- "A good story is worth more than an old trumpet."
The Legend of 1900 (Italian: La leggenda del pianista sull'oceano, 'The Legend of the Pianist on the Ocean') is a 1998 Italian drama film directed by Giuseppe Tornatore and was his first English-language film.
Most of the story is told through flashbacks by Max Tooney, a musician down on his luck and broke, while stopping by a secondhand music shop to sell his only possession, a Conn trumpet, which he sells for less than he had hoped. Clearly torn at parting from his prized possession, he asks to play it one last time. The shopkeeper agrees, and as he plays, the vendor immediately recognizes the song from a broken record matrix (master disc) he found inside a recently acquired secondhand piano. He asks who the piece is by, and Max tells him the story of 1900, a man who was found abandoned on the four stacker ocean liner SS Virginian as a baby in a box who grew up with a talent for the piano and became part of the ship's orchestra, who for all his life had never left the ship. Max met him during his time as the orchestra’s trumpeter and the two became best friends and always wondered what happened to him after he left the ship. The story periodically cuts back to Max in the present, as he finds out that the ship that houses his friend is scheduled to be scuttled and sunk far offshore, with him trying to delay the ship’s destruction to search aboard for his friend.
Tropes associated with The Legend of 1900:
- Arrogant Kung-Fu Guy: More of an Arrogant Piano Guy, but the film portrays Jelly Roll Morton as this.
- Bittersweet Ending: The ship is destroyed with 1900 refusing to leave it and Max has lost his best friend. The music shopkeeper that Max sold his trumpet to gives it back to him without charge stating "A good story is worth more than an old trumpet".
- Historical Domain Character: Jelly Roll Morton.
- Only Known by Their Nickname: The main character’s full name is Danny Boodman T. D. Lemon 1900 (a combination of his adopted father’s name, an advertisement found on the box he was found in and the year he was born). He is mostly called 1900 for convenience sake.
- Race Lift: The real life Jelly Roll Morton, while of mixed race, was light-skinned; in the film he is played by the black Clarence Williams III.
- Stunned Silence: The spectators of the piano duel between 1900 and Jelly Roll Morton are this when witnessing 1900’s final piece and several minutes after he is finished. It leads to several funny moments, such as a man dropping his cigar onto his crotch area with his jaw dropped and an old woman getting her wig accidentally pulled off by a distracted waiter, which they both only notice after the applause starts.
