BlogVibe

The principal doesn't think so. And, of course, the school has no funds, anyway (think what our society might be like if the funds spent on high school sports were used to help kids access the humanities). But Guaspari is persistent and establishes a music program, despite predictable difficulties, including the obligatory mother who complains her children are being taught the music of "dead white men." (The mother is correct, but man, could those guys compose!) The screenplay has the courage to go easy on the scenes involving movie romance. The Quinn character is disqualified as a candidate, and although another guy (Jay O. Sanders) comes along, this movie is not so much about romance as about practice, practice, practice. Ten years pass. The program has expanded to three schools, and is so popular kids enter a lottery to get into it. Then funds are cut, and the program is threatened. "Do you know anybody who works for the New York Times?" Guaspari thoughtfully asks a friend, and soon an article in the Times leads to a benefit concert at Carnegie Hall, with violinists Isaac Stern, Itzhak Perlman and Arnold Steinhardt playing themselves.

This second half of the film feels almost like a documentary, and no wonder; there was a documentary about this same material ("Small Wonders," 1996), unseen by me, and you can guess how Guaspari must have seemed like a natural for someone like Streep to play. The movie doesn't punch up the drama but simply shows good people trying to work together and get something done. That's why it's so effective.

Meryl Streep is known for her mastery of accents; she may be the most versatile speaker in the movies. Here you might think she has no accent, unless you've heard her real speaking voice; then you realize that Guaspari's speaking style is no less a particular achievement than Streep's other accents. This is not Streep's voice, but someone else's--with a certain flat quality, as if later education and refinement came after a somewhat unsophisticated childhood.

The movie was directed by Wes Craven, known for his horror films ("Scream," "A Nightmare on Elm Street"), and he may seem like a strange choice for this material. Not at all. He is in fact a cultured man who broke into movies doing horror and got stuck in the genre; he's been trying to fight his way free from studio typecasting for 20 years, and this movie shows that he can get Meryl Streep to Carnegie Hall just as easily as a phantom to the opera.

ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7s7vGnqmempWnwW%2BvzqZmq52mnrK4v46mrKyhk2K8p3nToZxmoJWWv7V5kHJwcg%3D%3D