West Side Story (1961)
#60 in my 2007 movie challenge was West Side Story, a long-unwatched movie gathering dust on our Tivo hard drive. It’s understandable we’d put it off; it’s not often we have enough time and energy for a three-hour movie. We split it into two nights. WSS is a riff on Romeo and Juliet, set in 50’s America and substituting racial tension for the rival families of the original play. It’s a film that I’m glad to have seen for it’s importance to my film literacy, but it wasn’t one I enjoyed a great deal. I found Natalie Woods’s accent especially irritating. Some of the musical numbers were great, and it’s important to note that musical movies simply weren’t done that way prior to this film. I liked the opening number, Natalie Woods’s “I Feel Pretty”, and Rita Moreno’s “America”. These were early on, though, and most of the following ones were not as lively. The studio freaked out when the original director, Jerome Robbins, choreographer and director of the Broadway show, looked to go over budget. They fired him after he’d completed four numbers (”Cool” in addition to the above mentioned three), and hired Robert Wise to complete the film. Both directors eventually shared the Best Picture Oscar. The result is a dated musical that occasionally sparkles with the possibility of what might have been.
September 18th, 2007 at 9:12 am
While I believe Jerome Robbins should have directed the whole movie, I’m not sure the slowing down in the second half is a function of that change. Having worked that show backstage during a run, the second half is just terribly slow, even in the theater. I can remember sitting backstage during the fake marriage scene (One Hand, One Heart) and just groaning because we often lost the audience engagement at that time. Figuring the second half includes “One Hand, One Heart,” “Somewhere,” “I Have a Love,” versus the first half (”America,” “Something’s Coming,” “Tonight” for example), it’s certainly a show that slows waaaay down in the second half.
November 6th, 2007 at 2:16 pm
Kate, that’s an excellent point. I just watched Robert Wise’s Sound of Music, and the first 2 hours flew along from song to song.