GG: 32 Short Films

[Mary Jo Watts <mwatts@rci.rutgers.edu>]

The subject of _32 Short Films about Glenn Gould_ we have only 
discussed on the list in passing threads, oddly enough...   

I have a feeling this will be an unpopular opinion, but here she goes.
As much as I like _32_ for its original approach to biography, and as
much as I admire the acting skills of Colim Feore (who appeared recently in 
a Lifetime network movie-- a terrible thing called _Where's the Money, 
Noreen?_ also starring Bruce Springsteen's ex-wife!), I find _32_ to be
cliche ridden, and often vapid (which is pretty much the stance of
Kevin Bazzana, the editor of _GlennGould_, the magazine-- Christy
mentioned him in her last post). 

There *are* pieces I like very much-- the "Tristan" scene with the boy
Gould shows the lonely side of childhood-- the pill scene is amusing
and frightening at once-- the dramatization of "GG interviews GG about
GG--" (where the puritanical GG makes a pun out of "fallacy!") The
love letter and the stock market scenes...

But for every gem there is ridiculousness-- the boy Gould on the dock 
spouting numbers like a child math prodigy (I've never run across any
indication that GG was anything but ordinarily talented in most things
except piano playing, studio editing and stock-market speculation.)
And the wild gesticulations of Feore in the studio-- the real Gould
would have been in the hospital if he'd have conducted so grandly!  
(The videos that exist of him conducting away from the piano show him
very tightly controlled-- with his trademark fluttery hand gestures-- and 
conducting left handed.)  

I wonder what kind of cinematic autobiography GG would have made--
surely it would have been fiction.  Maybe he'd be quite pleased with _32_.

-Mary Jo