Overblown anecdote about a shipboard foundling (found at the turn of the century and hence christened "1900") who never leaves the transatlantic liner throughout all his days, despite an untaught pianistic prowess, in styles ranging from Late Romantic to Impressionist to boogie-woogie ("When you don't know what it is, it's jazz!"), which would have guaranteed his fame and fortune in the world at large. Once, Jelly Roll Morton comes aboard -- an overblown anecdote in itself -- to face him in a piano duel ("You asked for it, asshole"). Immediately afterward, he consents to be recorded for the first and only time, and improvises (courtesy of Ennio Morricone) a Rachmaninovian prelude inspired by the sight of a virginal signorina outside the porthole. He then refuses to let his music leave the ship, either. He himself almost follows his muse ashore. He gets halfway down the gangplank: "Land is a ship too big for me." Giuseppe Tornatore's brand of waterlogged lyricism (Cinema Paradiso, Everybody's Fine) does not make a smooth crossing into English (Tim Roth, Pruitt Taylor Vince, in chief), jettisoning the language barrier that acted as at least a partial buffer. And nor does the similarity in setting and in period to And the Ship Sails On help him to fill the void left by Fellini (his life's ambition). It merely emphasizes the chasm between. (1999) — Duncan Shepherd
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