Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Spring 2009 - (Page 25) LOUISIANA STORY: THE REVERSE ANGLE Sixty years after the release of the controversial movie Louisiana Story, Louisiana Public Broadcasting has created a new documentary Louisiana Story: The Reverse Angle, that explores the legacy of Robert Flaherty’s film. Funding for this project came from the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities (LEH) and the Foundation for Excellence in Louisiana Public Broadcasting (LPB). The documentary has also been chosen as the 2009 Humanities Documentary Film of the Year by the LEH. Louisiana Story, released in 1948 and lauded as an artistic triumph, was film’s first look at one of America’s most distinctive subcultures, the Acadians (Cajuns) of Louisiana. The importance of this documentary was immediately appreciated in its day: along with an Academy Award nomination for Best Writing, Louisiana Story won the Venice Film Festival’s International Prize for its “lyrical beauty,” and a 1949 Pulitzer Prize for music. In 1994, Louisiana Story was declared “culturally significant” by the Library of Congress, and it was among the first films selected for preservation in the National Film Registry. Louisiana Story: The Reverse Angle, which was recorded in highdefinition, brings together the surviving key participants of the original 1940s movie and allows them to comment on this controversial film, including Richard Leacock, legendary cinematographer and associate producer of Louisiana Story, and J.C. Boudreaux, once the emblematic Cajun boy who personified Flaherty’s optimistic vision. This program takes an unusual opportunity in film history — a chance for the subjects of a seminal documentary to interpret a film that interpreted them. Reverse Angle features diverse commentary from native folklorists, artists, filmmakers, and historians who have both studied and shared in the legacy of Louisiana Story. Louisiana Story: The Reverse Angle was directed, produced and edited by LPB’s Tika Laudun (Louisiana: A History). It was written and co-produced by C.E. Richard and narrated by Grammy-winner Michael Doucet. The original music for the documentary was composed and performed by Darol Anger. Gary Allen did the post production editing for the project which was photographed by Keith Crews and Rex Fortenberry. For more information on Louisiana Story: The Reverse Angle, log on to www.lpb.org/programs/louisianastory/ Spring 2009/LOUISIANA CULTURAL VISTAS 25 STANDARD OIL (NEW JERSEY) COLLECTION, UNIVERSITY OF LOUISVILLE STANDARD OIL (NEW JERSEY) COLLECTION, UNIVERSITY OF LOUISVILLE Chopin, Tchaikovsky” or other works from the classical canon. Composer and the New York Herald Tribune’s chief music critic Virgil Thomson fit the bill. His dexterity when scoring for moving images depicting landscape — a prominent theme in Flaherty’s new picture — persuaded the director to approach the New York music critic. The composer began work in January 1947. He acquired an edited version of Louisiana Story and screened it four or five times, dividing the movie “into sections somewhat like the scenes of an opera or the movement of a suite.” He elaborated: “Then, with a detailed shooting script which itemizes each photographic shot and its length in minutes, seconds and thirds of seconds, I compose[d] the music for my musical sequences.” Thomson respected the natural sounds of oil field machinery and conversation as he interwove his score throughout the film. Meanwhile, Flaherty and his musical director agreed to fold in original music when landscape dominated the imagery and “tunes belonging to the people of the land” when scenes focused on individuals. From the New York Public Library, the musical director imagined a hardy American folk community while perusing The Southern Harmony, The Sacred Harp, and, most significantly, Acadia Parish native Irène Thérèse Whitfield’s 1939 publication Louisiana French Folk Songs. Whitfield’s work represented the first book-length academic study of vernacular Cajun music, complete with musical transcriptions outlining the melodic skeletons of local http://www.lpb.org/programs/louisianastory/
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