"Ah, but I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now."
My Boog Pages
Wednesday, July 20
The Hills Are Alive
Despite the fact that I love hard-edged crime films, I am, as Captain Renault might say, a rank sentimentalist. Thus I found it getting quite dusty last night as my wife, kids, and I watched The Sound Of Music.
I will always associate this film with my childhood - we had a VCR by the late 70s and taped this movie from one of its yearly TV appearances - and that plays its part, but this is just a great, great film. I still remembered many of the best scenes, from the dance in the gazebo to the farewell song at the party, to the "We have sinned" scene at the abbey. Somehow I managed to forget all the boring parts, of which there are several.
Julie Andrews was the star, but Christopher Plummer's performance as Captain von Trapp is really the key to the film. The movie essentially tells three love stories: von Trapp's love for his children, his love for Maria, and his love for his country.
In the festival finale', von Trapp sings "Edelweiss" but chokes up and cannot finish, faced with the prospect of either leaving Austria, maybe forever, or serving the hated Third Reich. When his wife, his children, and finally the audience join him in the song, he wasn't the only one choked up.
Jeeze, I'm practically crying at show tunes. Bryon must be the Borg of the blogosphere, and I'm being assimilated.
Anyway, I think this movie should be required viewing for all children, along with The Wizard Of Oz and Willy Wonka And The Chocolate Factory (the Gene Wilder version, of course!).
