In my review of A Complete Unknown, I noted that early critiques of the film prior to its release surrounded screenwriters James Mangold and Jay Cocks’ decision to focus on the early career of Bob Dylan. The Greenwich Village folk scene of the early 1960s which Dylan arrives into at the beginning of the film, it was argued, had already been effectively rendered in the Coen Brothers film Inside Llewyn Davis, thus negating the impact of seeing it again in Mangold’s film. The Coens’ depict the scene as a home for wayward travellers, rural-born country folk who travelled to New York City with nothing but an acoustic guitar and a dream of making a name for themselves singing songs that told stories of the places they came from, a haven for people who still like ‘the old music’ and rejected the modern frivolities and aggression of rock ‘n’roll and other burgeoning genres.
What makes Inside Llewyn Davis such an effective representation of that era of folk is its honesty about the fact that the Greenwich Village scene, like every music scene before it and since, was not ideologically pure, or solely populated by the ‘blue-eyed, good-hearted country boys’ that it lauded as its heroes. Llewyn himself is a mercenary asshole, seeking fame more than popularity, using people, and continually demonstrating a lack of empathy, and while he seems to have tied himself to folk music, we can’t even really be sure if he likes it. A Complete Unknown, hints at this being young Bob’s feelings too, with his desire not to label himself as a “folk with a capital F” musician, more an acolyte of Woody Guthrie.
Due to Dylan’s increasing fame and notoriety, Mangold’s film has to quickly shed the dank cafés, the twangy tunes and the wide-eyed idealism, while Llewyn Davis continues through it, growing more disillusioned with every passing moment, making the Coens’ film work more as a depiction of the folk scene.
This led me to wonder about depictions of other music scenes, or indeed just the evocation of a musical genre, in popular films. The difficulty presented for screenwriters and directors is stark from the outset. Music scenes are organic environments, born of a coalescence of people, social conditions, the political landscape, technological advances, artist innovation and the relative availability of money. Into this melting pot, musicians pour their creativity, joy and pain to create music which helps them to define the moment. Historical narrative filmmaking, by its definition, is inorganic, a recreation, and as such original participants or bystanders to music scenes are often frustrated by what the films get wrong. Most directors are also often not seeking to represent ‘the scene’ in the film per se, but use it as a vehicle to show the origins of one particular artist, even if that means a hasty and lazy portrayal of the environment that helped create that artist’s unique sound.
My attempt with this piece is to identify the best representation of different musical genres or scenes found in popular film. The film didn’t have to be a biopic, though it could be. It didn’t have to even necessarily be a ‘music movie’, if it still managed to capture the scene’s essential attitude or vibe. This final point was key in my first selection.
Grunge: Reality Bites (1994)
There are plenty of people who will consider it heresy not to choose Cameron Crowe’s 1992 film Singles as the best representation of grunge on screen. Singles is set in grunge’s hometown of Seattle, has a dedicated grunge soundtrack, features live performances by grunge bands and, for added authenticity, Crowe even cast luminaries of the scene such as Eddie Vedder and Chris Cornell as actors in the film. However, the scene itself ultimately feels like window dressing to a conventional and somewhat haphazardly-executed plot about a group of people who live in the same apartment complex looking for love. Crowe often claimed that the TV show Friends owed him a debt for his idea.
Ben Stiller’s Reality Bites is set in Houston rather than Seattle, features no luminaries of grunge in minor acting roles and, other than one Dinosaur Jr. song, doesn’t really boast a grunge-heavy soundtrack. In terms of the essence of what grunge is, however, it is a vastly superior representation. Grunge arose from post-Cold War apathy and discontentment, specifically among young, White Gen-Xers. The ‘forgotten generation’ had, by the early 90s, reached their twenties and found themselves totally disillusioned with the nuclear family, the nine-to-five job and the American dream, essentially everything their parents believed in. This perfectly describes the outlook of Lelaina (Winona Ryder) and Troy (Ethan Hawke) in the film Reality Bites. Troy is a quasi-libertarian malcontent who records answering machine messages like “At the beep, please leave your name, number, and a brief justification for the ontological necessity of modern man’s existential dilemma, and we’ll get back to you,” while Ryder’s Lelaina is a wannabe filmmaker drifting from one existential crisis to the next. Major conflict between the two friends arises when Lelaina starts dating Michael (Stiller) who encapsulates the ‘yuppie’ capitalist paeans that Troy despises.
Despite Cameron Crowe’s best efforts, nothing more perfectly summarises grunge than Ethan Hawke ending up with the girl at his estranged father’s funeral while Stiller’s TV exec uses his and Ryder’s relationship as fodder for a new show.
Classic Rock: Almost Famous (2000)
Where Cameron Crowe failed with Singles, he more than made up for in 2000’s Almost Famous. Telling the semi-autobiographical story of a high school music writer who is contracted by Rolling Stone to follow an up-and-coming band in the early 70s, Almost Famous’ primary advantage is its use of a fictional rock band (‘Stillwater’) as an entryway into the hard rock scene, and also making our lead character a fifteen year old superfan. This was a scene that perfectly appealed to fifteen year old boys: the music was loud and scuzzy and dangerous, the scene was filled with groupies and hard drinking and drugs, and the personalities were big and brash. These are all the reasons that William Miller adores this music, and why he idolises Stillwater’s guitarist, Russell Hammond (Billy Crudup), but he quickly becomes disillusioned by both Hammond and the scene at large, illustrative of the wider critical analysis of this genre which burned itself out through sheer hedonism as the 70s wore on. The ‘outsider-looking-in’ technique that Crowe employs helps capture the highs of the scene without sinking us into the malaise and languor of other classic rock films like Oliver Stone’s The Doors. The legendary soundtrack also features many of the heavy hitters of the genre like Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, The Who, Deep Purple and The Allman Brother Band.
Britpop: Trainspotting (1996)
Perhaps an obvious pick given the time of its arrival and its cultural associations, Danny Boyle’s Trainspotting remains as important of a Britpop touchstone as Oasis vs. Blur or Pulp’s ‘Common People’. Telling the tale of four friends from Edinburgh who become deeply immersed in the heroin scene of the early 90s, Trainspotting is the marriage of two of the major factors behind Britpop’s success: the American-influenced working class desire for ‘the good life’ that drove the aspirant songwriting of Oasis, and the middle class anti-establisment, anti-commercial, anti-yuppie cynicism that served as Blur’s modus operandi. Renton, Sick Boy, Spud and Tommy desire the good life that Liam Gallagher sings about in ‘Rock ‘n’Roll Star’ without any of the talent needed to realise it. At the same time, they philosophise about the world’s ills (as in the iconic opening ‘Choose life’ monologue) and wax lyrical about the moral and physical degradation of the society around them. Absent the will or know-how to make changes to either, they turn to other methods to escape the boredom and drudgery, namely hard drugs.
Trainspotting’s soundtrack memorably features many of the big Britpop bands of the era such as the aforementioned Blur and Pulp, as well as Elastica and Primal Scream, but like Reality Bites’ depiction of Britpop’s American cousin in grunge, Trainspotting’s status as THE Britpop film is more to do with its accurate representation of the time period and attitude that led to the music’s popularity. Though it would have been a grave error to change it, Renton’s drug overdose scene, memorably soundtracked by Lou Reed’s ‘Perfect Day’, could just as easily have featured Oasis’ ‘Live Forever’, a song about the belief that something else, anything else, is better to hope for than accepting the reality of the now.
Rap: Juice (1992)
Rap is a hard genre to accurately represent on screen. The mixture of social commentary, underdog mentality, aspirational wealth and power, aggression and poetry is an alchemical mix that can often be over-simplified in the conventional format of a screenplay. Most Rap biopics miss the mark in over-emphasising one of these conditions over the others to define an artist: 8 Mile focuses on Eminem’s outsider status, Notorious really hammers home Biggie’s upbringing, All Eyez on Me laughably ignores the importance of Tupac’s upbringing.
Ernest Dickerson’s Juice is not a film about Rap, but it arrived on a wave (initiated the previous year by John Singleton’s masterpiece Boyz n the Hood) of movies about the reality of life for young Black men, the oppressive society that weighed on them, the need to scrape and scrounge to eke out a ‘piece’ for themselves, all the while dreaming of something better. Singleton’s film is undoubtedly superior, but the arc of Juice’s quartet of characters is much more illustrative of the narratives that defined early Rap. It also has particular resonance given that its star, Tupac Shakur, came to be the ultimate representation of the gangster rap sub-genre, and many speculate that his portrayal of the character of Bishop in this film affected the music he made thereafter.
It should be noted that Juice is very much a representation of the defining characteristics of west coast Rap. For east coast Rap, Hype Williams’ 1998 film Belly serves as a good analogue.
Country: Coal Miner’s Daughter (1980)
Many famous country musicians had rather tragic lives, which is often why they make good subjects for biopics, or films about the destructive arc of stardom, like the Streisand and Bradley Cooper versions of A Star is Born. Country music is a heavily romanticised genre whose best songs work because of their intimacy and humanity, such as Dolly Parton’s mega-hit ‘Jolene’, where she sings directly to her love rival, begging her not to take her man.
For this reason, a straight biopic is the likely best choice to represent the soul of country music. Multiple country music stars have been immortalised on screen, from Hank Williams to Patsy Cline to Johnny Cash. However, the best of these films remains Michael Apted’s Coal Miner’s Daughter. Portraying the early life, rise, struggles and comeback of country legend Loretta Lynn (a role for which Sissy Spacek won the Oscar for Best Actress), Coal Miner’s Daughter depicts the life that country musicians often wish to portray themselves as having come from, even to this day: humble beginnings in a rural town in the American Midwest or South, fighting off the misery of existence through the power and soul of music, and through it, dragging themselves out into the bright lights of Nashville.
Coal Miner’s Daughter is not an unconventional biopic, following a similar arc that modern viewers will recognise, but its representation of that intimate pain that sparks the greatest of country songs is undeniable, and Spacek is excellent in the lead. Though Robert Altman’s Nashville remains the best film made in the sphere of country music, Apted’s film is the benchmark for what we think of when we think of the genre.
Classical: Fantasia (1940)
For centuries, classical music has represented the pinnacle of artistic expression in music. Prior to the 20th century, classical music would have still been regarded by the wealthy and upper classes as the only ‘real’ form of music, with other existing genres like traditional folk and gospel being seen as novelties for the amusement of the peasant classes. In 1940, when Fantasia was released, classical music was still subject to heavy gatekeeping and class exclusion, and attempts to modernise or popularise it were treated with suspicion by purists.
Fantasia is a largely plot-free film which features the performance of eight pieces of classical music, mostly by the Philadelphia Orchestra. Accompanying the music are a number of short Walt Disney animations. Many are abstract or don’t feature prominent characters. The noted exception to this is the performance of ‘The Sorcerer’s Apprentice’ by French composer Paul Dukas, which famously features Mickey Mouse as the titular apprentice attempting to perform several spells. Some of the most world-renowned and recognisable classical pieces of all time feature in the two-hour film, including Tchiakovsky’s ‘Nutcracker Suite’, Stravinsky’s ‘The Rite of Spring’ and Beethoven’s ‘Pastoral Symphony’.
What makes Fantasia the ultimate depiction of classical music in film is its ability to see past the barriers of class in order to marvel at the beauty and majesty of the music itself. It would have been controversial to say the least for Disney to marry the high art of classical music with the perceived low art of hand-drawn cartoon animation, but the use of the latter helps to express the dynamism, expressiveness and purity of the former. For many people born in the years after its release, this film would have served as their first exposure to classical music. Like Milos Forman’s Mozart biopic Amadeus, Fantasia also exposes the playfulness and joy inside a genre that to outsiders would have seemed cold and austere.
Pop: Mamma Mia! (2008)
Pop music is not a genre that has been often rendered in a standalone film. Indeed, it is often used in films centred around other genres as a sign of the subject’s fading love of music, and acceptance of the easy popularity provided by soulless computer-generated music, such as in 2018’s A Star is Born. Brady Corbet, director of The Brutalist, attempted to render the life of a particularly fragile popstar in his divisive film Vox Lux, but the dark and serious subject matter was very much at odds with the musical genre he was working in. Pop, by its very nature, has mass appeal. It’s fun, energetic, somewhat insipid and nonsensical at times, but always with the aim of lifting the mood.
Kind of describes the film Mamma Mia, doesn’t it?
Based on the jukebox stage musical of the same name and comprised wholly of songs by pop music legends ABBA, Phyllida Lloyd’s film is a carefree, cookie-cutter, pure-of-heart romp that’s impossible not to smile at while watching. It’s fitting that the (on reflection) bonkers plot of Mamma Mia is ultimately secondary to the music. Examining the ABBA songs that have the biggest centrepieces in the film, we have the title track, in which the lead character of the film self-flagellates for allowing herself to be cheated on by virtue of simply being too horny. We also have the entire cast singing ‘Waterloo’, a song comparing Napoleon’s surrender and acceptance of his fate at the titular battle to the singer’s surrender to the charms of their would-be lover.
Insanity. Madness. Pierce Brosnan. It’s pop music perfection.