Modern Day/Current Music for Movies Set in a Different Era (Great Gatsby-R)

[onetet]

JectWon said:onetet said:Never fully get this line of complaint. Yes, they didn't have rap in 1860... they also didn't have recorded music of any kind, not to mention movie cameras.







Not sure if you are talking about a different story...but The Great Gatsby takes place in 1922 and there was plenty of great recorded music to pull from.





I guess I just don't understand why the folks who made the movie feel they need to take such bold artistic liberties with a story that doesn't need any tweaking. Sure, there is no soundtrack to the book to follow.





It's a stubborn position for me to take, but I really enjoy when a movie adaptation sticks with the culture that was available during the time of the story.




My comments were generally addressing the idea that film music needs to wedded to the era in which the film takes place; the 1860s rap reference specifically was to those who have complained about the use of modern music in Django. I'm arguing that making movies in 2013 involves hundreds of tools that were not around in most prior periods of history, digital cameras being the most obvious; maybe our insistence that films' soundtracks limit themselves to music the characters could've heard in their era is limiting, unfairly focusing on one of these modern tools when we allow so many other contemporary devices to be used to tell the story.





I'm probably not going to be a fan of the new Gatsby, so this isn't meant as a defense of that film. There was a more reverent film version of the novel in the midst of Paramount's great run in the '70s--but while it's not as flat and lifeless as its reputation, it's also not great, and mostly of interest for the amazing cast:


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Gatsby_(1974_film)

 

[Plantweed]

Well, the old west wasn't in the Pyrenees, and I'm pretty sure they didn't have twangy surf guitar back then.

 

[Plantweed]

Also:

 

[DocMcCoy]

onetet said:maybe our insistence that films' soundtracks limit themselves to music the characters could've heard in their era is limiting, unfairly focusing on one of these modern tools when we allow so many other contemporary devices to be used to tell the story.




Nobody complains, or probably even cares, about rackmount-preset "Celtic" pipes in fantasy adventures, but if you're talking about a movie that in all other respects presents itself as a period piece, then why not point out when the music - as evocative of period as any and every other device a film-maker's likely to call upon - is jarringly anachronistic? I don't think doing so neccesarily makes you the kind of viewer who has an, er, unrealistic notion of what "realism" means in movie terms, but I can quite easily see why it would disrupt the atmosphere of a movie for some viewers.

 

[cookbook]

all this gatsby talk reminded me of this gem





http://greatgatsbygame.com/

 

[onetet]

DocMcCoy said:onetet said:maybe our insistence that films' soundtracks limit themselves to music the characters could've heard in their era is limiting, unfairly focusing on one of these modern tools when we allow so many other contemporary devices to be used to tell the story.




Nobody complains, or probably even cares, about rackmount-preset "Celtic" pipes in fantasy adventures, but if you're talking about a movie that in all other respects presents itself as a period piece, then why not point out when the music - as evocative of period as any and every other device a film-maker's likely to call upon - is jarringly anachronistic? I don't think doing so neccesarily makes you the kind of viewer who has an, er, unrealistic notion of what "realism" means in movie terms, but I can quite easily see why it would disrupt the atmosphere of a movie for some viewers.




Sure, and I love many period pieces that limit themselves to music that would've been available to the film's characters, and try to immerse viewers in that specific atmosphere. But I also think there's room for a wider spectrum of what period pieces can be, particularly in reference to music, and since audiences are resistant to this I appreciate films that work toward broadening the genre. I don't like Baz Luhrmann's films and I don't think Sofia Coppola's Marie Antoinette was a resounding success by any means; however, I appreciate that they are trying to stake out the right to make period pieces in which the characters are realistically situated in their historical period while acknowledging that we as an audience are still situated in the present day.





My larger point being: we expect the sound/music we hear in period pieces to be only sound/music the characters could've experienced, but have no expectation that the images we see will be only images the characters could've seen (a 2013 version of The Great Gatsby will not be shot on 1920s cameras, for instance). I'd argue this has to do with the conservative manner in which most period pieces have been conceived and executed throughout film history, and audiences getting accustomed to those conservative production values, rather than any inherently "right" or "wrong" potential way in which period pieces could be made.

 

[vintageinfants]

herbacios tweed said:soundtrack worked well on this imo http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0422720/soundtrack




agreed.





also:

 

[vintageinfants]

personally, i think having anachronistic anything in a movie is complete dogshit, unless it's pretty much PERFECTLY executed, consistent and subtle enough.

 

[Okem]

First off, I would agree that the opening credits to B.E. are all around pretty terrible. But I have no real issue with songs from other periods being used in films. Although it may sometimes be justifiable, it seems a rather petty complaint when you look at how music has been used in films on the whole.





I watched the Carlos miniseries biopic recently and that depicts actual events across a time period from 73 to 94. Now the fashions, furnishing and everything else were appropriate to each time period, but the music mainly stayed on a early 80s New Order, A Certain Ration, Fripp & Eno tip. They could've had the music also progress through the time period, but that could be pretty corny and certainly would've detracted from the sense of cohesiveness the limited period soundtrack brought.

 

[Electrode]

Francesco Rosi's "Lucky Luciano" has some funky instros.

 

[ppadilha]

this is on a totally different tip, but Peter Watkins makes historical films using a documentary style, as if there was a crew following the characters around - think The Office without the comedy. There are interviews, the characters constantly look at the camera, and there is doc style voice-over narration. It's obviously anachronistic, but his films are amazing.