Film Music Exam 2

Bernard Hermann

Who was the first major composer in Hollywood to incorporate the modern sounds of contemporary concert music in consistent fashion?

Citizen Kane (1941)

What film, scored by Bernard Hermann, was believed to be his titanic achievement?

Citizen Kane

Which film’s plot tells of the rise and fall of Charles Foster Kane and is told from the perspective of 6 characters?

Orson Welles

Who starred in and produced Citizen Kane?

dissonances, tone clusters, lower ranges

The film music in Citizen Kane contains many __________, _____ _________, and predominant use of the instruments’ _______ _________ that portrayed a dark and menacing mood to match the film’s dark story.

Casablanca (1942)

Which film was considered to be one of the principal movies of the war aesthetic?

Max Steiner

____ _________’s role was critical in Casablanca. His musical score quoted many nationalistic tunes, including the French “Marseillaise” and the German “Deutchland über Alles” and “Die Wacht am Rhein.”  

“As Time Goes By”

What was the central musical theme of the movie Casablanca?

Herman Hupfield

Who composed “As Time Goes By”?

1948

In ____, television established itself as a rival force to Film showings, with its coverage of the Rose Bowl football game, and political conventions/broadcasts.

1945, 1950

The prevailing mood of movies that won Best Picture from ____ to ____ was much darker, and tackled serious issues.

Alcoholism

What issue did The Lost Weekend (1945) tackle?

Difficulties of veterans

What issue did The Best Years of Our Lives (1946) tackle?

Anti-Semitism

What issue did Gentleman’s Agreement (1947) tackle?

Film Noir

A style of film centered on the dark and pessimistic, with images of black and white contrasted with light and dark, creating deep shadows.

B

Film Noir scores contained all of the following except for what?

A. Minimal musical cues

B. Orchestration for large ensembles

C. Prevalent use of low-pitched instruments/lower strings

D. Harsh dissonant harmonies

E. Use of jazz and angular disjunct melodies

7

How many Oscars did The Best Years of Our Lives (1946) receive?

The Best Years of Our Lives

Which film tells the story of three veterans arriving home after the war?

Harold Russell

The youngest character in The Best Years of Our Lives, Homer Parrish, was played by ______ ________, a real-life paratrooper who lost both hands in a grenade explosion, which won him Best Supporting Actor, and a special Oscar for bring hope and courage to veterans.

Harold Russell

Who is the only actor to win 2 Oscars for 1 role in film?

Hugo Friedhofer

Who wrote the musical score for The Best Years of Our Lives?

Steiner, Korngold, Newman

Which three composers did Hugo Friedhofer begin his career working for?

Alfred Hitchcock

Who established himself as the foremost British director of the Silent Film era?

Alfred Hitchcock

Whose films were/are synonymous with the thriller category?

A

Which film was NOT made by Alfred Hitchcock?

A. High Noon (1952)

B.  Rear Window (1954)

C. Vertigo (1958)

D. North by Northwest (1959)

E. Psycho (1960)

F. The Birds (1963)

1955, 1965

Hitchcock produced a weekly television series that ran from ____ to ____.

1951

Louis B. Mayer resigned from MGM in what year?

The 1950s

Which decade saw massive changes in film? (the film industry was suffering massive losses due to competition from television; several film studios sold lots and movie stars broke away from studio contracts.

Popular, symphonic scores

Hollywood soon discovered the antidote in music and realized that _______ music was less expensive than __________ _______, and could bring in a much younger demographic and revenue through sales of records.

Jazz

______ changed in the 1950s, as composers sought to use the stylistic music to portray moods of sexual intensity and violence.  The impact was quite disturbing for conservative and audiences who weren’t used to its overt suggestive tones.

A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)

Which film was adapted by director Elia Kazan and composer Alex North?

A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)

The setting of New Orleans, the birthplace of jazz, was the perfect scene for jazz to emerge as source music, and the film features it emanating from barrooms, restaurants, and the radio, to mirror and accentuate the lust, instability and passion at the center of the film. Which film is this?

High Noon (1952)

What is considered to be Hollywood’s greatest Western?

Dimitri Tiomkin

High Noon was scored by ______ _______, who created a landmark moment in film scoring by including a country and western song in his score.

Tex Ritter

Tiomkin’s ballad “Do not Forsake Me” was sung by the country and western singer ___ ______, as the lyrics “Do not forsake me, oh my darlin’ till I shoot Frank Miller dead.”

“Rock Around the Clock” by Bill Haley

What was the first rock tune to hit the top of the Billboard chart?

Rock and roll

Which genre of music featured performers such as Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis, Roy Orbison, Fats Domino and Little Richard?

The Blackboard Jungle (1955)

Which movie did “Rock Around the Clock” appear in?

The Blackboard Jungle (1955)

Which film dealt with juvenile delinquency in high school?

Elvis Presley

Likewise, the rebellious young rocker _____ ________’s music featured in Love Me Tender (1956) and Jailhouse Rock (1957) provided illustrious exposure for the new genre, and made him a household name and obsession for many.

An American in Paris (1951), Singin’ in the Rain (1952), Gigi (1958)

Which 3 musicals topped the 1950s list?

George Gershwin

An American in Paris featured the music of ________ __________, including his symphonic poem An American in Paris.

An American in P

Which film became only the second musical to win an Academy Award for Best Picture?

Nationalism, expressionism

In the 1950s, American _________ and _____________ played a larger role in films, as well as the music that accompanied them.

Frank Waxman

_______ __________ won back to back Oscars for Sunset Boulevard (1950) and A Place in the Sun (1951) for his effective soundtracks to these dark films.

Sunset Boulevard

_______ ___________, a story about dementia, tells the story of Norma Desmond, an “over-the-hill” 50 year old actress who attempts to make a comeback playing Salome. 

On The Waterfront (1954)

Which film specifically deals with mob influence and crime on the Longshoremen’s Union, focusing on the heroic motives of Terry Malloy (Marlon Brando) to confront corruption, as he testifies against the mob before a Senate hearing?

Leonard Bernstein

One of the great figures of American music, who was equally successful as a composer, concert pianist and conductor. He scored On The Waterfront (1954).

melodies, dissonances, Copland, syncopated, jazz

The score that Bernstein employed features disjunct __________ and stark ____________ in the style of ________, as well as __________ rhythms and elements of ____, accentuated by drums and saxophone.

television

In the 1950s, _________ had become a staple in most American homes.

The Blockbuster Film

A phenomenon started in 1956 that saw the birth of three epics: Around the World in 80 Days, War and Peace, and The Ten Commandments

Bernard Hermann

Who scored Vertigo (1958) and North by Northwest (1959)?

Vertigo

Hermann establishes a dark mood in the beginning with dark brass chords, and imitations of ostinato-frenetic strings, cacophonous winds and glissandos help to create the audial dizzying impression of Scottie’s _______ 

Religious

The ________ epic was a genre that was as timely as it was novel.

40 million dollars

How much money did Cecil B DeMille’s remake of The Ten Commandments (1956) gross, making it the most garnered since Gone With The Wind?

Victor Young, Elmer Bernstein

_______ ________ was the chosen composer for Ben Hur, but _____ __________ replaced him when he became ill

11

How many Academy Awards did Ben Hur (1959) win?

10

How many Oscars did Gone with the Wind receive?

Miklos Rosza

Hungarian musicologist who had scored the films Quo Vadis (1951) and Julius Caesar (1953), so he was quite acquainted with the religious epic genre/trend that was emerging in Hollywood. He scored Ben Hur.

modal scales, parallel harmonies, harmonic progressions

Ben Hur features many _____ ______, ________ __________, and a lack of ________ ____________ that typified the music of the early Christian church.

The 1960s

Which decade contained many cultural upheavals, including the threat of Nuclear War and the apex of the Cold war, civil rights, sexual liberation, assassinations, the Vietnam War, and the Moon landing?

serious, popular

In the 1960s, the gulf between the “_______ arts” and the “______ arts” widened even further — rock concerts were attended by the thousands — “new music” concerts, or those in the classical tradition, were sparse in attendance.

movie classics, classics

Once movies were able to be shown on TVs, the “_____ _______” term entered the fray, and the films like King Kong and The Wizard of Oz were now ________.  

87

In the famous shower scene, Hitchcock directed __ shots with a cutting technique that actually shows no nudity and the knife stabbing Marion Crane, but in actuality, this is only implied in the terrorizing scene.

sex, violence

Psycho, as emphasized as one of the true horror genre representatives, delved into ___ and ________ more than many previous films, including showing a backside of a bra — something very risqué at the time for audiences to see.

Bernard Hermann

The soundtrack for Psycho is written for string orchestra, and eliminates the colors that would have added to it by leaving out winds and percussion. Who wrote the soundtrack?

Rite of Spring

The percussive-effects of the strings in Psycho is extremely reminiscent of Stravinsky’s ____ __ ______ masterpiece, with hard accents and pizzicato effects.

tonal clusters

Hermann favors writing the strings in _____ _______, or minor seconds and major sevenths.