Music of the Heart (1999) Reviewed by Eugene Novikov http://www.ultimate-movie.com/ Member: Online Film Critics Society
"How do you get to Carnegie Hall? Practice, practice, practice."
Starring Meryl Streep, Aidan Quinn, Angela Bassett, Gloria Estefan. Rated PG.
There are two parts to Music of the Heart. One is a charming, well- developed, engrossing human story. The other is a derivative, formulaic piece of pseudo-inspirational melodrama. Priority is given to the latter. Meryl Streep does her best with it, but fails to lift it above mediocrity; the general storyline is too tired and too overdone to work with any actor or actress. This is a good effort from genre-hopping director Wes Craven, but it never does come around.
They say it's a true story: struggling musician Roberta Gaspari comes to East Harlem with her two kids to teach. Though she is met with fierce opposition, she manages to start a violin class in a local elementary school. She is treated with skepticism by the principal (Angela Bassett) and with utter contempt by the head of the music department. Determined as anything, she persists and succeeds in establishing an enormously successful program that is eventually taken beyond the elementary school and into the high school.
Meanwhile her husband and father of her two boys has left her for a former friend and she starts up a relationship with the charming Brian (Aidan Quinn), whom the boys take to well. Unfortunately it falls apart when Brian tells Roberta that he does not believe in the institution of marriage and if Roberta didn't meet all of his need he would, in theory, seek to have his needs met elsewhere. After that fling comes to a screeching halt, Roberta spends years as a single mother, until her fed up sons, now all grown up, place a personal ad in the newspaper on her behalf (but without her permission).
Her life is torn apart when, predictably, the school board cuts the budget and the violin program is cut. Her position is put in jeopardy. She decides to give the system a fight for their money. With the help of her friend, Roberta plans a benefit concert at a local theater, starring her most advanced violinists as well as a couple world-famous violin stars. Hell, she even brings back 3 of her first students, now dashing young ladies and gentlemen who still happen to remember how to impeccably play a difficult instrument.
Music of the Heart manages to go through every solitary convention usually associated with these kinds of films. There's the idealistic teacher whom nobody believes in but who triumphs at the end; the evil schoolboard that conveniently slashes the budget; the mother of a student who confronts the teacher, telling her that what she is teaching is worthless ("white man's music," in this case); and of course the big standing ovation at the end. It is a retread of a whole bunch of movies: Dangerous Minds, Mr. Holland's Opus, Lean on Me, even Sister Act. It's even less compelling.
I did like the personal story, which is far too shortened and concise. The result of the personal ad was wrapped up so abruptly it seemed like a script screw-up; I wanted to see more. Roberta Gaspari is a rich, interesting character stuck in a horrid plot punctuated by occasional heartfelt moments. The film's focus is on the wrong part of the plot; the human story would have served as a far better vehicle for thespian extraordinaire Streep.
The film was directed, oddly enough, by none other than Wes Craven, the horror-meister who brought us A Nightmare on Elm Street and Scream. I suppose he molds to the genre well, with only the slightest hints of his horror movie roots (such as a scene where Streep, upon finding out some bad news, walks menacingly down a hallway, her head low, her hair flowing, with intense music blaring on the soundtrack) left over. I appreciate the effort to break out of his niche genre, but this was the wrong project to do so; his Scream movies were much less ordinary and formulaic.
The film insists on telling us that it's a true story, almost as a justification for its trite plot. When I pan a film that was "based on a true story" on the grounds of an inadequate plot, people always tell me "That really happened: the filmmakers didn't make it up!" Well I don't care. Not every true story has to be made into a movie. This particular story has been filmed too many times, both fictitiously and allegedly based on facts. Enough already.
Grade: C
©1999 Eugene Novikov
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