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I've seen two documentaries about Charlie Parker recently, but I haven't seen a lot of Parker. In an age when archives are filled with newsreel footage and videotape on even the most obscure of public figures, Parker seems always to have been somewhere else when the cameras were on. There is a shot of him accepting a Downbeat Award at a banquet, where the master of ceremonies solemnly informs him that jazz is color blind (if so, then why the reassurance? ), and another brief clip of him playing with Dizzy Gillespie. There are a few minutes of silent footage, too, and that's it. No complete performances on film. No interviews. No home movies. That's one reason why Clint Eastwood 's "Bird, " a musical biography of Parker, is so valuable. It supplies us with images to go with the music, and it provides an idea of the man, more than 30 years after his death. If we are to judge by Forest Whitaker 's substantial performance, Parker was a large, warm, gentle man who was comfortable with himself and loved his work.
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Plugin not supported. where to watch flatrate rent buy Original title Bird Year 1988 Running time 161 min. Country United States Director Screenwriter Joel Oliansky Music Charlie Parker, Lennie Niehaus Cinematography Jack N. Green Cast Forest Whitaker, Diane Venora, Michael Zelniker, Samuel E. Wright, Keith David, James Handy, Anna Thomson, Morgan Nagler, Bill Cobbs, Sam Robards, Arlen Dean Snyder, Penelope Windust, John Witherspoon, Tony Todd Producer Warner Bros., Malpaso Productions Genre Drama | Biography. Music. Jazz. Alcoholism. Drugs. 1940s. 1950s Synopsis / Plot This film is a tribute to the life and genius of saxophonist great Charlie Parker. Bird is a collage of passages from Parker's remarkable life, from his childhood in Kansas City, through his tumultuous interracial relationship with Chan Richardson, to his tragic death at the age of 34. Awards 1988: Academy Awards: Oscar Best Sound 1988: Golden Globes: Best Director. 3 Nominations 1988: Cannes Film Festival: Best Actor (Forest Whitaker) & Technical Prize 1988: BAFTA Awards: Nominated for Best Score and Best Sound 1988: César Awards: Nominated for Best Foreign Film (Meilleur film étranger) 1988: New York Film Critics Circle: Best Supporting Actress (Diane Venora).
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OSCAR WINNER: Best Sound The year: 1946. The event: Oakland's "Jazz at the Philharmonic. " The music streaked into the unknown, daring listeners to grab hold and fly there, too. On stage was the creator of those new sounds: Charles "Yardbird" Parker. In the crowd was the sixteen-year-old boy who would someday bring Parker's extraordinary story to the screen: Clint Eastwood. "Americans don't have any original art except Western movies and jazz, " observes Eastwood. Movie fans, of course, know that few heroes sit as tall in the saddles as Eastwood. Now the legendary America icon, whose Dirty Harry films have been praised for their jazz scores, ventures deeper into that other original American art. Eastwood produced and directed Bird, a film burnished with the magic of that 1946 concert encounter between legend and future legend and honored with an Academy Award for Best Sound in its spellbinding recreation of a man and his music. Like jazz itself, Bird rings with counterpoints and embellishments.
Samuel E. Wright is brilliant as Dizzy Gillespie, who tried to save him from the fate toward which he was so obviously speeding. We see the creation of the extraordinary Charlie Parker With Strings sessions, groundbreaking recordings whose popularity has never flagged. The music in Bird is extraordinary. Eastwood's tech staff took the original recordings, isolated Parker's solos, cleaned up the sound and then re-recorded them with contemporary musicians, including Ron Carter on bass. Eastwood, always a competent and deeply feeling director, doesn't smack you in the face with Parker's story. Artistically a feel-good tale — because the joy in Bird's playing could never be described — the tragedy of his loss at such a cruelly young age stays with you long after the film is over. The Beethoven of jazz? Absolutely. And this is one of the most deeply felt musical biographies you'll ever see. Don't miss it. How to watch it online: Cineplex YouTube Google Play iTunes David Basskin is the host of The Nightfly, Saturday at midnight on 91.
Past and future overlap as the film explores Yardbird's soaring skill and destructive excesses. Cast & Crew Director: Clint Eastwood, L. Dean Jones Jr.
This is a world where breakfast is a meal held in the late afternoon, where hotel rooms are home, where work is play, and everything else is work. Whitaker occupies this world as a large, friendly, sometimes taciturn man who tries to harm nobody and who cannot understand why the world would not let him play his music. Neither can we. Roger Ebert Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, he won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism. Bird (1988) Rated R 160 minutes about 12 hours ago 1 day 2 days ago
Bird (1988) Directed by Clint Eastwood Release Date - Sep 30, 1988 (USA) | Run Time - 161 min. | Countries - United States | MPAA Rating - R AllMovie Rating 8 User Ratings ( 0) Your Rating Overview ↓ Review Cast & Crew Awards Releases Showtimes Forest Whitaker stars as the brilliant jazz saxophonist Charlie "Bird" Parker in this elegiac biopic. Director Clint Eastwood pays full homage to Parker 's musical genius, but also devotes ample time to the musician's twin demons--drugs and alcohol-which accelerated his death at the age of 34. In his struggles to gain widespread acceptance for his music, "Bird" is forever stymied by his own self-destructiveness, and forever bailed out by the love of his life, Chan Richardson Parker ( Diane Venora). The film bemoans the decline of the brand of jazz fathered by Parker, which came to be replaced by more conventional material -- as illustrated by the "descent" into the mainstream of Parker 's mentor Buster Franklin. Also starring in Bird is Samuel E. Wright as Dizzy Gillespie.