I always found this film by Francois Girard so strange and at the same time so fascinating! These are 32 snap-shots in the life and music of Glenn Gould. Some of them I fail completely to understand; others I find moving; others I find utterly successful in terms of depicting the "reality" of this great pianist.
By far the best "moment" in this film is , in my view, the extract here below. In just four minutes Girard manages to convey so many elements of Gould's life: his seclusive life-style, his wit, the obsession with his health, his eccentricity, and, above all, the way he chose to communicate with the other people: not simply through his music but through his records. The relationship between him and the cleaner is transformed to another dimension by the end of the piece (it's Beethoven by the way) and she is gradually (and so charmingly!) "won" by his music, but the point that Girard wants to make is that the means and vehicle of this transformation is a record, not any kind of direct communication. This was Gould!
No comments:
Post a Comment