Classics in the Cinema, quiz 2 on QuizRevolution

Stanley Kubrick became increasingly known for using very little original score in his films, and using a wide variety of classical music to accompany his dramas. This first became really noticeable with 2001: A Space Odyssey. The 140 minute film contains only 40 minutes of dialogue and harks back to 'silent' film storytelling. Kubrick likewise followed the once common early cinema approach of extensively applying selections from popular classics. Since then the method has become increasingly popular with directors from Woody Allen to Michael Mann.

Woody Allen, himself a highly talented clarinettist who famously opted to stay in New York and play jazz on the night Annie Hall swept the Oscars, almost always chooses to use classical music over newly composed score in his films. The opening of Manhattan (1979) accompanied by the iconic Gershwin Rhapsody remains his most celebrated fusion of sight and sound.

Mozart is one of the most popular composers with filmmakers. So successful was the use of his music in the 1967 Swedish romance Elvria Madigan that his piano concerto No.21 is now often referred to by the title of that film.

Little known outside France, Tous les matins du monde, starred Gérard Depardieu as Marin Marais and Jean-Pierre Marielle as Monsieur de Sainte Colombe. Both composers were masters of the viola da gamba. In 1992 the rather austere drama won seven César awards, including Best Film, and was nominated for a further four.

The Piano Concerto No.2 is most associated with David Lean's classic Brief Encounter (1945), but it had long before made its' screen debut in the 1932 Best Picture Oscar winner Grand Hotel. Being set during the Russian Revolution one might expect the concerto to make a reappearance in Lean's Doctor Zhivago (1965), but in fact on this occasion Hollywood chose to go with Rachmaninoff's Prelude in G minor, Op.23-5.