Bird

Some time after Unforgiven in the 90s I began to revise my thoughts about Clint. I had been used to him being the prototype of the mindless wordless macho or the rightwing law and order guy. Hard to take him seriously. Then he became somebody else. I heard that he had made a film about Charlie Parker in the late 80s, but I never found that one. Well, now my daughter found it for me somewhere in Shanghai. I watched as immediately as possible. Alone, as none of my women could be moved to share my interest.I spent the first hour of an impossibly long film wondering why Clint had not bothered to hire a script writer. Then I thought, what is this obsession with scripts that I seem to have. Who needs a script for a life like this? What story could you possibly tell that requires a script writer?What you need is Forest Whitaker, and some people who knew what happened, like Mrs. Parker, and some original soundtracks, and some good bands for replays. There you are. Nothing else required.But you need to be a Birdfan and a Clintfan. Otherwise you might underappreciate this.

The focus of this story is primarily Bird's marriage and how the heroin and alcohol use affected his home life. He might have died even younger than 34 without such a supportive wife. However, the music of the 1940's and 1950's never gets short shrift. Clint Eastwood did the impossible and assembled 1988 musicians who were truly able to recreate the very specific excitement of a generation of musicians who were almost all dead. The whole project would have fallen apart if the music was annoying or boring. I would liked a little more time devoted to the very beginning and end of Bird's career, but clearly there is more known about the middle years. Not all of it is interesting but I suppose all of it is important to gain a true understanding of how quick and easy success is not always healthy.

I'm not gon say much but this film is so inspirational since I seen over and over. I think it was the 1st jazz film I ever watched on Charlie "Bird" Parker. Yeah Forest Whitaker does a good job on this movie which win him a award for best film or supportive actor.I'm happy I bought it on DVD instead on VHS which I didn't want.It goes to tell all the details on what's behind Bird's life on how he got involved in music, how he got addicted by drugs, how he died, when did he became a legend in the jazz era, etc.I recommend this along w/ Ray (which I like 'cuz it features Jamie Foxx which won him a whole load of accolades), Jazz-A Film by Ken Burns, The Miles Davis Story, Lush Life, Tupac: Resurrection, Let's Get Lost (the documentary on Chet Baker), Gil Evans and his Orch., Louie Bellson and His Big Band, Marsalis on Music (all volumes), just to name a few.If u love jazz or if u love Bird, you must love this movie, it'll take u inside on being the best jazz player or best jazz listener yet.

Just as "Amadeus" enhanced my appreciation of Mozart's music, "Bird" made me a Parker fan for life. The music is a star, and it never sounded better (credit fancy engineering for mixing Parker's original solos with modern recording of a backup band). The disjointedness of the timeline just serves to enhance the perception of the disjointed life of a brilliant but tragically flawed artist. The acting is fantastic, the mood and atmosphere are recreated in amazing fashion.I only wish I had a better feel for Parker's motivation for how he did things. Maybe part of the point is that he was so strongly affected and destroyed by his demons that he really did not have a motivation for how he did what he did.

I've read extensively about Bird, mainly accounts by others who had anecdotes or mentioned him in passing. I've also watched documentaries about him and jazz from his era. Piecing together the mosaic of facts, conjecture and lore this movie seems to capture his personality and life in broad strokes. As always, there are inaccuracies and artistic license. For example, the opening scene where Papa Jo Jones throws his cymbal at a very young Bird is disputed (or at best apocryphal).I personally think that Forest Whitaker did an excellent job of portraying Bird, and Diane Venora did a credible job of portraying Chan Parker. What I love, though, is this movie does not glorify Bird, but still manages to show his genius. In real life Bird was highly intelligent and articulate. I have audio of his actual interviews and I can assure you that his genius went well beyond music. Given his scant formal education his IQ was probably at the Mensa level. Part of that is captured too. Indeed, the script, directing and acting show many facets of Bird the man as well as the musician.Interestingly, the soundtrack was performed by Jon Faddis on trumpet, and backing ensembles comprised of folks who actually knew and played with Bird (Ray Brown, Walter Davis, Jr., Ron Carter, Barry Harris and Red Rodney). Bird's own playing was isolated from tapes in Eastwood's personal collection and layered into the recreated songs in the movie.Unless you are a musician or fan who is deeply into Bird (or the era), this movie will probably be a depressingly pointless waste of time. On the other hand, if you want to see a slightly fictionalized, but still accurate glimpse of who he actually was this movie will prove satisfying.

An uneven homage to jazz great Charlie Parker, directed and produced lovingly but with lots of flaws by Clint Eastwood. Basically it's a movie about Bird the drug addict and only incidentally about Bird the great innovator of modern jazz. Forrest Whitaker does a superb job in his portrayal of the almost continuously strung out Parker. He looks and talks just like him - indeed at times he seems to become him. It's a wonderful acting performance. But the character is one dimensional - really it could be about any junkie who happens to play jazz. The turth is Parker, like any great artist, worked hard at his craft, was more times than not committed to his job responsibilities, and loved what he was doing and had fun at it. The movie makes little if any recognition of these things. Instead we have a portrayal of the mythologized Bird: the free-spirited, junkie neer-do-well. Who wants to tell a story about Parker where he showed up to a gig on time, played well all night, and then went home when you can tell about the time he was 2 hours late and walked off the bandstand to shoot up in the club's men's room? We don't even get the idea of the martyred artist here, unable to confront the pressures of his art and audience - just a junkie who blew a great sax. And at 3 hours, the picture is much too long. All the arty tricks are employed, too: dark interiors, lots of shots in the rain. A lot was taken off the superior Gary Giddens documentary on Bird, too. There are mistakes galore as well, though Hollywood can be forgiven for that (i.e. he was not Charles Christopher Parker, Jr.; he and Chan did not buy a house "near Westchester" but in New Hope, PA, etc.). Some finagling was done with the music also, so that we hear Bird's solos as recorded by him but with modern sidemen added. Why? As a jazz fan I am delighted that mainstream Hollywood would do a jazz movie such as this, and I know Eastwood loves the music. I just wish it was better.

good

I am not usually a big fan of bio-pics about genius musicians because it is impossible to "act" them playing. And, after all, it is their playing that we care about. However, Clint Eastwood brings so much affection and integrity to this film and Forest Whitaker has such a perfectly fit genius of his own for this role that I think it comes off quite well.Charlie Parker was a tortured soul whose musicianship was so powerful that he was able to teach himself a virtuoso style of playing jazz alto saxophone that has influenced nearly every alto-sax player since. Certainly, anyone with pretensions to playing bebop jazz. The film captures his difficult beginnings, his powerful rise and artistry, his terrible drug addictions (and how this also provided an unfortunate influence on others), and his early, far too early, death.There is the sound of his playing throughout the movie, but it is in short snippets. We get more over the closing credits. But we get enough to remember what is special and unique about his playing. Everyone talks about his speed and harmonic variety. All that is there, certainly. However, there is also so much in Parker's commitment to what he is singing through his horn that allows us to feel the music in a way that was unique to him. Without that ability to reach into the heart of an audience, no amount of virtuosity can keep an audience for generations. Parker is still winning new fans every day and that is his greatest legacy. This film is a nice tribute to him. It is just so sad that he got onto such a self destructive path and the only way off for him was to die at 34.

Bird, is a film about the life of jazz great Charlie "the Bird" Parker. Forest Whitaker is doing a great job as Charlie Parker and the story is generally loyal to the real life, except one is lead to believe that "Chan" was his wife (in real life, she wasn't). One negative thing I felt was that the scenes were overly dark throughout the film. I think the director wanted to create an atmosphere of reality but in my opinion he overdid it to the point of annoyance. Another criticism is for a film about Charlie Parker, his talent on improvisation, his creativity could have been, and should have been emphasized more. There is a scene where he asks a friend to write a piece that he composed just that night and the friend wants to do it in the morning but by the next morning, Charlie doesn't even remember the piece, or even the conversation that took place. This is a good example but his creativity could have been emphasized with more examples like improvisation. In real life, Charlie Parker played the same piece of music differently almost every time, with some additions here and there, giving it a new mood, new angle, new taste. This could have been shown. However, despite these minor shortcomings, I think the film is a very good one. For Charlie Parker fans, I also strongly suggest the book "Bird Lives" by Ross Russell.

Very Good Biopic!