Imprint: The Music of Chance

[John Cope]

I couldn't recommend Music of Chance highly enough. It's a tremendous film and it will be a real pleasure to finally have a high quality edition of it as, previous to this release, I think its only been available on a UK DVD which is frankly atrocious. The movie deserves far better than that and I look forward to seeing what extras Imprint comes up with especially given their consistently high standard. Maybe they could eventually release Haas's The Blood Oranges or Auster's Lulu on the Bridge as well.

[therewillbeblus]

I couldn't recommend Music of Chance highly enough. It's a tremendous film and it will be a real pleasure to finally have a high quality edition of it as, previous to this release, I think its only been available on a UK DVD which is frankly atrocious. The movie deserves far better than that and I look forward to seeing what extras Imprint comes up with especially given their consistently high standard. Maybe they could eventually release Haas's The Blood Oranges or Auster's Lulu on the Bridge as well.

I thought this was a flat-out masterpiece, a quietly philosophical shaggy dog tale that manages to be deeply emotional without being overstated. It’s fascinatingly restrained and an honest reconstruction of bromance pictures, with both leads giving incredibly complex and eclectic performances. Spader is unrecognizable behind facial hair and an accent, and it may be his very best work (ditto to Patinkin). Is either Haas or Auster’s other work anywhere close to on par with this?

[beamish14]

I couldn't recommend Music of Chance highly enough. It's a tremendous film and it will be a real pleasure to finally have a high quality edition of it as, previous to this release, I think its only been available on a UK DVD which is frankly atrocious. The movie deserves far better than that and I look forward to seeing what extras Imprint comes up with especially given their consistently high standard. Maybe they could eventually release Haas's The Blood Oranges or Auster's Lulu on the Bridge as well.

I thought this was a flat-out masterpiece, a quietly philosophical shaggy dog tale that manages to be deeply emotional without being overstated. It’s fascinatingly restrained and an honest reconstruction of bromance pictures, with both leads giving incredibly complex and eclectic performances. Spader is unrecognizable behind facial hair and an accent, and it may be his very best work (ditto to Patinkin). Is either Haas or Auster’s other work anywhere close to on par with this?

If you're not familiar with Smoke/Blue in the Face, they're absolute must-watch films. I like but don't entirely love The Center of the World, which was Miranda July's first feature film credit as a writer, too. Auster/Wayne Wang are up with Alain Tanner/John Berger as one of the most unusual and intriguing director/writer combos I can think of.

Regarding Haas, I'm a big fan of Angels & Insects. John Hawkes' novel The Blood Oranges is great, but the film has perennially been on my watchlist, so I can't comment on its merits.

[John Cope]

I couldn't recommend Music of Chance highly enough. It's a tremendous film and it will be a real pleasure to finally have a high quality edition of it as, previous to this release, I think its only been available on a UK DVD which is frankly atrocious. The movie deserves far better than that and I look forward to seeing what extras Imprint comes up with especially given their consistently high standard. Maybe they could eventually release Haas's The Blood Oranges or Auster's Lulu on the Bridge as well.

I thought this was a flat-out masterpiece, a quietly philosophical shaggy dog tale that manages to be deeply emotional without being overstated. It’s fascinatingly restrained and an honest reconstruction of bromance pictures, with both leads giving incredibly complex and eclectic performances. Spader is unrecognizable behind facial hair and an accent, and it may be his very best work (ditto to Patinkin). Is either Haas or Auster’s other work anywhere close to on par with this?

Glad you enjoyed it. Auster's fiction is very meaningful and formative to me though I'm torn on some of his more recent work. He has always evidenced an interest in film (which is a very pronounced part of his novel The Book of Illusions which film fans in particular should love) and so his direct involvement with it is especially gratifying. That isn't to say that it's all accomplished equally well. Even within his celebrated collaboration with Wayne Wang only Smoke is truly great while Blue in the Face is marginal at best. His solo directorial debut, Lulu on the Bridge, is fascinating and exceptional as far as I'm concerned though many have been dismissive of it. It's also one of the rare films in which the deleted scenes are first rate as a sequence unto themselves and yet were wisely removed from the finished film. His follow up, The Inner Life of Martin Frost, based upon a fictional film referenced within The Book of Illusions, was not as compelling to me upon my first viewing of it and I have not had another. For whatever reason that one remains his most recent completed film.

As to Haas, Angels & Insects has always been his most celebrated work but for me his best is easily The Blood Oranges. The Hawkes book is truly great (it's one of my favorite novels) but the film is, if not equal to it, certainly excellent in its own right (and here I'll direct you to my own intro piece on it for further clarification/contextualization). It's never been released in HD to my knowledge which is unforgivable as it would be glorious to experience that way. And speaking of works that are MIA, I have been looking for years for his earlier Magicians of the Earth documentary series but so far to no avail. Haas hasn't been active in filmmaking for a number of years now, concentrating more upon the field of the fine arts in which he was originally trained and which is perhaps best exemplified in his Four Seasons exhibit.

[therewillbeblus]

I've seen Smoke and its sequel, and loved the former but not the latter. Thankfully my library has Angels & Insects and Lulu on the Bridge so I put them on reserve, and I have The Blood Oranges cued up for tonight or tomorrow (though now I'm wondering if I should read the novel first...) Thank you both!

[therewillbeblus]

Considering blind buying The Music Of Chance based on some of the enthusiasm I've seen for it here and elsewhere. And because it looks like it is right in my wheelhouse thematically. It seems like the kind of obscure title that may not ever get a proper release here in the U.S. It's also nowhere to be found on any streaming outlet. Anyone else concur that it is unlikely to get a US release? The two Imprint titles I have purchased (The Winslow Boy and The Gambler) have both been disappointing visually, so I'm trying to justify an expensive blind buy.

I wouldn't be surprised to see FCE release The Music Of Chance, as it's very much within their label's thematic and temperamental proclivity. Also, never rule out KLSC for releasing obscure titles like this that already look fine, vs. FCE's recent trend of releasing films that only exist on terrible unrestored copies before now. That's another reason why they're my no. 1 label at the moment, though this shift does make me wonder if they'll prioritize these restorations of rarer, shoddy-looking films over stuff like Cutter's Way that have watchable copies in existence, at least.

Either way, I wouldn't bank on another label releasing a title like The Music of Chance in the way that, for instance, I'm banking on another label releasing Detective Story, a far more marketable film that attracts a wider variety of labels' tastes. The Music of Chance is a great film, and worth owning and seeing immediately. The copy I watched on back channels looked fine, so I can't imagine the new blu-ray looks terrible, though I doubt it's some incredibly-detailed outlier for the label either

[swo17]

Unless there's a new one, the back channel copy is in the wrong AR

[therewillbeblus]

Glad to have it in the right one, just another reason why everyone should support the Imprint release

[tolbs1010]

Gambling, Mandy Patinkin, a mustachioed James Spader, and some insightful praise from the commenters here. How can this not be good? I'll take a tumble for $30.

I and DeepDiscount.com thank you.

[therewillbeblus]

That's just the beginning- this goes to very unexpected and rewarding places, and Spader has never been better or less recognizable in character or appearance. I often roll my eyes when people say this, but he escapes into the role

[MichaelB]

That's just the beginning- this goes to very unexpected and rewarding places, and Spader has never been better or less recognizable in character or appearance. I often roll my eyes when people say this, but he escapes into the role

One unexpected place, at least for those who'd already read Paul Auster's source novel beforehand, being the radically altered ending - and I thought it was a particularly witty touch to give Auster himself a cameo at that precise moment, as if to say "I'm the original author, and I give this new ending my blessing."

(Rightly, as it's a significant improvement on his original one - I remember my immediate reaction to reading it being "well, that was a total cop-out.")

[tolbs1010]

That's just the beginning- this goes to very unexpected and rewarding places, and Spader has never been better or less recognizable in character or appearance. I often roll my eyes when people say this, but he escapes into the role

Finally got around to watching this and have been meaning to post my thoughts for a while. I had to ruminate on it and then watch it again a few weeks after the initial viewing. I then immediately watched it again with the commentary (not very enlightening). Not many films give you enough to chew on to warrant three viewings within a few weeks and still come away with pleasurably unresolved feelings. Perhaps this film should have it's own dedicated thread, but for now I'm going to post my somewhat disorganized thoughts here:

Spoiler

I can’t decide if the central metaphor at the heart of the film is obvious or subtle. Maybe both. Willie Stone's (Joel Grey) "City of the World" miniature model is his vision/plaything, and the implication is that he and his partner, Bill Flower (Charles Durning), are realizing that vision within the city/town that they live. The larger metaphor being that the unseen hand(s) of the masters of the universe/illuminati are composing The Music Of Chance (great title) that we all live by. We even see a disembodied hand coming down from the top of the frame to place more items/details in the model at various points in the film. This visual model as metaphor complements Flower's wonderfully ominous speech about numbers having souls and a personality of their own. Specifically, he talks about how the numbers they chose for their lottery win were prime numbers; those numbers that "refuse to cooperate, that don't change or divide, and remain the same for all eternity." Humanity reduced to numbers with some numbers controlling the rest throughout eternity. A variation on Orwell's "some animals are more equal than others." Spader's Jack Pozzi and Patinkin's Jim Nashe are a couple of non-prime numbers who are at different stages of disillusionment. Nashe still retains some belief in the social order, other people, and, most importantly, selling his time and labor as a practical solution. The circular, and somewhat pat though satisfying, ending puts Jim Nashe in the same position that we saw Pozzi in at the beginning of the film. Nashe's disillusionment is complete it seems. The kicker being that the ultimate master of this universe, the author Paul Auster, is the person who picks him up on the side of the road.

Durning and Grey are brilliant as Flower and Stone. Even their appearances seem to reflect the dichotomy of the characters' names, with Grey's slightly reptilian visage and alacrity as perfect contrast to Durning's doughy repose. This dichotomy is misleading, of course, because Flower and Stone work together in concert just as flowers and stones are married over the graves of non-prime numbers. Their matching white suits are like wedding suits and their interplay is like that of a couple that finishes each others' sentences. Their scenes were the highlight of the film for me. Joel Grey's reaction shots and imaginatively truthful line readings made me laugh multiple times. The editing by Belinda Haas captures a lot of wonderful non-verbal acting from the entire cast while never losing rhythm.

M. Emmet Walsh also scores big in his 3rd best role ever--after Blood Simple and Straight Time in my estimation--as Calvin Murks, the dependable middle man who is "just doing his job", which is mostly reminding everyone else of their jobs and enforcing the terms of the "paperwork". Great line readings throughout by Walsh. The falsely benevolent ooze that he does so well is used to great effect in this role.

Upon initial viewing, I felt less enthusiastic about the two lead performances, and I am a fan of both actors. The initial impression being that Spader was overplaying, Patinkin was underplaying, and both were playing against type. Seems like the two could flip roles and it would work just as well but be completely different. They're also both doing accents which can raise the criticism hackles of any viewer—Spader goes big, Patinkin more targeted, results varied for both. Viewing it a second and third time made me appreciate both performances much more, especially in their physicality. Spader's hunched rubbernecking vs. Patinkin's strength and stillness. Commentary guy A.S. Hamrah mentions the credit for Mandy Patinkin's Personal Trainer as a weird credit. The character's strength is central to the larger themes at play, so I can see why Patinkin, and probably the Director Phillip Haas, wanted to ensure he was in camera-ready shape. Or maybe Mandy was just really into being in shape at the time.

While the turning point of the film revolves around a poker game, this is definitely not a cards/gambling film. First viewing, I was bristling at a personal film pet peeve that many films are guilty of: unrealistically fabulous poker hands winning all the time. Over two montages and what is supposed to be two days, we see Spader's character win three different times with straight flushes. Full houses, 4 of a kind, flushes are what we see on every hand (almost). Obviously unrealistic. But then I started paying attention to the spare, declarative dialogue in these scenes. "Straight flush" "Clubs" "Two-Pair" "Heart heart heart heart....heart!". It's evocative, rhythmic, and open. The sound of the words and their vague allusiveness seem to be the intention. A stylized choice rather than going for realism.

Overall, I loved the film. This despite the fact that Imprint once again offers up a disappointing presentation. It looks like a DVD transfer. Soft source material, other reasons, whatever. It doesn't look great. As for bonus features, there are two very disappointing interviews that were filmed specifically for the release. Joel Grey and M. Emmet Walsh. Sounds good, right? Both are very short and neither talk about the film very much. Joel Grey not at all, basically. They talk about their own careers for like 4 or 5 minutes.