>Date:    Sun, 21 May 2006 14:04:18 -0400
>From:    Jurretta Heckscher <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Re: NEW WORLD revisited
>
>On May 21, 2006, at 6:39 AM, Randy Cabell wrote:
>
>
>
>>. . . one of the major problems with life is that there is NO
>>background music.
>>
>>
>
>That's a great line, Randy--thanks.  I agree!
>
>--Jurretta
>
>
>
It is a great line!  I'm on an e-mail list for discussion of show and
film records and recently a member posted a story he had heard but had
not been able to authenticate.  A particular composer reportedly went to
Alfred Hitchcock, furious that he had announced that there would be no
music in his next film.  Hitchcock replied that if he could answer one
question, he'd have the job.  The film begins with a woman alone in a
lifeboat, it continues as other survivors climb onboard.  It ends as
they sight a ship.  Where was the orchestra?  The conductor replied that
it was in the other boat, behind the boat with the movie cameras!  He
got the job.

I was inspired by the story (true or not) to rent the film.  Hitchcock's
"Lifeboat" is a remarkably gripping piece of work (realistic suspense,
not horror), set during WWII.  The only orchestral music is at the very
beginning and end of the movie.  In between, the soundtrack consists of
ambient sounds, a survivor playing a metal recorder (the kind I had in
grade school, but then we called a "flute" though I'm not sure it was),
and survivors occasionally singing parts of old songs and lullabyes.  I
won't say any more, in case anyone is planning to rent it.  It's well
worth the time and rental fee.  Excellent cast, including a very young
Hume Cronyn.  (And, back to the topic, it didn't bore, frustrate and
confuse me the way many scenes in THE NEW WORLD did.)

Rosanna Bencoach



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