The Hills Are Alive

with the sound of Anti-Nazi sentiment. I just watched The Sound of Music tonight for the first time in probably 10 years and i gotta say, i was amazed at the amount of political and social commentary that i missed the first few go 'rounds. And about a third of the film. My family taped the movie when it came on tv in about 1990 and there were dozens of scenes that the network had apparantly cut for time's sake--scenes that we saw for the first time tonight when it aired on ABC's "Wonderful World of Disney." I finally came to appreciate several characters that previously had been mentioned only fleetingly in what was merely a story about a governess teaching children to sing. I came to appreciate Frau Schmidt (the maid), the Baroness, Max, and just how much Captain von Trapp really hated the Nazis. And so many more of the scenes made sense! there's a Story to the film, an actual interesting, mature, and stable focus to it that has jack squat to do with deer or tea with or without jam and bread. Turns out that missing hour of film contained the entire pertinent plot. (Did you know its a 3-hour film? Originally it had an intermission. the copy i have can't be more than one and a half hours long. I should torch it for being such a blatant bastardization.) It hits on issues of national identity such as culture and history, pre-WWII concepts of finance and family, treatment of religion by the State, heroism, and despair. All the themes that you'll never hope to pick up on when they cut out everything but the songs! I've just been amazed by this film--it always bored me as a child, but now that I've studied european history for at least five years and seen some of the effects of the Blitz and WWII (to England--slightly different story) personally I can honestly say that I have gained a new appreciation for The Sound of Music.