I have never thought about what defines a musical compared to a film with music in it before this week. Barry Keith Grant states in The Hollywood Film Musical that the ‘definition of the film musical is a matter of some debate’ (2012, p.1). I think that music has to be relevant to the narrative advance the story. I think that a defining characteristic of a musical is that the characters don’t realise that they’re singing, they’re in an ‘imaginary space’ (Grant 2012, p.1).

As Grant explains, ‘music does comment on the characters and their situations, but does not emanate from them. This makes all the difference between a musical film and (…) the film musical.’ For example in 10 Things I Hate About You (1999) Patrick (Heath Ledger) serenades Kat (Julia Stiles) with a rendition of Can’t Take My Eyes Off You. This doesn’t make the film a musical simply because there is a musical number in it, the song doesn’t move the narrative forward , it’s just decoration.

The charmed space that exists in musicals, such as One Night the Moon (2001), allows the characters to sing their emotions without other characters noticing. As Fiona Probyn (2002) states, the music in the film ‘is a vehicle for moving the narrative forward and underscores a central theme of the film’ (p.2). The song, This Land is Mine/This Land is Me played a big part in delivering the message of the film about land ownership vs belonging. When watching the film I actually didn’t notice how little talking there is, only communication via songs. This shows Grant’s point that ‘musical’s privileged space is a place of transcendence when time stands still’ (Grant 2012, p.1).

References:

Grant, Barry Keith (2012). Introduction. In The Hollywood Film Musical. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, pp. 1-6.

Probyn, Fiona (2002). “This land is mine/This land is me”: Reconciling harmonies in One Night the Moon. Senses of Cinema, 19.