Michael Wager Movies
The Ismail Merchant-James Ivory team generated this account of a pair of teachers battling for the rights to produce an unpublished Jane Austen play. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Anne Baxter, Robert Powell, (more)
- 1973
This program features one in a series of lectures given by Leonard Bernstein at Harvard in 1973. His accomplishments both in serious music and for the Broadway stage and his flair for teaching young people combined to make Leonard Bernstein a well-known conductor, composer, and teacher. After retiring in 1969 from a long and illustrious career as conductor for the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, Bernstein turned much of his energy to teaching. This particular lecture examines how Igor Stravinsky kept tonality viable while freely experimenting with dissonance. The Russian-born composer Stravinsky, best known for his ballets, developed an interest in and made lasting contributions to serial, or 12-tone music. Invited to lecture at Harvard University in 1939, Stravinsky moved to the United States, making his home in Hollywood. There, through collaborations with the young American musician Robert Craft, Stravinsky became interested in serial music -- particularly that of Anton von Webern. Stravinsky's Canticum Sacrum for voices and orchestra and the ballet Agon contain 12-tone elements and were followed by the fully serial works Threni, Movements, Variations, and Requiem Canticles. The flamboyant Bernstein talks about Stravinsky's achievements and contributions. Included in the film is a complete performance of Stravinsky's Oedipus Rex. ~ Rose of Sharon Winter, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Leonard Bernstein
One major film star referred to director Nicholas Ray as a "loser," because of Ray's alleged willingness to let his more temperamental actors walk all over him. Evidently, Ray had a very compliant and cooperative cast in King of Kings, inasmuch as the film emerged as one of the most disciplined Biblical epics ever made. Jeffrey Hunter is cast as Jesus Christ, delivering a wholly credible performance in this most taxing of roles (never mind the wags who referred to the film as "I Was a Teenage Jesus"). Siobhan McKenna is a radiant if somewhat overaged Mary; Hurd Hatfield offers a properly preening Pontius Pilate; Rip Torn portrays Judas more for the tragedy than the treachery; Robert Ryan (a personal favorite of Ray's) is one of the best John the Baptists you're ever likely to see; and Harry Guardino convincingly interprets Barabbas as a firebrand political extremist. The only false note in the casting is the MGM-dictated selection of teenaged Brigid Bazlen as Salome. The best aspect of the film is its handling of the days after the Resurrection; the "Jesus sightings" are offered as secondhand information, so as to retain some of the mystery inherent in the Scriptures. King of Kings was previously filmed in 1927 by Cecil B. DeMille, with a middle-aged H.B. Warner as Jesus. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jeffrey Hunter, Hurd Hatfield, (more)
Produced and directed by Otto Preminger, Exodus is a 212-minute screen adaptation of the best-selling novel by Leon Uris. The film is concerned with the emergence of Israel as an independent nation in 1947. Its first half focuses on the efforts of 611 holocaust survivors to defy the blockade of the occupying British government and sail to Palestine on the sea vessel Exodus. Paul Newman, a leader of the Hagannah (the Jewish underground), is willing to sacrifice his own life and the lives of the refugees rather than be turned back to war-ravaged Europe, but the British finally relent and allow the Exodus safe passage. Once this victory is assured, 30,000 more Jews, previously interned by the British, flood into the Holy Land. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Paul Newman, Eva Marie Saint, (more)
- 1955
The first Israeli film to enjoy success outside its borders, Hill 24 Doesn't Answer is set during the war of 1948. As the Arabs endeavor to gain control of the Holy Land, we concentrate on four people who've cast their lot with the Jews: Irishman Edward Mulhare, American Michael Wager, Palestinian Arieh Lavi and Yemenite girl Margalet Ovid. As the foursome holds tenuously onto the militarily crucial Hill 24, the film flashes back to show why and how these disparate souls have come together for this undertaking. Haya Harareet, who later co-starred with Charlton Heston in Ben-Hur, plays the underground worker who galvanizes Mulhare into joining the Israelis. While each actor speaks his or her native language, Hill 24 Doesn't Answer is generally shown on TV in an English-dubbed version. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Michael Wager, Arieh Lavi, (more)
