The Music of Regret (2006)
By Laurie Simmons
Simmons, best-known for her photographs of miniature rooms populated by dolls and of oversized objects — such as a house, birthday cake, and pistol — balanced on female legs, both human and fake, brings these characters to life in a three-act mini-musical. The film is inspired by three distinct periods of Simmons’s photographic work: vintage hand puppets, ventriloquist dummies and walking objects enact tales of ambition, disappointment, love, loss, and regret. Working with composer Michael Rohaytn ("Personal Velocity") and cameraman Ed Lachman ("The Virgin Suicides" and "Far From Heaven"), Simmons’s puppets come to life in miniature domestic scenes that echo real life. Act one, “The Green Tie,” takes the form of a puppet show/radio play and recounts a suburban tragedy where one simple decision wreaks havoc on the fragile ecology of everyday life. Simmons uses rubber hand puppets in four scenes to recount a story occurring over several generations and involving two feuding families. Act two, “The Music of Regret,” is based on a 1994 photograph of the same name and takes its structure from the American musical, which relies on melody and lyric to move the narrative forward. A girl…
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