo and Juliet.
West Side Story was one of the first (perhaps even THE first) adult films I ever watched in a movie theatre. It was at the Golden Mile plaza, in Scarborough. Musicals were popular in my family - my parents had 33-rpm lps of shows like The King and I, Porgy and Bess, The Music Man, Oklahoma and My Fair Lady that got a lot of play. My father used to entertain us in car trips by singing songs from Gilbert & Sullivan operettas. So taking their 11-year-old son along to a musical, even one with such a mature theme, was natural for my parents. Except that in October, 1961, when WSS was released, my mother wasn't with us - she had suffered a stroke six months earlier and was in hospital, where she would be for another two-three years.
Perhaps that's one of the reasons the story was etched so clearly into my young brain. I still recall all of the words, the dance scenes, the passion and the tension. My young mind was very impressionable back then.
Last night, we watched it again. I can't remember having seen it again since that evening in 1961, but it could have been last week, so clearly did I recall it last night. Susan even enjoyed it and it isn't a film she'd normally want to watch.
For a film that's 44 years old, and a musical, it still holds up well and carries considerably emotion for the viewer. If it was filmed today, it might be done somewhat differently, the gang members looking tougher and meaner, and the whole thing probably a lot more violent. In some scenes the guys are so clean cut and well-dressed it looks like a scenario right out of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. They don't look tough - they look like dancers. But that was the style.
Natalie Wood, 23 at the time, was beautifully cast as Maria, the Juliet of the story. Richard Beymer is a good Tony - Romeo. The music and choreography were quite modern, and sophisticated even by 2005 standards. Despite being a musical, the social issues - poverty, employment, youth, race, money, sex - remain in the forefront throughout the story and never fade into insignificance as mere window dressing for the music.
I still like this film, and it still has the power to move me today. I seldom can say I like most modernizations of Shakespeare, but this one works, and works well. Recommended viewing - both for those who have never seen it and those who haven't seen it in many years.[/indent]
Patsy Cline released two hits: Crazy and I Fall to Pieces. The Tokens' hit The Lion Sleeps Tonight hit number on on the Billboard Top 40 charts. So did Michael Row Your Boat Ashore (the Highwaymen), Big Bad John (Jimmy Dean), Blue Moon (the Marcels), Hit the Road jack (Ray Charles), Mother-in-Law (Ernie K Doe) and Moody River (Pat Boone).
John F. Kennedy was inaugurated into the White House. America sent up its first two astronauts.
The Soviets erected the Berlin Wall, while America cut ties with Cuba then backed an unsuccessful invasion of Castro's island.
OPEC was formed. The first American advisors went to Vietnam. Mcdonald's opens its first corporate university. The Canadian Bank of Commerce and the Imperial Bank of Canada merged to become the CIBC. The CTV network opened. Tommy Douglas Tommy Douglas resigned as Premier of Saskatchewan to lead the federal New Democratic Party, a new party built from an alliance of the CCF and the Canadian Labour Congress.
In 1961, John Diefenbaker was Canada's Prime Minister. Harold MacMillan was Britain's. David Ben Gurion was Prime Minister of Israel. Nikita Khrushchev was Premier of the USSR. Mao Tse Tung was leader of China.
And in 1961, the film of West Side Story was released, a musical about New York gangs, based on Shakespeare's plot for Romeo and Juliet.
Quote
The story originates from a 1476 story of Mariotto and Gianozza by Masuccio Salernitano, in Il Novelino. Luigi da Porto's Istoria novellamente ritrovata di due Nobili Amanti gave the story much of its modern form, renaming the lovers to Romeus and Giulietta and shifting the action from Siena to Verona. Da Porto's story was taken up and included by Matteo Bandello in his Novelle of 1554, and translated to English by Arthur Brooke, whose narrative poem "Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet", written in 1562, was the source for Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Shakespeare enriched its texture through his vivid characterizations of both major and minor characters, in particular the Nurse and Mercutio.
West Side Story was one of the first (perhaps even THE first) adult films I ever watched in a movie theatre. It was at the Golden Mile plaza, in Scarborough. Musicals were popular in my family - my parents had 33-rpm lps of shows like The King and I, Porgy and Bess, The Music Man, Oklahoma and My Fair Lady that got a lot of play. My father used to entertain us in car trips by singing songs from Gilbert & Sullivan operettas. So taking their 11-year-old son along to a musical, even one with such a mature theme, was natural for my parents. Except that in October, 1961, when WSS was released, my mother wasn't with us - she had suffered a stroke six months earlier and was in hospital, where she would be for another two-three years.
Perhaps that's one of the reasons the story was etched so clearly into my young brain. I still recall all of the words, the dance scenes, the passion and the tension. My young mind was very impressionable back then.
Last night, we watched it again. I can't remember having seen it again since that evening in 1961, but it could have been last week, so clearly did I recall it last night. Susan even enjoyed it and it isn't a film she'd normally want to watch.
For a film that's 44 years old, and a musical, it still holds up well and carries considerably emotion for the viewer. If it was filmed today, it might be done somewhat differently, the gang members looking tougher and meaner, and the whole thing probably a lot more violent. In some scenes the guys are so clean cut and well-dressed it looks like a scenario right out of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. They don't look tough - they look like dancers. But that was the style.
Natalie Wood, 23 at the time, was beautifully cast as Maria, the Juliet of the story. Richard Beymer is a good Tony - Romeo. The music and choreography were quite modern, and sophisticated even by 2005 standards. Despite being a musical, the social issues - poverty, employment, youth, race, money, sex - remain in the forefront throughout the story and never fade into insignificance as mere window dressing for the music.
I still like this film, and it still has the power to move me today. I seldom can say I like most modernizations of Shakespeare, but this one works, and works well. Recommended viewing - both for those who have never seen it and those who haven't seen it in many years.[/indent]
