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COPYRIGHT 2001 Society for the Advancement of Education
THE MUSICAL has never been my favorite film genre. I was never taken by the idea of the fabric of drama suddenly ripped asunder as people break into song, affirming the goodness of life even as it seems to stink for the moment. This sounds a little glib and creel, but it more or less sums up, I think, what the musical has been about since its inception in the sound era (and, without a doubt, the musical was the biggest sales tool for sound movies).
There seems no irony that the musical begins in earnest with the Great Depression, with "Footlight Parade" and "Gold Diggers of 1935" being Hollywood's assurance to the public that life can be a bowl of cherries. In the postwar period, the musical reached epic proportions with "Kismet," "South Pacific," "Oklahoma," "The Music Man," and "The Sound of Music." Each seemed an expression less of its own vapid storyline than of the triumph of escapism.
Lars Van Trier's "Dancer...
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