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Mark McKinney, Isabella Rossellini, Maria de Medeiros, David Fox, Ross McMillan

Canadian filmmaker Guy Maddin directs The Saddest Music in the World, reworked from an original screenplay by Kazuo Ishiguro. Set in Winnipeg during the Great Depression, the film involves a contest a... read more read more...nnounced by the legless and glamorous Lady Port-Huntly (Isabella Rossellini) to find the saddest music in the world. She's hoping the contest will result in increased sales of her company's brand of beer. American theatrical producer Chester Kent (Mark McKinney) shows up to win the contest with his kooky show-business idea, while brother Roderick Kent (Ross McMillan) returns from the war. Maria de Medeiros plays Narcissa, a sleep walker romantically linked to both brothers. Their father, the alcoholic doctor Fyodor Kent (David Fox), is tortured by his role in Lady Port-Huntly's leg amputation, so he makes her a new glass pair filled with beer. The Saddest Music in the World was shown at the 2003 Toronto Film Festival. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, Rovi

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R, 1 hr. 39 min.

Directed by: Guy Maddin

Release Date: April 30, 2004

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DVD Release Date: November 16, 2004

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Flixster Reviews (522)

  • 366weirdmovies
    October 23, 2011
    366weirdmovies
    A legless Canadian beer magnate (Isabella Rosselini) holds a contest during the Great Depression to discover the titular music; the bout attracts a musical family with a very odd and twisted history. Very funny if you can get past the need for everything to make absolute sense; ... read moreGuy Maddin continues his visual experiments in recreating the look and feel of movies from the 20s and early 30s, yet this may be his most accessible and mainstream story.
  • ceWEBrity
    July 15, 2011
    ceWEBrity
    Watched this as part of my avant-garde film class. Because I am lazy, here is the response I wrote:

    Since taking this class, I've developed an odd pleasure in picking out experimental technique in conventionally narrative films. Being aware of the genesis of many of these techni... read moreques and how mainstream cinematic culture has reappropriated them has really enhanced my comprehension and appreciation of the form overall. The Saddest Music in the World, in this regard, was the perfect capstone for this semester's screenings; its artful blurring of the line between a knowingly sentimental, almost maudlin narrative and unabashed avant-garde aesthetic sensibility extends a hand to an audience familiar with both worlds, inviting us to share in a celebration of the specific elements that make film so great.

    Even without its unique visual approach, The Saddest Music in the World would be a suitably bizarre movie. Its story, full of larger-than-life quirks and flourishes, suggests a certain magical realism, right down to its talking tapeworm and its prophetic medicine man in the snowy wilderness of Canada. It is wound, however, around a core of human loss and tragedy recognizable to any viewer - the challenge of the film is that Guy Maddin makes us work strenuously through his vision to reach that core. We must first swim through the often grainy, blurred picture, the rapid-fire editing, and montages of images that seem to make very little sense. These stylistic devices almost serve as layers of protection, as if Maddin was reluctant to surrender the emotions of his story right away. The movie teases in a playful way, conveniently strapping the emotional linchpin of the film with amnesia (and nymphomania), and it never truly divulges all its secrets, such as the ultimate fate of Roderick's son. Audiences accustomed to more commercial films may find this lack of closure unsatisfying, but the movie quickly makes clear that Maddin's definition of satisfaction is different than normal.

    The Saddest Music in the World is most interesting when its concept is dismantled fundamentally: what is it that makes music sad? Ultimately, a song boils down to a collection of resonances, sonic symbols that have more meaning to some than others. It is an immensely abstract art form, especially when its role in cinematic aesthetics is considered. Music is highly cultural, and American film culture has strictly regimented ideas about what constitutes appropriate music, which is what makes the concept of this film so exciting. In exploring the "sad" music of other countries around the world, we are thus invited to look at what we consider objectively sad and contrast it to the vastly different sounds that we hear. It serves as something of a metaphor at large for the film's idea of tragedy, because no matter how it is presented, or how we've experienced it, sad occurrences invoke the same universal sensations.
  • YLOWBSTARDreturns
    June 2, 2008
    YLOWBSTARDreturns
    I haven't viewed much of Guy Maddin's work, but after seeing THE SADDEST MUSIC IN THE WORLD, I'm not in any hurry too. I really liked the setting, plot, and Isabella Rossellini, but the dialogue is terrible and the weird for weird's sake approach to the material is almost nausiat... read moreing.
  • RCCLBC
    January 16, 2008
    RCCLBC
    Five words: Isabella Rossellini Glass Beer Legs. I turely imaginative and funny story about broken hearts, revenge and capitalism.
  • vierasesine
    October 15, 2007
    vierasesine
    I have to say, this is easily the weirdest thing I have ever seen. I loved the 1930's feel of the movie, and how America's "competetor(s)" in the contest turned out to be just as multicultural as the country itself.
  • mjgildea
    November 23, 2006
    mjgildea
    A little goofy, kind of enjoyable and kind of dry. Catch it if you can but don't go out of your way.
  • michaelneumann
    December 1, 2004
    michaelneumann
    I don't often share info about myself in this journal, but I go through my phases. You are privileged, readers, for you are experiencing one of them!


    My holiday weekend was kooky, but mostly good. But, kooky all the same. Here are some highlights:
    ... read more
    **Thanksgiving happened twice. Once at each parent's house. My stomach felt stretched on a mangle rack, and still hasn't forgiven me. My taste buds were lulled to sleep after that final glass of wine.

    **Went to a comedy show on Friday. 90 minutes of straight, hearty laughter. Comedians are therapists. So good, man. I was laughing so hard, the rest of the world was convulsing with me. Some people turn their laughter into a full-bodied performance, too! I thought a few would combust on the spot, letting out the shrill cry of their demise (just to scratch the surface of how annoying some laughs can be). Still, one might think that the laughing all throughout the room would suck the air up completely. I was too busy laughing to think, only focusing on swallowing my next breath and how I could cycle it through my system to keep the laughs a-flowin' comfortably ('cause sometimes I laughed so hard I stopped, as if I ran out). Unbelievable. I must try this again.

    **The Mom figure scored two DVD's for a buck each (neither of which I've seen, but will see soon): 'The Royal Wedding' (1951) and 'The Last Man On Earth' (1964). :up:

    **Saw the Spongebob film with my two most favorite moviegoing companions: my little bro & little sis (they tend to agree with all my opinions ;)). The movie was pretty much an episode stretched thrice as long as usual, hampered by some tiresome "requisite" story devices, and blown to silly proportions by returning to its usual self. The movie was upped a notch with its ending (which I may sometimes deem as "brilliant," depending on my mood). :fresh:

    **I am a sports fan. More specifically, I am a football fan. Even more specifically, I am a fan of my alma mater's football team. U of Colorado thumped Nebraska this past weekend to enter the Big 12 Title game next week against dreaded Oklahoma (ahyuck!). Yep, you guys don't care, but I do. :p

    **'Zoolander' moment of the week: My friends can often be unoriginal and want to hang at clubs and crap. So, since I never see these guys, I buckled down and went to a club. And I found myself being cajoled into a dance-off. A [i]dance-off! [/i](This was probably the next most hilarious event of the weekend behind the comedy show. And maybe that one guy who slipped on the ice in front of the department store). I didn't even care to be doing it, but I was somehow pitted against the guy who does "the loose robot" (shrug). But yeah, he would dance some move, and then point to me, like we were in the "Beat It" video. Oy. Hey, what else could I do? I danced, dammit. And I beat the sucker (only indicated when he came up to me and told me "You done good." OMG! The Loose Robot told me I "done good"!!!). My dream of defeating the mighty Loose Robot at the club is now fulfilled. You may kiss my dance sneakers.

    **Last week, at a Mexican restaurant where 15 of my co-workers & I were lunching, a manager staged a 'fake birthday' gag on me. Sometime in the middle of my third quesadilla, strange people wearing employee outfits were singing and smothering my head with hat (sneaky devils! I think I was chewing too loud to hear them coming). So, I wore the sombrero for the remainder of the day at work. And, as a result, I vowed to wear hats every Friday at work. All of this is a preface to me bringing with me a legion of my bestest hats with me back to Cali, including my fez, my panama hat, my plaid fedora, and my 3 foot long santa hat. Hat revolution commence!

    **Had Thai. Fantastic.

    **Had pie. Fantastic.

    **Snowed 8 inches. Fantastic.

    **Slept in. Fantastic.

    **Beard approved by the Mom figure. Fantastic.


    [img]http://www.virtual-impact.ca/images/dance-snoopy2.gif[/img]
    [size=1]"Do the 'Loose Robot', Snoopy!"[/size]



    Some other strange, unpleasant, and somewhat bizarre things also happened. Those I keep for myself. *swallows key*


    Everybody else enjoy your weekend?
  • fb20312798
    February 19, 2012
    fb20312798
    It has a sad, surreal atmosphere that suggests a type of fantasy nostalgia, as if Maddin is lamenting a false version of the past that he desperately wishes was real. The result is a film that's intoxicating to watch. Its also a pretty spot on and rather hilarious satire of perce... read moreived cultural identity and America's invasive notion of superiority.
  • shitfaced8
    June 15, 2011
    shitfaced8
    A Damn fine slice of Canadiana, centering around a competition in the height of the great depression to determine which nation produces the saddest music in the world. Oddball humour, surrealism and drama ensue. Guy Maddin is a director I've been meaning to check out for awhile n... read moreow, and I'm glad I've finally made the plunge. I plan on watching the 'auto-biographical' trilogy within the next couple days after really enjoying this. The old tyme style of the film is incredibly genuine and I often had to remind myself that this was filmed in 2003. The humour was really bizarre but really good and I found myself laughing more than I have at a movie in a really long time. Isabella Rossellini was terrific as I had expected. Mark McKinney and Maria de Medeiros were no slouches either. The performances were over the top and kind of cheesy but it fit the overall tone of the movie well in my opinion. Strongly recommended.
  • littlecharmer1959
    January 19, 2009
    littlecharmer1959
    "If you are sad and like beer, I'm your lady."

View All The Saddest Music in the World Reviews

Critic Reviews

Roger Moore
June 18, 2004
Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel

Silly, sick and surreal, it's a triumph of style over message or entertainment value. Full Review

Andrew Sarris
June 6, 2004
Andrew Sarris, New York Observer

From time to time during the 99-minute running time, I kept thinking of those old Off Off Broadway impositions on wriggly audiences -- or was it just me who was the transplanted Village square trapped...

Philip Wuntch
June 3, 2004
Philip Wuntch, Dallas Morning News

Provocative title, provocative premise, provocative direction, routine movie. Full Review

Steve Murray
June 3, 2004
Steve Murray, Atlanta Journal-Constitution

To fully appreciate the lunatic possibilities of the film medium, consider the spectacle of Isabella Rossellini frisking around on hollow glass legs filled with sparkling beer. Full Review

John Anderson
May 29, 2004
John Anderson, Newsday

The amber-refracted comedy can serve as an introduction to the work of Canada's most original filmmaker or as a culmination of everything he's done before Full Review

Colin Covert
May 22, 2004
Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune

It's a rare film today that doesn't assume audiences are stupid. Weird as they might be, Maddin gives us credit for being in on his esoteric jokes. Full Review

Stephanie Zacharek
May 22, 2004
Stephanie Zacharek, Salon.com

Narratively and spiritually, the movie is bankrupt, even though it's so packed with stuff ... that you can hardly bring yourself to believe that it all adds up to nothing. Full Review

Carla Meyer
May 21, 2004
Carla Meyer, San Francisco Chronicle

The concept is high, the humor lowbrow and the joy of experimentation evident in every frame of this wonderful picture. Full Review

Roger Ebert
May 14, 2004
Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

To see this film, to enter the world of Guy Maddin, is to understand how a film can be created entirely by its style, and how its style can create a world that never existed before, and lure us, at fi... Full Review

Stephen Hunter
May 14, 2004
Stephen Hunter, Washington Post

Any film where a beer baroness's glass leg (filled with beer) shatters when a high note is struck is okay by me. Full Review

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  • Despite being a daughter of Hollywood royalty, the Saddest Music in the World makes her Wild at Heart among the Blue Velvet. Death Becomes Her especially as Jennifer Garner's aunt in Alias.  Answer »
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