After spending years lambasting this Oscar win I saw the movie again and found his score quite clever. I have no doubt the win came from the same misguided idea that the Menken wins came from. Voting for the songs. But Bernstein approached this the way it should be, as satire. Gotta put it up with ANIMAL HOUSE and AIRPLANE as one of his best comedy scores. Somebody has got to be working on a release of this.
Still can't figure out why nobody's ever called this film on its rampant asian racism. I first saw it about 10 years ago and felt like I needed a shower afterwards to get clean.
I have very little issue with racism in film. But, since you do, I need to ask you, do you find it more racist than say, THE GODFATHER or GOODFELLAS, or any number of other Italian mob-type films? Or, say, BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY'S or GONE WITH THE WIND or DRIVING MISS DAISY or HAIRSPRAY or WHITE CHICKS or WATERMELON MAN or THE GOOD EARTH, etc., etc., etc.?
Still can't figure out why nobody's ever called this film on its rampant asian racism. I first saw it about 10 years ago and felt like I needed a shower afterwards to get clean.
Where have you been the last 50 years???
I guess you never saw "Gone With The Wind" "Song of the South" "Breakfast at Tiffanys;" or "The Godfather"
FWIW, Elmer included one MILLIE sequence, scored for an airplane ride, in one of his last retrospective anthologies, (a double CD, I believe, on Silva).
Here's a rather silly sequence featuring some scoring by Bernstein:
Too little by EB, darn-it! There's a whole lot of the "Do It Again" material in the acrobat portion and just a little by Bernstein.
It's fun to listen and pick out what is him and what appears to be someone else (sorta like Duning's work in PAL JOEY), but a little disappointing he appears not to have been given the whole job.
A release of it would be interesting to find out who did what, and what maybe got replaced.
Here's all the Movie Music up for Oscars the year Elmer won:
Music Song
“The Bare Necessities,” The Jungle Book, Terry Gilkyson, music and lyrics “The Eyes of Love,” Banning, Quincy Jones, music; Bob Russell, lyrics “The Look of Love,” Casino Royale, Burt Bacharach, music; Hal David, lyrics “Talk to the Animals,” Doctor Dolittle, Leslie Bricusse, music and lyrics “Thoroughly Modern Millie,” Thoroughly Modern Millie, James Van Heusen and Sammy Cahn, music and lyrics
Original Music Score
Richard Rodney Bennett, Far From the Madding Crowd Elmer Bernstein, Thoroughly Modern Millie Leslie Bricusse, Doctor Dolittle Quincy Jones, In Cold Blood Lalo Schifrin, Cool Hand Luke
Scoring of Music, Adaptation or Treatment
DeVol, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner? Alfred Newman and Ken Darby, Camelot Lionel Newman and Alexander Courage, Doctor Dolittle André Previn and Joseph Gershenson, Thoroughly Modern Millie John Williams, Valley of the Dolls
White slavery still exists. Teenaged prostitutes disappear every year by the bushel, usually ending up in Arab harems.
Which is why watching it as a comedy with stereotypical Chinese (played by anglo) villain and goofy lackeys left me feeling sleezy in my liberal PC shoes.
I have very little issue with racism in film. But, since you do, I need to ask you, do you find it more racist than say, THE GODFATHER or GOODFELLAS, or any number of other Italian mob-type films? Or, say, BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY'S or GONE WITH THE WIND or DRIVING MISS DAISY or HAIRSPRAY or WHITE CHICKS or WATERMELON MAN or THE GOOD EARTH, etc., etc., etc.?
Breakfast at Tiffanys does make me cringe every time Mickey Rooney comes on screen, though it's a small enough portion of the movie that I can still enjoy the rest.
Gone with the Wind I am able to watch with an adult appreciation of the racism as a sign of its times and the fact that one of the performers was awarded an Oscar shows that their (naive) hearts were in the right place even if their execution had a long way to go.
With the organized crime movies, although Godfather/Goodfellas and many others happen to be about mobsters who are Italian, I don't come away feeling liking either is making a statement that all mobsters are Italian or that all Italians are mobsters. If you're Italian and are offended by these films, I think you're assuming the behavior of these characters is an ethnic stereotype when the reality is that a portion of organized crime is tied to people of Italian decent. I suppose if any villain is of non-wasp decent, that some members of that group might be offended, but the world is full of good and bad people of all backgrounds. Why shouldn't movie characters, good and bad, be the same?
While the others you mention I've never seen, there are plenty of racist films out there when watched outside the context of the times in which they were made, and some I don't watch because of it, but Millie makes me particularly uncomfortable and it happened to be the film being discussed in this thread so I thought it worth mentioning because it isn't often talked about and the film so wears its racism on its sleeve (much like Birth of a Nation) that it's hard to appreciate without being put off by its racist imagery.
White slavery still exists. Teenaged prostitutes disappear every year by the bushel, usually ending up in Arab harems.
Which is why watching it as a comedy with stereotypical Chinese (played by anglo) villain and goofy lackeys left me feeling sleezy in my liberal PC shoes.
Let's not overdo it. "Mrs. Meers" may dress like a dragon lady but she isn't suppose to be Chinese.
With the organized crime movies, although Godfather/Goodfellas and many others happen to be about mobsters who are Italian, I don't come away feeling liking either is making a statement that all mobsters are Italian or that all Italians are mobsters. If you're Italian and are offended by these films, I think you're assuming the behavior of these characters is an ethnic stereotype when the reality is that a portion of organized crime is tied to people of Italian decent. I suppose if any villain is of non-wasp decent, that some members of that group might be offended, but the world is full of good and bad people of all backgrounds. Why shouldn't movie characters, good and bad, be the same?.
I sorry, but there are other races in orgainzed crime - not only races but religions/sexual orientation etc.
The fact that you know a portion of organized crime is tied to people of Italian decent is because of films like "the Godfather" "Goodfellas" and tv shows like "the Sophranos"
Every country has orgainzed crime - but in America - its the Italians who the movies concentrate on
besides the Asian men in Millie were played but Asian men! So why would you want a shower?
