Film Record: Lend Me Your Ear

Still from Lend Me Your Ear featured on the cover of the December 1943 issue of Movie Makers.

Date produced: 1943

Filmmaker(s):

Erma Niedermeyer

Languages:

English

Length:

300 ft

Format:

16mm

Colour:

Kodachrome

Sound Notes:

Silent

Sound:

With music on disc.

Awards/Recognition:

Hiram Percy Maxim Memorial Award 1943, ACL Ten Best 1943 - General Class

Description:

"Lend Me Your Ear is an almost perfect synthesis of shrewd planning, impeccable camera work, smoothly integrated music and general, overall charm. It is gay, glamorous and in good taste. In it, Erma Niedermeyer has caught the lighthearted spirit of 'teen aged American youth. That she was amply aided by her own attractive son was her further good fortune. As the film opens, the Boy is discovered musing over that classic advertisement which guarantees to teach you piano in ten easy lessons. "You too can be the life of the party!" it clarions. The Boy answers the call, the lessons start arriving and the fun begins. There is the light "running gag" of the harried postman, continually overwhelmed by the Boy's enthusiasm as he delivers each new installment; there is the time the piano refuses to play, clogged up as it is by a basketball in its "innards"; there is the tousle headed imitation of Franz Liszt at the age of fourteen — and more. There is, in climax, the Boy's devastating triumph amid a bevy of admiring beauties, as he becomes in truth "the life of the party." Geared to these sequences — which are presented in swift pace and with unerring command of the camera — is a musical accompaniment as suave as the film itself. A single commercial recording provides a slight and recurring background theme. All the remaining score — from the first hesitant scales to the final rocking rendition of a jazz hit — is in the Boy's own playing, especially recorded by Mrs. Niedermeyer to fit her own picture. It is an ineffable and irresistible combination, this Lend Me Your Ear, warmly deserving of the high honor it has won." Movie Makers, Dec. 1943, 457.

Resources:

Discussed by Niedermeyer in "Fun in a Family Film" (Movie Makers, Jan. 1944, 9, 35-37). The article describes the film's production, and lists the piano compositions featured in the film.

The film was available in the ACL's Club Film Library.

Subjects:

• Arts
•      Music
•           Organ and piano music
• Persons
•      Teenagers

Genre:

• Youth

Form:

• Short

Tags:

Screenings:

• Screened by the Hartford Cinema Club in 1944: Hartford, CT
• Screened by the Amateur Movie Society of Milwaukee in 1944: Milwaukee, WI
• Screened by the Kenosha Movie Makers Club in 1944: Kenosha, WI
• Screened by the Brooklyn Amateur Cine Club in 1944: Brooklyn, N.Y.
• Screened by the Passaic Cinema Club in 1944: Passaic, N.J.
• Screened for the Associated Amateur Movie Clubs of Chicagoland in 1944: River Park, IL
• Screened by the Trenton Movie Makers in 1945: Trenton, N.J.
• Screened by the Minneapolis Cine Club in 1945: Minneapolis, MN
• Screened by the Chicago Cinema Club in 1946: Chicago, IL
• Screened by the 8-16 Movie Club of Philadelphia in 1946: Philadelphia, PA
• Screened by the Berkshire Museum Amateur Movie Club in 1947: Pittsfield, MA
• Screened at a Brazilian International Amateur Movie Contest in 1950: Sao Paulo, Brazil
• Screened by the Winnipeg Cine Club in 1951: Winnipeg, MB
• Screened by the Wichita Amateur Movie Club in 1953: Wichita, KS

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