SATURDAY, AUGUST 6
You know the festival is coming to an end, when it takes the celebratory plunge from the creaky springboard that is pop culture into the realm of higher art, trading the functional interiors of academic auditoriums for the cathedral of culture. For the second year in a row, the good people at the festival have offered us a rare threat by celebrating the early genre efforts without which there would be no festival. And once more, they're doing it style by soliciting the services of world-renowned, homegrown silent film composer Gabriel Thibaudeau who thus revisited his very first score, which was commissioned by la Cinémathèque québécoise back in 1990. By making a bridge between the lowbrow form of entertainment that is cinema, especially in its iteration as the genre film, and the highbrow art that is orchestral music, the programmers at Fantasia have not only lifted their own favorites above the lower street level, but the whole of cinema as a transcendental, all-encompassing art form worthy of all the attention that high society will bestow on the grand masters of old.
Fortunately, tenue de ville was not mandatory, and so we slithered in Place des Arts wearing the dirty shirts, shorts and running shoes inherited from an entire day of competitive dodgeball. With broken fingers, broken ankles and broken egos, we heaved ourselves painfully into the padded chairs where we would spend the evening, ready to be filled by the vibrant notes necessaryto animate our empty shells into a semblance of life. And when the lights dimmed and the first image arose, accompanied by a heavenly chorus that seemed too close to be true, we knew we were in for a rare experience. Evidently, we had already attended the screening of Metropolis which was programmed on the previous year, but the memories thereof had since faded into memory and any palpable experience we might have derived from it had left the prickly pores of our skin and found refuge in the recesses of our mind. Freed once more from its prison of flesh, the transcendental experience derived from seeing olden images of static beauty laced with the aerial notes of reverence took our soul into orbit. And while the film itself wasn't as good as I remembered it, its re-contextualization made it more relevant than ever, and so was the Fantasia festival itself lifted out of the shackles that genre cinema might represent to the uninitiated. A splendid event to close yet another splendid edition. Great job!
FILM SEEN
Phantom of the Opera
It's hard for me to incense this film, knowing that Nosferatu was made three years earlier and still remains light-years ahead in technical terms. That said, one cannot compare diamonds with rhinestones and so I must appraise Phantom on its own merit. After all, it does have ample merits, pertaining mostly to the grandiose, elaborate sets allowing the film to bridge the gap between the Gothic elements of the narrative (involving the abusive, desperate romance between virginal Christina Daaé and the titular pariah) and its more romantic, contemporary elements (involving the stale romance between Daaé and rich, protective Raoul). That said, the contrast between the grandiose upper floors, with their immense rooms covered with embroidered decorations, and the lower floors, comprised of decrepit vaulted crypts filled with stagnant waters and medieval traps, perfectly exemplifies the discrepancy between the Phantom's nature and that of the Parisian socialists in attendance at the opera. And while the titular character is not as nuanced as he was in later iterations, being pegged almost categorically as a remorseless evil-doer, he still comes out as a pitiful being, one tagged with Otherness only because of the extravagance and egotism of the economical elites. When the Phantom mingles with the crowd at the annual "Bal masqué", in a sequence which we were lucky enough to see in the original, painstakingly colorized version, he refuses to share in their merriment and plainly states instead that he cannot dance atop the corpses of many good men (entombed in the lower crypts). This reverent attitude toward death reveals a spiritual side absent from contemporary men, too content as they are to celebrate their own lives. Christine's attitude is similarly self-absorbed and uncaring as she brutally unmasks and ridicules the Phantom in a classic scene highlighted by Lon Chaney's stellar makeup job and his commanding gestures. Yet, this being an horror drama aimed at the unrefined, prejudiced masses from the turn of the century, any dramatic nuance is only a matter of speculation and interpretation, the resulting success of the film being imputable only to the sumptuous decors, extended cast of extras, creepy makeup and murderous contraptions lying around the scenery. And while today's audiences are just as unrefined, they all have heard of Andrew Lloyd Webber's singing Phantom and so they are better equipped to appraise him as a misunderstood, dramatic figure akin to Frankenstein's monster in James Whale's pair of masterpieces. Narrative considerations aside, one cannot overlook the fact that Phantom was presented in a proper auditorium and scored by an armada of no less than thirty carefully-selected musicians. The resulting, unique soundtrack, one that hadn't been heard for twenty years, is a pure delight and it greatly enhances the dramatic power of the film. While a far cry from the more accomplished, more enthralling score for Metropolis (shown at last year's festival in a rare, complete version), the addition of vocals have made this a one-of-a-kind experience, which any righteous festival-goer should've rushed to see. And while public tastes would generally privilege Japanese comedies involving rocket-launching breasts and other such nonsense over silent films, no matter how crucially influential, the turnout was great, and the crowd was wholly involved. I mean, they actually contributed to the score by clapping in unison in order to emulate the onscreen extras and contribute their own effort to maestro Gabriel Thibaudeau's, who was showered with praise at the end of the screening. It was great! And while the film was a bit too theatrical for my tastes, and light years away from the mind-blowing formal experimentation of the Europeans, the experience thereof, in a packed auditorium vibrating at the sound of a tailor-made score, was entirely worthwhile
THUMBS UP
You know the festival is coming to an end, when it takes the celebratory plunge from the creaky springboard that is pop culture into the realm of higher art, trading the functional interiors of academic auditoriums for the cathedral of culture. For the second year in a row, the good people at the festival have offered us a rare threat by celebrating the early genre efforts without which there would be no festival. And once more, they're doing it style by soliciting the services of world-renowned, homegrown silent film composer Gabriel Thibaudeau who thus revisited his very first score, which was commissioned by la Cinémathèque québécoise back in 1990. By making a bridge between the lowbrow form of entertainment that is cinema, especially in its iteration as the genre film, and the highbrow art that is orchestral music, the programmers at Fantasia have not only lifted their own favorites above the lower street level, but the whole of cinema as a transcendental, all-encompassing art form worthy of all the attention that high society will bestow on the grand masters of old.
Fortunately, tenue de ville was not mandatory, and so we slithered in Place des Arts wearing the dirty shirts, shorts and running shoes inherited from an entire day of competitive dodgeball. With broken fingers, broken ankles and broken egos, we heaved ourselves painfully into the padded chairs where we would spend the evening, ready to be filled by the vibrant notes necessaryto animate our empty shells into a semblance of life. And when the lights dimmed and the first image arose, accompanied by a heavenly chorus that seemed too close to be true, we knew we were in for a rare experience. Evidently, we had already attended the screening of Metropolis which was programmed on the previous year, but the memories thereof had since faded into memory and any palpable experience we might have derived from it had left the prickly pores of our skin and found refuge in the recesses of our mind. Freed once more from its prison of flesh, the transcendental experience derived from seeing olden images of static beauty laced with the aerial notes of reverence took our soul into orbit. And while the film itself wasn't as good as I remembered it, its re-contextualization made it more relevant than ever, and so was the Fantasia festival itself lifted out of the shackles that genre cinema might represent to the uninitiated. A splendid event to close yet another splendid edition. Great job!
FILM SEEN
Phantom of the Opera
It's hard for me to incense this film, knowing that Nosferatu was made three years earlier and still remains light-years ahead in technical terms. That said, one cannot compare diamonds with rhinestones and so I must appraise Phantom on its own merit. After all, it does have ample merits, pertaining mostly to the grandiose, elaborate sets allowing the film to bridge the gap between the Gothic elements of the narrative (involving the abusive, desperate romance between virginal Christina Daaé and the titular pariah) and its more romantic, contemporary elements (involving the stale romance between Daaé and rich, protective Raoul). That said, the contrast between the grandiose upper floors, with their immense rooms covered with embroidered decorations, and the lower floors, comprised of decrepit vaulted crypts filled with stagnant waters and medieval traps, perfectly exemplifies the discrepancy between the Phantom's nature and that of the Parisian socialists in attendance at the opera. And while the titular character is not as nuanced as he was in later iterations, being pegged almost categorically as a remorseless evil-doer, he still comes out as a pitiful being, one tagged with Otherness only because of the extravagance and egotism of the economical elites. When the Phantom mingles with the crowd at the annual "Bal masqué", in a sequence which we were lucky enough to see in the original, painstakingly colorized version, he refuses to share in their merriment and plainly states instead that he cannot dance atop the corpses of many good men (entombed in the lower crypts). This reverent attitude toward death reveals a spiritual side absent from contemporary men, too content as they are to celebrate their own lives. Christine's attitude is similarly self-absorbed and uncaring as she brutally unmasks and ridicules the Phantom in a classic scene highlighted by Lon Chaney's stellar makeup job and his commanding gestures. Yet, this being an horror drama aimed at the unrefined, prejudiced masses from the turn of the century, any dramatic nuance is only a matter of speculation and interpretation, the resulting success of the film being imputable only to the sumptuous decors, extended cast of extras, creepy makeup and murderous contraptions lying around the scenery. And while today's audiences are just as unrefined, they all have heard of Andrew Lloyd Webber's singing Phantom and so they are better equipped to appraise him as a misunderstood, dramatic figure akin to Frankenstein's monster in James Whale's pair of masterpieces. Narrative considerations aside, one cannot overlook the fact that Phantom was presented in a proper auditorium and scored by an armada of no less than thirty carefully-selected musicians. The resulting, unique soundtrack, one that hadn't been heard for twenty years, is a pure delight and it greatly enhances the dramatic power of the film. While a far cry from the more accomplished, more enthralling score for Metropolis (shown at last year's festival in a rare, complete version), the addition of vocals have made this a one-of-a-kind experience, which any righteous festival-goer should've rushed to see. And while public tastes would generally privilege Japanese comedies involving rocket-launching breasts and other such nonsense over silent films, no matter how crucially influential, the turnout was great, and the crowd was wholly involved. I mean, they actually contributed to the score by clapping in unison in order to emulate the onscreen extras and contribute their own effort to maestro Gabriel Thibaudeau's, who was showered with praise at the end of the screening. It was great! And while the film was a bit too theatrical for my tastes, and light years away from the mind-blowing formal experimentation of the Europeans, the experience thereof, in a packed auditorium vibrating at the sound of a tailor-made score, was entirely worthwhile
THUMBS UP
