The Legend of 1900: A Review

Release year: 1998

Original title: La leggenda del pianista sull'oceano

Rating: R for language (and NOTHING else)

Tagline: A beautiful story of a man who could do anything... except be ordinary.

Genre: Drama, fantasy, music, romance.

Let me just start off by saying that I love this movie, that it dominated the number 1 spot on my personal top 10 for a good, long while and that it currently contends with some of the greatest movies of all time on said list.

Max (Pruit Taylor Vince) was the trumpet player aboard a ship that ferried illegal immigrants from Europe to America, through New York, about five times a year. His introductory monologue is well-paced, ripe with emotion and vivid in the message it wants to convey. After his introduction, our story continues with Max walking into a pawn shop to sell his trumpet. Begging the owner to let him play his trumpet one last time, the owner recognizes the tune Max plays and pulls out a shoddily stitched together vinyl record. The tunes match up. The frame narrative is set up and the second story begins.

The transition is beautiful, the flashback here executed without the clumsiness that soap operas are known for. Throughout the film, time is toyed with through the use of flashbacks and quick-cuts back to the present but is handled beautifully all throughout.

The story-within-a-story begins with coal stoker Danny Boodman (Bill Nunn) picking through the ground of the upper-class party room after all of the immigrants unload. Here he finds a baby in a hand basket. You read it right. Danny decides to adopt the abandoned baby and raise him as his own. He names the child Danny Boodmann T.D. Lemon Nineteen Hundred '1900' (Tim Roth).

At this point you might be asking just how much I'm going to give away. Well the answer is, not that much really. So we're going to blur over the finger and coarser details of things here and flash forward in the plot a little bit. 1900 is now grown and, as it turns out, a musical prodigy. He is said never to have stepped foot off the ship in all his years on it.

Introduce Max. Again we're going to gloss over some details, but if you like characterization then you'll love the following scenes. The audience is given a very comprehensive grasp of 1900 as an adult. The thirst for wonder and magic, the ability to make it happen even (figuratively) and the raw, musical genius. We also get a good idea of Max, and more importantly of the bond of friendship between them.

Well, then it happens. What happens exactly? Piano duel. You read it right, and if you've never managed to conceptualize a piano duel before, let the notion detonate in your mind for a little bit.

Ready for more? Well alright then. Jelly Roll Morton (played by Clarence Williams III, Morton's real life persona is credited as a pivotal figurehead in early Jazz and who credits himself as the inventor of Jazz in the movie) hears about 1900 and challenges him to a piano duel. Three rounds, no holds barred. Slow to start, tense middle, and strong finish. Everything you could want in a piano duel, and believe me, that's saying a lot.

There is a lot of tension mixed into this as in the first story, the one with Max and taking place after the events of the ship, Max is in a race against time to convince a crew not to blow up the now defunct ship and save the man he is sure remains inside. And, to add even more punch to the bowl, inside of the second story (where we see 1900 in action), a short-lived but undeniably intense romance is interwoven into the man's legacy.

There's a LOT I've left out and with good reason. The rest of the movie is powerful and might truly inspire you.

Watch it.