NYFF ’17: Amalric’s Music Films

What do Canadian Opera soprano Barbara Hannigan and Downtown multi-everything John Zorn have in common? Aside from the fact both have probably conducted ensembles playing in a broadly classical context (certainly true in her case), they both are known associates of French actor-director Matheiu Amalric and been the subjects of his short films. Usually they were largely unplanned. Amalric just had his camera running, suspecting something interesting would happen. His rapport with his subjects and their remarkable talent produced the three highly distinctive short documentaries that screened as a program at the 55th New York Film Festival.

Hannigan is the subject of C’est presque au bout du monde and Music is Music, which each clock in around twenty minutes and bookend the nearly hour-long John Zorn (2010-2017). Presque was an online commission for the Paris Opera, but seeing it on a theater screen instead of a little streaming window is an almost overwhelming experience.

When you are an artist of Hannigan’s caliber, you do not simply crack your knuckles and hit the high notes. You have to warm up your instrument, which in her case is her entire body. Amalric captured her warm-up process before several performances, which he and his editor Caroline Detournay assembled into a master-cut. To say this is a private process would be an understatement. Hannigan is incredibly exposed, captured often in a ritual that suggests auto-eroticism. Yet, when you watch it, viewers will feel an extraordinarily personal and protective attachment to her.

The Zorn film is something completely different, starting with the fact is not, strictly speaking, finished yet—and may never be. According to Amalric’s lively post-screening discussion, he and Detournay have already cut together more footage for the next installment, which is great news, because what he has so far is terrific.

Again, Amalric was commissioned to do a standard TV doc on Zorn, but apparently that went by the wayside. Instead, they became fast friends. Every time they crossed paths, Amalric filmed Zorn in performance, as well as his backstage comings and goings. In just fifty-four minutes, Amalric conveys the wide ranging stylistic diversity and virtuosity of Zorn’s work. We see him in a variety of settings, including a Downtown-style jazz ensemble (featuring Dave Douglas) and approvingly watching a string trio perform his chamber composition, “Freud.”

Yet, probably the greatest merit of the Zorn piece is the way it captures his sense of humor. I know several jazz musicians and most of them are very funny, because when you accept that kind of life, you have to have a sense of humor or you’ll soon be crying. In later sequences, Amalric and Detournay show Zorn listening appreciatively to other musicians sets, which is another decision that really pans out.

Similarly, viewers get a keen sense of how Hannigan relates to other musicians in Music is Music. For her latest CD, Crazy Girl Crazy, Hannigan chose a program of Alban Berg and George Gershwin that she performed as both featured vocalist and conductor. To make things even more interesting, the musicians of the Ludwig Orchestra would also perform the chorale arrangements, sort of like the flip-side of John Doyle’s Sondheim revivals. Initially, they are clearly uncomfortable in their new role, but Hannigan coaxes them out of their shells, which is lovely to watch. The way she makes connections between Berg and Gershwin is also fascinating. Frankly, it is just nice to see her expand the classical canon to include the Great American Songbook.

None of Amalric’s music films could be described as fannish, but they each can turn viewers into fans because they really get at the essence of their subjects. You feel like you have been backstage with them and then watched them perform from the wings. Very highly recommended, Music is Music is now available as an extra with Crazy Girl Crazy and John Zorn 2010-2017 will continue to expand and hopefully screen again at future NYFFs. Presque is also available online from the Paris Opera, but you won’t get the same overpowering impact that way.

Tevye’s Creator: Sholem Aleichem

He was a Zionist, not a Communist. Yet, Sholem Aleichem’s stories were so popular with Yiddish speaking Russians, the Soviet state declared him a friend of the proletariat, albeit a politically naïve one. Often dubbed the Yiddish Mark Twain (to which Mr. Clemmons once replied: “tell him I am the American Sholem Aleichem”), he remains best known as the creator of Tevye the Milkman, the beloved protagonist of Fiddler on the Roof. The eventful life and full oeuvre of the Yiddish writer is put into fresh context in Joseph Dorman’s documentary Sholem Aleichem: Laughing in the Darkness, which opens this Friday in New York.

In addition to Twain, Sholem Aleichem might also be compared to Anthony Trollope as a prolific working writer. Early in his career, Sholem Aleichem (born Solomon Rabinovich) lived by his pen in the Ukrainian shtetls, where threats of pogroms were a real and present danger. Eventually, Sholem Aleichem (twice) immigrated to America. Laughing repeatedly emphasizes the role Sholem Aleichem’s stories played in keeping alive recent Jewish immigrants’ cultural memories in their bustling new homes. On-screen commentators describe Sholem Aleichem as a critical transitional figure, a New World man of letters writing of the Old World his readers knew so well.

Of course, he had a handful of beloved characters, most definitely including Tevye. Laughing nicely delineates the differences between the Tevye immortalized by Topol and that of the original short stories, but it stretches the point when speculating how Aleichem might have approved of the happy ending rewritten for Broadway and Hollywood.

Traditional in its approach, Laughing is always respectful to its subject without becoming obsequious. It covers the epic sweep of Sholem Aleichem’s life and the richness of his canon briskly but informatively. The parade of talking heads (including his granddaughter, author Bel Kauffmann) are considerably more insightful than the documentary industry’s standard, while actor Peter Riegert (fondly remembered for Local Hero and Animal House) clearly and sensitively gives voice to the Sholem Aleichem’s words.

A quality production, Laughing also boasts a supportive yet distinctive soundtrack composed by John Zorn (known for curating the Radical Jewish Music series), operating here in mostly a chamber string quartet mode with musicians like violinist Mark Feldman and cellist Erik Friedlander. It is perfect soundtrack music, apparently playing obtrusively in corner, but actually quite compelling once you focus on it.

An intelligent film wrapped in a classy package, Laughing should appeal to wide audience: essentially anyone who saw and loved Norman Jewison’s Fiddler or any stage revival, which should be just about everyone. Engaging and enlightening, it opens this Friday (7/8) in New York at the Lincoln Plaza Cinema.

Coming Soon: The Treatment

John Zorn has built a reputation for genre-crossing compositions and a diverse, but dark body of film scores, collected in his ongoing Film Works series. After providing soundtracks to serious documentaries, sexually provocative short features, and Japanese cartoons, Zorn scores his first romantic comedy in The Treatment, opening May 4th in New York (trailer here).

Zorn had collaborated with director Oren Rudavsky previously on the documentary Hiding and Seeking. Although reportedly resistant at first, Zorn was convinced after screening the film. As befitting a New York romance, The Treatment is indeed more neurotic than standard date movie fare.

Zorn, at Rudavsky’s suggestion, composed a score with tango overtones, particularly in the choice of instrumentation with Rob Burger’s accordion, Mark Feldman’s violin, Shanir Ezra Blumenkranz's bass, and in places Marc Ribot’s guitar. Giving a distinctive flavor to the soundtrack is the addition of Kenny Wollesen’s vibes. The result is a sophisticated, but vaguely agitating score that creates a consistent mood, enhancing the on-screen drama.

Whit Stillman regular Chris Eigeman stars as Jake Singer, an exclusive prep school teacher with serious emotional issues, in therapy with Dr. Ernesto Morales, the Freudian from Hell, played with theatrical relish by Sir Ian Holm. Whether Morales’ advice is helping or hindering his attempts at romance with widow Famke Janssen is debatable throughout the film. At times though, Singer’s fantasy interludes of Dr. Morales are difficult to distinguish from his actual sessions—whether these were conscious attempts to problematize the film’s reality were not readily apparent.

The Treatment clearly follows in the Annie Hall tradition of New York comedies of love and neuroses, with stronger writing than many of its precursors. It is not afraid to put its protagonist in embarrassingly uncomfortable situations, and it handles the father-son reconciliation plot line with nuance.

Filmed in the City and featuring a strong supporting cast, including Harris Yulin, Stephen Lang (Crime Story), and Roger Rees (Cheers), The Treament is an entertaining film. It is particularly well served by Zorn’s soundtrack, which has been available well before the film’s release on the 18th installment of Film Works on the composer’s Tzadik label. It opens in New York on May 4th, the same weekend Spiderman 3 debuts on several thousand more screens, so one will have to seek it out.