624 Quadrophenia

[flyonthewall2983]

Just watched the BBC documentary. The final scene with Pete is quite enlightening and foreboding of the kind of personal stress he had undertaken with everything from Quadrophenia to their "final" tour in 1982. Powerful stuff.

[flyonthewall2983]

And there it was, while it lasted.

[tachyonEvan]

I always loved Quadrophenia (the album) more than Tommy (the album), but felt as if the Tommy movie was always quite a bit better - I'll have to re-evaluate after seeing this set. Hopefully I'm not as disappointed as I initially was with Quadrophenia (the movie).

[Drucker]

I always loved Quadrophenia (the album) more than Tommy (the album), but felt as if the Tommy movie was always quite a bit better - I'll have to re-evaluate after seeing this set. Hopefully I'm not as disappointed as I initially was with Quadrophenia (the movie).

What did you like about the movie Tommy? I've always felt the complete opposite as you just described.

[Murdoch]

Ann Margaret flailing in a puddle of baked beans and Jack Nicholson sing-talking - what's not to like? (Granted I haven't seen Quadrophenia)

[flyonthewall2983]

The movie is dreadful, from my perspective as a fan of the material. I'm unfamiliar with Russell's other material so I can't really comment on where it fits in his body of work. How Townshend is able to defend it (getting nominated for an Oscar probably helped a lot, which is cool in and of itself) is probably because he is a fan of Ken's work. Musically it had it's moments (Tina Turner, Eric Clapton and of course Elton John being the highlights), but is incredibly weak compared to the album. Which mind you is not as polished as a lot of the rock music of it's time, sonically Who's Next is a stark contrast in part because Glyn Johns was more accomplished as a producer than Kit Lambert. But the album Tommy is the beginning of the long 4-year period of material that I (and a lot of other people I'm sure) consider the best they've ever done, ending with Quadrophenia.

[Roger Ryan]

Concept albums are better at evoking a consistent emotional through-line than in telling a story. TOMMY, the album, occasionally suffers from being too specific in its attempt to move a plot forward. The QUADROPHENIA album, on the other hand, paints in broader strokes and allows the listener to better identify with the material.

TOMMY the film is Russell let loose and free to indulge in over-the-top visuals merely suggested by the admittedly flimsy storyline. Townshend's song "Sally Simpson" detailed a star-struck fan who is physically scarred in an incident at a concert, but who maintains a certain fondness for the scar in subsequent years as it reminds her of her youthful passion. In the film, Russell makes the scar monstrous and literally portrays "Sally" as the Bride of Frankenstein. This exaggeration obliterates the emotional nuance of the song.

Whereas TOMMY the film slavishly exploits the source album to a fault, the film of QUADROPHENIA seems merely inspired by the 1973 album. This lighter touch is a welcome contrast to Russell's approach, but the central emotional thrust of the album again seems largely absent. This may come down to the fact that an album, like a novel, can excel at exploring the inner thoughts of a character whereas a film must show all of that externally. QUADROPHENIA the film feels bland in a way that the album does not.

[flyonthewall2983]

I always thought an interesting way to do these kinds of films would be to cut the songs out, and somehow transpose lyrics into scenery and dialogue, and likewise musical themes into score. Make the film it's own entity apart from the music.

Pink Floyd The Wall has some of the same problems you describe. That album is peppered with social and political satire, and the movie almost takes it literally, specifically when it comes to the fascist rally stuff. There's really very little on-screen impetus for Pink to immerse himself into that character in his head, as basically the majority of Geldof's performance is done his apartment mostly fixated on his television screen. Roger Waters' intent was he felt stadium concerts were becoming akin to Nazi rallies, with the star of the show wielding the power to tell 70,000 or 100,000 people whatever he wanted them to do. It sort of works on the album, but it's not as emoted as well in the movie.

[Roger Ryan]

While I agree that PINK FLOYD THE WALL has similar problems, I think the film has more success at evoking the emotions found on the album than The Who films. The absence of the father is keenly felt and I like how the National Front riot imagery is used as a stand-in for the more insular "fascism" described in the songs. I'd also be hard-pressed to think of a better visual to represent the final track ("Outside The Wall") than the child innocently disarming the molotov cocktail.

Cutting out the songs altogether would be an interesting choice, but since "story" is the last thing concept albums do well, I'm not sure the films would be much better. I suppose QUADROPHENIA comes closest to this approach. The songs are there to establish mood, but not significantly more than, say, the songs in THE GRADUATE. But by shifting the focus to the dramatic action instead of attempting to illustrate the lyrics to the songs, QUADROPHENIA comes off as oddly detached.

[flyonthewall2983]

While I agree that PINK FLOYD THE WALL has similar problems, I think the film has more success at evoking the emotions found on the album than The Who films. The absence of the father is keenly felt and I like how the National Front riot imagery is used as a stand-in for the more insular "fascism" described in the songs. I'd also be hard-pressed to think of a better visual to represent the final track ("Outside The Wall") than the child innocently disarming the molotov cocktail.

It wasn't a complete failure as a cinematic translation of the album. I agree with your points, and will add that visually (animation and live-action) it captures an utter bleakness to the character's emotional breakdown. And it's influential, Christopher Nolan cited it as such in interviews when he was promoting Inception. There's even a pretty blatant homage in Aliens too.

Cutting out the songs altogether would be an interesting choice, but since "story" is the last thing concept albums do well, I'm not sure the films would be much better. I suppose QUADROPHENIA comes closest to this approach. The songs are there to establish mood, but not significantly more than, say, the songs in THE GRADUATE. But by shifting the focus to the dramatic action instead of attempting to illustrate the lyrics to the songs, QUADROPHENIA comes off as oddly detached.

Maybe the approach would be better suited to basing an entire film around a song, as opposed to an entire album. The movie Kevin Smith is doing based on Warren Zevon's "Hit Somebody" is an example. I'm sure Dylan has inspired countless screenplays just because of one of his songs, instead of an album's worth of inter-connected material.

[manicsounds]

BlurayDefinition review

[ryannichols7]

nobody's posted this but in my Barnes and Noble, they have signs everywhere saying this now comes out August 14th* exclusively at Barnes and Noble.

(*-also known as "the day I go broke because all these August releases are so damn awesome")

[med]

Also has a 14th release date on the B & N website. Everywhere else is still listing the 28th.

[colinr0380]

DVD Beaver

[flyonthewall2983]

Blu-ray.com

[ptatler]

Here's a rather jumbled piece I wrote over at my blog. In the end, I think I like the idea of QUADROPHENIA more than the reality. I can't think of too many films made from albums that I've liked.

[flyonthewall2983]

I do wonder how the technical limitations of rock concerts in the 70's affected the choice to make these albums into the films. With Tommy once it came out, it was just the four of them with a (in today's terms) simple light show. A powerful musical performance, and Daltrey stepping up and becoming and finally becoming an equal stage presence to Townshend and Moon.

And the problems with staging Quadrophenia are legendary. In the BBC doc, Pete said that the management basically booked the tour on the fly once the album came out, and left his hands tied to do something more ambitious than what had been done before. It resulted in a bit of a frantic, clumsy presentation with Roger having to explain the story, especially to American audiences who generally had a vague idea about Mod culture.

By the time they revisited these pieces for those big reunion tours in '89 and '96-7, the technology had advanced in leaps and bounds to make the story-telling and performance sync up like never before. Especially with the Quadrophenia tour, where what was happening on screen informed the audience about the story in a way the songs alone couldn't. If that kind of stagecraft was possible in the 70's, both movies probably would have never been made.

[colinr0380]

Although with Tommy at least the film had all of those performances that likely couldn't be booked into a stage show now (Elton John, Tina Turner, not to mention the non-professional singers like Ann-Margaret and Oliver Reed), which to me makes the film stand apart from the other works.

Outside of The Who's work, there is Jeff Wayne's rock opera version of The War of the Worlds that still remains a stage show and album, so I wonder if these things were part of the zeitgeist of the times. Perhaps it would just have been impossible to have turned War of the Worlds into a film, particularly after Richard Burton's death.

[flyonthewall2983]

There's been a few rumors over the years that Genesis' The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway was going to be done as a film, most likely stirred up by fans. To convey the proper scope of it (Peter Gabriel cited Jodorowsky and West Side Story as cinematic influences on the songwriting), it would be near impossible to see it on the big screen considering the album's relative obscurity compared to the one's we've talked about so far.

[skuhn8]

There's been a few rumors over the years that Genesis' The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway was going to be done as a film, most likely stirred up by fans. To convey the proper scope of it (Peter Gabriel cited Jodorowsky and West Side Story as cinematic influences on the songwriting), it would be near impossible to see it on the big screen considering the album's relative obscurity compared to the one's we've talked about so far.

Probably too surreal of a concept album to carry in film...but there was potential.

"Grouchooo with his movies trailing/stands alone with his punchlines failing..."

[rspaight]

The CD/DVD edition of "Lamb" that came out a few years ago included the slideshow they projected onto screens in concert on the Lamb tour as a visual accompaniment to the 5.1 mix on the DVD. It's a mix of photography and artwork and some low-quality footage of the 1975 band performing. Very interesting if you like the album, and likely the closest you'll get to a "Lamb" movie.

[flyonthewall2983]

I also remember reading someone made a 50-minute film based on Marillion's Brave a year after it came out.

[rspaight]

Richard Stanley (Hardware) directed that.

[flyonthewall2983]

The BBC documentary has surfaced on YouTube again, my guess it'll be on there in some form or fashion since a lot of their docs are there in full. It can be seen here and I've already said my piece on it, but it is a recommended watch would probably have been a good fit for this release.

[manicsounds]

It was recently discussed in the "Slacker" thread about filmmakers deciding to alter flaws years after the movie was made, "Quadrophenia" also has a few lighting and exposure flaws corrected digitally by the cinematographer with Criterion's help. These seem to be exclusive fixes, and not on the Universal blu-ray or DVD. ("Mishima" also had one scene fixed on the Criterion DVD)