09/15/06 The Sound Of Music

The Sound Of Music (1965), directed by Robert Wise

watched w/ Leslie; DVD (borrowed from parents) @ home

Today is a very special day for me & Leslie...as it is our third anniversary of dating. For me, this is significant for not only sheer length of time to be in a strong and loving relationship, but also to be so damn in love that I'm blindsided by letting my guard down and finally getting around to seeing such a sappy musical classic as "The Sound Of Music." My lovey-dovey side must be getting the better of me, but who cares...I love her, and I'm sure giddy Austrian singing in the snow-capped mountains while escaping Nazi persecution and religious convents only to become a nanny of militaristic youngsters and fall in star-crossed love with a disciplinarian starched-collar type can't be so bad? Can it? Heck, this is Mary Poppins after all isn't it? She can do anything with a spoonful of sugar. Alright folks, everyone must know the tale by now, but for newcomers like me, here's the break-down. Maria (Julie Andrews, aka Mary Poppins) plays a troublesome nun-in-training who is sent to the estate of retired naval Captain Georg Von Trapp (who I didn't even realize until the end credits was a much younger Christopher Plummer...who sounds Shakespearean Brit, but is actually Canadian by birth) to care for the widowed man's seven rowdy children. As a rebellion to the Captain's strict rules, the children misbehave and scare off potential nannies right & left...that is until Maria. Setting her own pace at the job, this sweet fraulein sees to it that the children get more love & affection to avoid their attention-getting antics...and furthermore sets her flirtations with Georg on high to break into his tough exterior shell. Once Maria opens their world to love, song and dance, the family unit becomes stronger...only to come to a heart-breaking separation when Maria flees back to the convent and Georg is set to marry another Baroness. Well, guess what, once all the dust settles and the frilly attired musical numbers cease...it's actually a pretty decent touching story. Maybe I'm becoming an old sap myself, or maybe I like exotic Austrian singing, based on true stories. Whatever, it's my anniversary, and I can rock out to classics if I want to.With such well-known monster ballads as "Edelweiss," "My Favorite Things," "So Long, Farewell," and "Do-Re-Mi"...how can you go wrong?! My favorite is the naughty "Sixteen Going On Seventeen," which was later covered by Winger in the early 90's. OK, I'm lying, but I bet you never thought you'd hear references to Winger and Sound Of Music in the same sentence eh?

3 out of 5 stars