Watched: 09/07/2026
Format: FX Movies on basic cable
Viewing: Second
Director: Steven Somebody
I was performing repetitive manual tasks (dealing with comic books. Where my fellow nerds at?) which means I need something to occupy my brain, but not something *new*, as I might get up to perform part of a task, move around, etc... And then I saw the 2021 version of West Side Story was on cable, and, sure, why not?
I first saw the play in about 5th or 6th grade with our own Matt A. at the former Capital City Playhouse in Austin. I then saw the 1961 film in about 1992, and so ask me about bearing witness to Rita Moreno as Anita in her lavender dress.*
But this was the 2021 version, which *also* features Moreno, but doing fewer high kicks.
I really dig this version, too. I feel like Spielberg did it right, bringing his sense of visuals, character and narrative tension which he built his career on to the material and made it feel both fresh and deeply rooted in the time and place from whence it sprang, managing to make it speak to the now.
It also fills in some narrative gaps and does some info-dumps to clarify the situation in New York which the general population would have known by osmosis in 1961, but which has shifted and shifted and shifted in the decades since. The actual politics, economics and on-the-street situation in the film is made abundantly clear in a way it just wasn't previously.
I'm just checking in on this one. No real notes. And will say, I'm really glad DeBose and Ziegler are both doing great on the other side of this film. The guy who played Riff is slated to be in the new East of Eden movie.
I recall people being a little weird about this when it came out, and a lot of the commentary came down to skill issues and that even dummies can have internet access. And people oddly offended that a play, done in every town in America, which was a movie, should get remade when the first movie had some really odd weaknesses (like making all the Puerto Ricans wear matching full-body make-up).
So, yeah. I dig it.
*Great googly moogly
My only beef with the new version is the same as a lot of modern movies, where cranes and other technologies make it easier for the camera to swing hither and yon, but at the cost of the precision older movies used to their advantage. The OG choreo and framing had to hit perfectly, and it’s a miraculous movie where every frame is serving up electricity and intent. Spielberg’s is a bit more “alright boys, let’s spend some money and fly the camera around, y’all just keep dancing out there and don’t worry about us.”
ReplyDeleteAs I understand it, Robert Wise fired Jerome Robbins off the 1961 version because of that precision and not letting him just cut around the dancers. I do think it's a tale of two approaches - I appreciate what you mean about the 1961 version and also appreciate what Spielberg did to show more of the world inhabited by the characters to do a bit more storytelling per frame.
DeleteI still vividly remember singing "We don't need another hero" when Tony passes at that Cap City Playhouse production. Hopefully I wasn't too obnoxious about that - I still worry on occasion that I was loud.
ReplyDeleteWell, I still think about you doing that every time I see the movie, so it left at least one person with an impression!
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