Nobody would mistake Glenn Miller for the hipster of the century, but he did have a toehold in the best of swing (he recorded with Coleman Hawkins in 1929). In the stirring melodramatic 1954 bio-pic “The Glenn Miller Story,” the director Anthony Mann avidly depicts the young jazz musician’s search for a personal sound, together with the intimate romanticism behind his poignantly sentimental style (helped along by the tender chemistry between James Stewart, as Miller, and June Allyson, as the musician’s wife). The clip below highlights the higher notions behind Mann’s filmic devotion to Miller’s artistry.
Goings On
What we’re watching, listening to, and doing this week, online, in N.Y.C., and beyond. Paid subscribers also receive book picks.
The Front Row
The Best Bio-Pics Ever Made
The genre presents very particular artistic challenges, but here are thirty-three films that transcend them.
By Richard Brody
The Current Cinema
“Love Lies Bleeding” and the Perils of Genre
Crackling performances from Kristen Stewart and Katy O’Brian can’t quite disguise a thinness of characterization in Rose Glass’s neo-noir.
By Richard Brody
Goings On
Kim Gordon Is at the Peak of Her Powers
Also: Adventurous shows at Carnegie Hall, “The Effect” at the Shed, and more.
Goings On
Harrowing Melodrama in “A Different Man”
Also: Emotion experiments in “Jerrod Carmichael Reality Show,” the art of Sonia Delaunay, Reyna Tropical’s electro-cumbia, and more.