Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Is it a Cosmic Coincidence? Or just universally nonsense?

The Wizard of Oz + Dark Side of the Moon = Making something big out of a very little weeeee tiny bit.

For those of you just joining me, my goal for the week was to listen to Pink Floyd's masterpiece "the Dark Side of the Moon" as I watched MGM's classic "the Wizard of Oz."

As the length of the album really only lasts up to the time Dorothy meets the Tin Man, I found that I did wish that it did run the length of the film. Some moments where the music hit upon a certain lyrical theme or crescendo, there were equally dynamic moments on screen.

When Dorothy's house gets sucked up into the tornado, the song Great Gig in the Sky starts playing. When Dorothy lands in Oz and the film switches to colour, this happens as the song Money starts. When the wicked witch shows up and hurts a few munchkins, the song Us and Them is playing and Roger Waters is singing the words, "black and blue". As Dorothy starts on her trip down the yellow brick road, the beautiful music of any color you like starts playing which gives one the feeling that a new journey is about to be embarked upon. And so on and so forth.

Does it sound like I'm starting to conjure things up here? Well maybe I am, maybe I'm not. These things did happen, but sometimes when someone is searching so hard for the meaning behind something, it's easy to make a big deal about it. Having said that, I can see why some people get so excited about this, but then I can also see why people think this kind of stuff is just ludicrous. I guess at the end of the day it's just coincidence, but I don't know if I'd go as far as calling it cosmic.

What is not a coincidence here is the fact that these are two pieces of wonderful art and that is because they were made by some of the finest artisans of their time. The fact that they are able to coexist as a visual and aural experience is quite unique. You don't have to believe in cosmic this or that to enjoy the experience, and so I would recommend it to anyone.

On a side note, having recently attended a class in Media Production where we learned a bit about composition in film, I actually found myself paying more and more attention to this. Pretty cool stuff.

As far as Pink Floyd was concerned, they wrote it to "The Sound of Music." Maybe I should watch that next week...

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