The Jazz Singer (1927)

"Wait a minute, wait a minute. You ain't heard nothing yet." These were the first and one of the most memorable lines in motion picture history. Like Neil Armstrong's words upon first stepping on the surface of the moon, this line from Al Jolson would be the most fitting words to exclaimed to the world that sound films were finally here. With the release of The Jazz Singer we are introduced to the world of the feature length motion picture with synchronized sound and it would change everything in the world of movie making for now the people would want to see what they would call the "talkies."

The advent of sound was the next step in motion picture production in the late 20s. Many studios dabbled in the technology which was crude and cumbersome, but it took Warner Bros. to make the world see that it can in fact work practically and financially. At that time there had been some shorts with some sort of sound put over parts of them, mainly sound effects, crowd noise, or in most cases background music. D.W. Griffith even produced an very short piece where he talks directly to the camera. Warner Bros. did produce a couple of films with recorded music, but made no return on this expensive process, for a very few select theatres had any sound system installed within them. And why would they? They played silent pictures. At a point of financial desperation Warner Bros. would go forth and produce a picture synchronizing sections of it with live recorded sound introducing the world to the talking pictures, in turn leading to the revolution and evolution of the entire industry.

The story of The Jazz Singer is a simple one, yet a classic one. Based loosely on the life of it's star Jolson, which was originally made into a stage play starring another performer named George Jessel, when Warner Bros. bought the story and would in a way unknowingly cast it with the star that inspired the tale in the first place. It is the tale of the son of a Jewish American cantor, Jakie Rabinowitz (Jolson), that grows up and strives to use his vocal talents to become a jazz singer despite the wishes of his father to follow in his footsteps. Jackie would be kicked out of his parents' home, as they exclaim they "have no son," and pursue work on the stage, first in vaudeville before luck would strike and he would be discovered for his singing talents and would work in a Broadway revue. Once again he is shunned by his father, but his mother finds that Jackie is home on the stage. As Jackie's father falls ill and to prove his love to his father Jackie sets it up that he would take his father's place for Yom Kippur and sing in the synagogue. This helps heal the wounds of the fraction between Jackie and his father, leading to his father accepting his son as a jazz singer being a talent from God.

The film touches on a couple of cultural issues of it's time, Jazz and blackface. Firstly it is important that Jazz music was very different culturally then than it is now. Jazz was a new form of music and was seen as a music born of African Americans in a segregated culture. To some it was seen as immoral or even lustful, making conservatives cringe. Think of it as what rock-n-roll was like in the early 50s, disco in the early 70s, or rap in the early 90s. It would be something that parents, especially conservative parents, would forbid their children to partake in. Blackface was yet another issue Jolson performs. It was more common in those days, but Jolson did it in parts of his act for a reason, to show that he was a Jew living in a white world. To give himself color manifested that he separated himself from the world he felt he wasn't quite accepted into. It also manifested that Jazz was seen as a black form of music. It was done for many reasons, but it was meant in no harm, or be condisending at all towards the race, as that was never his intentions, but rather to draw attention to the points Jolson was making in his act

The picture itself is really no more then a silent film with a selection of recorded segments in which Jolson sings and occasionally shares in some dialogue before, after, or during the music. Most of the movie is silent with title cards like any other silent feature, but the novelty of the scenes with Jolson singing or talking with the audience hearing what is actually coming out of his lips reportedly made those watching go crazy with excitement. Warner Bros had a hit and a star on it's hands from that. Of course Warner Bros. only had a few select theatres in the major cities wired with sound, which is where people had to go to actually hear the film. There would be silent versions of the film distributed as well to movie houses not equipped with the proper sound systems so that all audiences can still enjoy the story which plays out well without the sound sections. But of course the real success is the what is coming out of the speakers.

Al Jolson would go on to be a huge star and an American icon until his death in 1950. The song and dance man would produce numerous records, perform in more motion pictures, and continue with performing on stage, including with the USO. His death would be national news. He was the first and greatest Jewish star of his time. Though his famous line "You ain't heard nothing yet," was made famous by this film, it was known to be a common line he would state during his stage acts, but it was perfect for the first line of dialogue in a feature motion picture and lives on as one of the most famous quotes in movie history.

The success of the film would in return put Warner Bros. on the map of Hollywood. People would start seeing Warner Bros. as meaning quality and ground breaking. If it wasn't for the film's success the studio would have most likely went under, especially with the stock market crash of 1929. The studio would turn that success of sound into producing more full-length sound pictures and later find their niche in the 30s with gangster dramas. This film saved an entire studio.

The advent of sound goes without saving had changed motion pictures forever. The Jazz Singer was just the first step towards the process of perfecting the skill of recording live sound to film. The process of recording for this film was quite clumsy and difficult, even though the sound was crude and rather simple the playing back of the sound synchronized with the picture seemed even more primitive as it included the playing of discs (think vinyl records) hand started at the right instance to line up with the lips on the screen. There would be several different sound pieces and therefore changes in disc, a complication that would lie on the shoulders of the projectionist. So really it can be seen that the projectionist was the most important person with the success of the film.

The technology of recording sound to movies would improve, eventually being recorded on the film stock itself, eliminating the problem of discs, but you had to be careful with making noises while filming, which you didn't have to worry about before. (Quite on the set!) During the silent age you could film several pictures just steps away from each other, as long as you didn't get in each others shots. Now you had "sound stages," stages built to block out outside noise. Filmmakers also had to worry about the noise made by the camera, as these are machines that had moving parts made noise. They had to find ways to make the camera more quite, or block out the noise it already made. Most importantly sound deeply effected the stars. Now the actors didn't just have to look and act the part, now their voices had to fit the part, and this would prove to be more trouble for many actors and actresses, especially those with thick New Yorker or European accents. Some actors' voices would have them be laughed out of existence never to act again. This change in Hollywood is very well dramatized in the musical classic Singing in the Rain, recreating the Hollywood of the early sound era.

The movies changed and the actors and technology had to too. The talkies were here and here to stay. More and more theatres installed sound systems. More audiences would go to movies for the novelty of hearing their favorite stars. Al Jolson was a multi-tooled star and it would be this type of star that would come to dominate the scenes in the near future. Warner Bros would grow into the huge studio we see it today. The Jazz Singer would become a classic hailed as one of the best films of all time (perhaps because it was simply groundbreaking in movie history), honored with a special Academy Award at their first award ceremony for it's revolutionary work in sound. The silent days were numbered. A brave few would try to stick to silent pictures, but the people wanted talkies and talkies were what they would get. This would be their end, but also a whole new beginning. And as Al said we "ain't heard nothing yet!"