The MoFo Musicals Countdown - Preliminary Thread

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Haven't been reading a lot of this thread, but just wanted to get a feel on if people are considering films that feature a lot of songs performed, but not necessarily where characters burst into song to converse. Stuff like 8 Mile or Inside Llewyn Davis where the characters are singing and performing as part of the story, and not just talking in song.
So, I've heard musicals where the singing and dancing are a natural part of the narrative and something that could happen in real life be classified as diegetic musicals, such as Cabaret, All That Jazz, and Once. It's been probably a decade since I've seen Once, but IIRC, the musical performances are performed by musicians in the story and not stage performers (as opposed to the two Fosse musicals mentioned), so you don't get dancing sequences timed to the music. I don't think I've heard of people arguing Once isn't a musical, but I'm not sure what would differentiate that from Inside Llewyn Davis (though I never classified the latter as a musical, mentally, and didn't cross my mind until I saw it mentioned in this thread recently).

What most people refer to as traditional musicals, I've heard classified as non-diegetic musicals (this diegetic vs non-diegetic is akin to, but not the same as diegetic and non-diegetic music though, with the latter including things like the soundtrack of a movie). One may observe the phrasing you used would exclude something like Cabaret, though I think when people are making statements such as that, they're still probably mentally including them with the "burst into song to converse" group. I saw Please Baby Please probably last year. Classified as a musical, looks like a musical, halfway through, it felt like they shoe-horned in a musical solo because they realized there weren't any musical pieces in the movie - just a lot of people doing little dance-like movements to the instrumental-soundtrack. Made me wonder if traditional musicals should be called "dansicals", since it seems like the dancing and not the bursting out into song is what really breaks the sense of reality in the movie.



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A quick eligibility reminder as we've had a couple of eligibility questions:


A musical is defined by wikipedia as:

"a film genre in which songs by the characters are interwoven into the narrative, sometimes accompanied by dancing. The songs usually advance the plot or develop the film's characters, but in some cases, they serve merely as breaks in the storyline, often as elaborate "production numbers".

And by @Harry Lime as:

"where people (and animals or candlesticks) randomly burst into song"

I'm not going to request people check eligibility using tags on imdb or anything like that (although you can certainly use those to help you find eligible movies). A musical has songs throughout, not just one or two incidents of characters singing karaoke.

Allowed: animated movies, jukebox musicals, classic musicals, modern musicals, musicals where all the singing takes place on stage, musicals with no dancing whatsoever, sung through musicals

Not allowed: concert films, documentaries, movies with only one song, musical TV episodes

I'm really trying to leave the eligibility as open as possible, to allow people to vote for what they want, and what they consider to be a musical. And because I haven't seen every film ever so can't necessarily make an individual judgement on each film.

It does need to have singing. The singing might or might not tell the story - several well-loved movies have the singing 'on stage' or as part of set-piece sequences.

To add to the above list, films about singers or bands only count if there is a significant amount of singing. Having a soundtrack doesn't make a film a musical. Films that have subsequently been made into stage musicals (e.g. Legally Blonde, Mean Girls, Billy Elliot) are not musicals.

There may well be some films on the list that some people may not consider 'proper' musicals. That's the nature of a group list of this type.

However movies with no singing whatsoever are not eligible and will not be counted in the countdown.



Friendly reminder to everyone that has voted, or is in the process of voting, check and double-check your ballot while you're voting AND when you receive the confirmation message. Make sure that the films you voted are actually the ones you wanted. Double-check the titles and years. There are a good bunch of remakes with the same name which might lead to the usual confusions so this is the moment for each of us to tackle that. Remember, it's easier for you to check your one ballot with 25 entries than it is for the host to check 40-something ballots with 25 entries each.
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Yeah, and please, check your PMs, because you might have a clarifying message from Thursday about an ineligible film.

I can't promise I'll be able to tweak your ballot however you like in response, there just isn't enough time and it involves a lot of manual work in some cases, but your odds are better if you reply promptly, clearly, and suggest a very simple fix (like simply replacing the ineligible film with another, in the same slot). If you request that the odds that I'll be able to do it are very very high.



If you made a boo boo I thought all lists are final though?
It's one of those notices that's there so nobody can (reasonably) get mad if they make a mistake.

Often there'll be a reasonable, good-faith effort to make changes, but I'm the technical bottleneck as it is and all such changes push all the crucial prep work back even more, so every mistake that gets fixed directly delays the countdown for everyone else. So no promises.



A quick eligibility reminder as we've had a couple of eligibility questions:




I'm really trying to leave the eligibility as open as possible, to allow people to vote for what they want, and what they consider to be a musical. And because I haven't seen every film ever so can't necessarily make an individual judgement on each film.

It does need to have singing. The singing might or might not tell the story - several well-loved movies have the singing 'on stage' or as part of set-piece sequences.

To add to the above list, films about singers or bands only count if there is a significant amount of singing. Having a soundtrack doesn't make a film a musical. Films that have subsequently been made into stage musicals (e.g. Legally Blonde, Mean Girls, Billy Elliot) are not musicals.

There may well be some films on the list that some people may not consider 'proper' musicals. That's the nature of a group list of this type.

However movies with no singing whatsoever are not eligible and will not be counted in the countdown.
oh wow so the commitments counts? i didn't realise this.

i was going more along the lines of

"where people (and animals or candlesticks) randomly burst into song"



Come on let's get some more lists sent in. Even I sent one in and I devoted days (multiple days!) to try and stop this countdown from ever happening.


This has been a Harry Lime endorsement.
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Well, that's frustrating. I've got a list of 15, but the ballot thing doesn't seem to be working for me, and when I try to grab a URL from iMDB it says only movies between 2010 and 2019 are accepted.
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Haven't been reading a lot of this thread, but just wanted to get a feel on if people are considering films that feature a lot of songs performed, but not necessarily where characters burst into song to converse. Stuff like 8 Mile or Inside Llewyn Davis where the characters are singing and performing as part of the story, and not just talking in song.

As long as there are enough songs in the movie, and they're sung by the characters in the movie, whether they're burst into songs or performances by the characters, (not just background music), I considered those movies for my list.
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Well, that's frustrating. I've got a list of 15, but the ballot thing doesn't seem to be working for me, and when I try to grab a URL from iMDB it says only movies between 2010 and 2019 are accepted.

Hopefully it's just a glitch. Try clearing the cache and trying again. If that doesn't work, try closing the browser and reopening it, or try a different browser.

If that doesn't work, ask Yoda for help.



OMG! This new Chromebook is so sensitive that it keeps sending my ballot when I haven't sent it. You make get a random numbered ballot from me because of a fat thumb issue. Stupid pesky Chromebook!