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Thirty Two Short Films About Glenn Gould, Directed by François Girard Max Films, September 14, 1993 (Canada) Screenplay: François Girard, Don McKellar, including the writing of Glenn Gould Starring: Colm Feore, Derek Keurvorst, Katya Ladan, Devon Anderson, Joshua Greenblatt, Sean Ryan, Kate Hennig, Sean Doyle, Sharon Bernbaum, and David Hughes Glenn Gould (Colm Feore): My mother tells me that by five years old … l had decided definitively to become a concert pianist. l think she had decided sometime earlier. The story goes that while l was in the womb … she played the piano continuously to give me a head start … and evidently it paid off. We can look up into the sky and see magic. Billowing white pillows float through a sea of blue. You wish you could reach up and touch the clouds. To lay down in their soft embrace. When such beauty inspires us—really moves us—we search for ways to pay tribute. For director François Girard, the quandary was particularly daunting. How to capture the essence of genius. He refused to settle for a typical two-dimensional biopic that would only piece together a flimsy frame. Glenn Gould deserved more than that. He was one-of-a-kind. To pay tribute to the man and artist required more than a Hollywood formula could provide. Accordingly, Girard searched for something more. And he found it. A narrative structure mirroring Gould’s famous Goldberg Variations. The unique result—thirty two variations of a man—is film that touches the clouds. Gould: l could read music before l could read words. I heard of Glenn Gould through a friend. My head had been buried in cool, comfortable rock and roll sand where Crickets and Beatles and Stones held my gaze. I was electrified by Neil Young. I melted in the harmonies of The Everly Brothers. Searched for something greater still through open Doors. I woke up from it all in a punk frenzy and raged against the machine. Alive in the 90s, I felt the excitement of fuzz emanating inside the garage. Gould: l often think how fortunate l was … to have been brought up in an environment … where music was always present. Who knows what would have become of me otherwise? The progression of this fan’s journey was paved with wildly inspiring performances, both live and between the grooves. But I wasn’t naive. Was I experienced? (Have you ever been experienced?) I knew there was much more out there, waiting for its chance. The many roads and the detours not taken. I’d tiptoed gingerly into jazz—Coltrane and Miles—almost fearful of the financial implications of where such meandering would lead. (Record store bins. Downloading frenzies. Who had the money or time?) I had only scratched the surface of country music—real country music—and I knew I was well behind that curve too. And then, a tip from a friend to check out the world of Glenn Gould. Go see this film with the strange title. Sure … why not? The marriage of varying art forms (in this case, music and film) had excited me many times before, from A Hard Days Night to Gimme Shelter, from The Wall to Amadeus and countless others still. In the case of Thirty Two Short Films about Glenn Gould, I’m just not sure I was prepared for the awakening. The emotions the film would stir inside me. I had thought of classical music much like poetry, foreign and beyond my grasp. And yet, I found the film so inspiring on so many different levels, that I had no choice but to explore the music and ideas of Glenn Gould further. Gould: The artist should be granted anonymity. He should be permitted to operate in secret as it were … unconcerned with or better still unaware of the marketplace’s demands, which demands given enough indifference on the part of enough artists … will simply disappear. Given that disappearance the artist will then abandon his false sense, of public responsibility, and his audience or “public” will relinquish its role of servile dependency. And never the twain shall meet. I’ve been to many greatest hits concerts in my time. Karaoke nights. Large venue shows with ridiculous ticket prices. The dreadful droll of fans singing along to their favorite tunes. When they weren’t singing, these same fans would bark out requests in hopes that the trained monkeys on stage would obey. If you have ever experienced the opposite end of the spectrum—the communal euphoria of audience and performer becoming one, lost in another dimension where the artist really is invisible (as Gould longed to be), channeling something far greater than the sum of the parts (performer, audience, music)—you know you can never go back. Glenn Gould’s live performances were portals to another level of consciousness. Celebrations of the delicate purity inherent in every last note that bled through him. That his performances could achieve such heights was the greatest tribute Gould could give back to the music itself. Music he loved dearly. If this elevation could not be reached (since it required more than just the artist to reach it), then there was simply no point in performing at all. Doing so would cheat the music, the listener, and Gould himself. And so it made perfect sense that when Gould’s persona as resident genius became bigger than the magic and experience of the performance, it was simply time to move on. Poof. Just like that. No more live shows. It was time to focus his considerable energy into mastering the intricacies of the recording process. And why stop there? On to writing. He even went on to broadcast a radio show. Blink and everything changes. Every moment, fleeting and precious. With that level of awareness, you begin to understand, at last, just how extraordinary each minute can be (is). Poof. You begin to understand just how much one person can leave behind. |
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