Thirty Two Short Films About Glenn Gould 4K 1993

The film Thirty Two Short Films About Glenn Gould is nothing less than a kaleidoscope, revealing from different angles the extraordinary personality of one of the greatest pianists of all time.

The film is a completely atypical representative of the biopic genre. It is an experimental film, divided, as the title suggests, into 32 short stories. Director François Girard (known to many for The Red Violin) found a unique way to describe Gould's life. Dramatic episodes alternate with documentary ones, where his acquaintances talk about this or that action of the brilliant Canadian pianist, sharing their thoughts, and one of the novellas is even animated.

In Colm Feore's brilliant performance, Gould appears in various guises: sometimes he is an eccentric perfectionist with hints of Asperger's syndrome, sometimes a recluse suffering from triskaidekaphobia (a fear of the number 13, which was also observed in the Austrian composer Arnold Schoenberg), and a very successful stock market player. But all these stages of his life are united by Gould's true, genuine passion for music.

Despite the intimacy of the production, the viewer is left with a sense of the scale of what is happening. The main reason for this feeling is undoubtedly the music of Bach, Wagner, Prokofiev, and other great composers, which is constantly heard throughout the film. Gould himself hears it constantly. Music was always with him, as he learned to read music before he learned to read words.

In the fall of 1977, the US government sent two probes, Voyager 1 and 2, into space to reach the edge of our galaxy. In the hope that someone would one day intercept this package from Earth, various messages were left on board that could inform about the existence of intelligent beings living on planet Earth. Among these messages is a short prelude by Johann Sebastian Bach performed by Glenn Gould...