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August Rush

 August Rush
type
TVTItem
 August Rush
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August Rush
 August Rush
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AugustRush
 August Rush
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August Rush is a 2007 Academy Award-nominated drama film directed by Kirsten Sheridan and written by Paul Castro, Nick Castle, and James V. Hart, and produced by Richard Barton Lewis. It has been called an up-to-date reworking of the Oliver Twist story by Charles Dickens.A boy named Evan Taylor (Freddie Highmore) lives in an orphanage but believes that his parents are alive. He believes that the music that he hears all around him (which others interpret as background noise) is his parents communicating with him. He meets a counselor, Richard Jeffries (Terrence Howard), of the New York Child Services Department. Evan tells Jeffries that he does not want to be adopted because he believes his parents are still alive and will come to collect him eventually.Through a series of flashbacks, his parents are revealed to be Lyla Novacek (Keri Russell), a famous concert cellist, and Louis Connelly (Jonathan Rhys Meyers), an Irish guitarist and lead singer of a rock band. Lyla and Louis spent one romantic night together and never saw each other again - they were forced to separate by Lyla's domineering father. Lyla became pregnant; her father did not approve because he wanted Lyla to have a successful career without the obstacle of a child. After an argument with her father, Lyla ran out of a restaurant and was hit by a car. While in the hospital, she gave birth to a son. Afterward, she was told by her father that her child had died, but he had been delivered successfully and then given up for adoption by her father, who forged Lyla's signature on the necessary paperwork.Louis has never forgotten Lyla and does not know about Evan. Both have since given up performing; Lyla is a music teacher in Chicago, and Louis is an unhappy financial minion in San Francisco.Evan believes deeply that as long as he follows the music he hears and reacts to it, he will have a chance to be found by his parents. He runs away from the state institution and makes his way to New York City, where he is taken in by a man known as "Wizard" (Robin Williams), who houses various orphans and runaways, employing them to play music on the streets and taking a large cut of their tips. Evan immediately proves to be a musical child prodigy. Wizard enlists him and gives him the name "August Rush", convincing him that he will be sent back to the orphanage if his real name is ever discovered...
 August Rush
fetched
2023-09-29T01:14:58Z
 August Rush
parsed
2023-09-29T01:14:59Z
 August Rush
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DBTropes
 August Rush / int_18d15922
type
Title Drop
 August Rush / int_18d15922
comment
Title Drop: By Wizard.
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August Rush / int_18d15922
 August Rush / int_1b901025
type
The Fagin
 August Rush / int_1b901025
comment
The Fagin: Wizard again
 August Rush / int_1b901025
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August Rush / int_1b901025
 August Rush / int_1fb520d0
type
Anachronistic Orphanage
 August Rush / int_1fb520d0
comment
Anachronistic Orphanage: At the start of the film, Evan lives in a group home. This is treated as though it's an orphanage with the boys even talking about their parents "coming back for them." While group homes exist in Real Life, they're for kids who need a higher level of care, parents can't just drop their kid off at one, nor can they just "come back to get them" on a whim. Weirdly, even though the movie has a social worker as a secondary character, foster care is rarely mentioned.
 August Rush / int_1fb520d0
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August Rush / int_1fb520d0
 August Rush / int_22eed18a
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Parents Know Their Children
 August Rush / int_22eed18a
comment
Parents Know Their Children: Lyla recognizes Evan's picture on a missing persons poster, despite never actually getting the chance to see him after he was born and this being over a decade later.
 August Rush / int_22eed18a
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August Rush / int_22eed18a
 August Rush / int_2f9a0236
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Your Son All Along
 August Rush / int_2f9a0236
comment
Your Son All Along: Louis and Evan play guitar together in the park without Louis knowing Evan is his son. He puts the pieces together after tracking Lyla down at Evan's concert.
 August Rush / int_2f9a0236
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August Rush / int_2f9a0236
 August Rush / int_3322dd48
type
Hollywood Law
 August Rush / int_3322dd48
comment
Hollywood Law: Lyla's father presumably paid a lawyer a large sum of money in order to forge Lyla's signature on the adoption paperwork, but for a lawyer to go along with this plan would be highly unethical and could get them disbarred (not that such a thing is unknown, it just would be less likely). It's unlikely that Evan, a healthy newborn, would be placed in a group home. No explanation is given for how Evan was able to enroll at Julliard, despite having no apparent legal guardian to sign the paperwork, nor does the school make any attempts to see if he's a missing child or a ward of the state (he is both).
 August Rush / int_3322dd48
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August Rush / int_3322dd48
 August Rush / int_337a0f4
type
TrailersAlwaysLie
 August Rush / int_337a0f4
comment
Trailers Always Lie: If one only looked at the promotional footage, that person would think Wizard was The Mentor or the Cool Old Guy, but that's not true at all.
 August Rush / int_337a0f4
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August Rush / int_337a0f4
 August Rush / int_3ac583f4
type
SlidingScaleOfIdealismVsCynicism
 August Rush / int_3ac583f4
comment
Sliding Scale of Idealism vs. Cynicism: This movie is about as far to the idealism end as Grave of the Fireflies is to the cynical end.
 August Rush / int_3ac583f4
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August Rush / int_3ac583f4
 August Rush / int_3b84b916
type
Band of Relatives
 August Rush / int_3b84b916
comment
Band of Relatives: The Connelly Brothers.
 August Rush / int_3b84b916
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August Rush / int_3b84b916
 August Rush / int_3d078cc5
type
Concert Climax
 August Rush / int_3d078cc5
comment
Concert Climax: The film ends with Evan running away from Wizard to conduct his symphony in the park, Lyla being drawn to the stage because she somehow knows that's her son, and Louis chasing Lyla through the crowd because he was in the city and saw a sign advertising her as a featured musician for this concert in the park.
 August Rush / int_3d078cc5
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August Rush / int_3d078cc5
 August Rush / int_40eff02d
type
Impractical Musical Instrument Skills
 August Rush / int_40eff02d
comment
Impractical Musical Instrument Skills: August picks up an electric guitar for the first time and immediately is able to play it with flashy hammer-ons and percussive drumming with his hands. And somehow it works without an amp.
 August Rush / int_40eff02d
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1.0
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August Rush / int_40eff02d
 August Rush / int_50f66629
type
Crazy-Prepared
 August Rush / int_50f66629
comment
Crazy-Prepared: Julliard evidently brought a tuxedo for Evan to the concert on the off chance he actually showed up to conduct at the last minute.
 August Rush / int_50f66629
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August Rush / int_50f66629
 August Rush / int_537dd8fe
type
Affably Evil
 August Rush / int_537dd8fe
comment
Affably Evil: Wizard, who turns from being jovial and upbeat to intensely angry and cruel on a dime.
 August Rush / int_537dd8fe
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August Rush / int_537dd8fe
 August Rush / int_62434fe2
type
Sanity Slippage
 August Rush / int_62434fe2
comment
Sanity Slippage: It's possible that Wizard was a person who was slowly losing it due to rough childhood, poverty, and general disillusionment with the world. It's even possible to craft a possible backstory to him, given hints from the movie. Based on his rant to Jeffries about what child protective services "really does", it seems he has personal experience with that situation. Plus, the film seems to hint that he has been a street performer for a long time now, which doesn't pay well, and may have been why he took in all the other runaways in the first place, he may have genuinely believed they'd be better off with him than alone. Of course, it also appears even at his initial meeting, that he is a little unhinged, and the prospect of August being his "ticket to riches" (and then losing that prospect) just drove him deeper into madness until even Arthur (who seemed to think well of him at first) knows he needs to be stopped.
 August Rush / int_62434fe2
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August Rush / int_62434fe2
 August Rush / int_66805a18
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Race for Your Love
 August Rush / int_66805a18
comment
Race for Your Love: Louis does this twice. He's far more successful the second time around.
 August Rush / int_66805a18
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1.0
 August Rush / int_66805a18
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August Rush / int_66805a18
 August Rush / int_6941e30b
type
Room Full of Crazy
 August Rush / int_6941e30b
comment
Room Full of Crazy: A more pleasant use of the trope, Evan fills a room with scribbled music.
 August Rush / int_6941e30b
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1.0
 August Rush / int_6941e30b
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1.0
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August Rush / int_6941e30b
 August Rush / int_6bd689ca
type
Meaningful Echo
 August Rush / int_6bd689ca
comment
Meaningful Echo: "11 years, (X) days. I counted." Also, August's Symphony echoes music from meaningful scenes throughout the movie.
 August Rush / int_6bd689ca
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1.0
 August Rush / int_6bd689ca
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1.0
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August Rush / int_6bd689ca
 August Rush / int_6e27397
type
Missed Him by That Much
 August Rush / int_6e27397
comment
Missed Him by That Much: Louis trying to find Lyla the first time.
 August Rush / int_6e27397
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1.0
 August Rush / int_6e27397
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 August Rush
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August Rush / int_6e27397
 August Rush / int_702c2de3
type
Line-of-Sight Alias
 August Rush / int_702c2de3
comment
Line-of-Sight Alias: The titular protagonist's stage name is a fragment from the slogan on the side of a frozen foods truck.
 August Rush / int_702c2de3
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1.0
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August Rush / int_702c2de3
 August Rush / int_801a35a5
type
Only the Leads Get a Happy Ending
 August Rush / int_801a35a5
comment
Only the Leads Get a Happy Ending: Well, Arthur's going to get beat or killed, most of the friends August made along the way are the same or worse than they were before he came along, but hey, kid found his parents.
 August Rush / int_801a35a5
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August Rush / int_801a35a5
 August Rush / int_8ad43dc9
type
Ragtag Bunch of Misfits
 August Rush / int_8ad43dc9
comment
Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: The kids "employed" by Wizard, though Arthur is the only one given much of any screen time.
 August Rush / int_8ad43dc9
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August Rush / int_8ad43dc9
 August Rush / int_8afadb7e
type
Department of Child Disservices
 August Rush / int_8afadb7e
comment
Department of Child Disservices: Played with, mostly from the "overworked and underfunded" angle. Wizard calls Mr. Jeffries out on this trope when he comes looking for Evan and several other missing children. Julliard will evidently let any random man walk in off the street to come into a classroom and claim a student with no proof, and not give the student the chance to explain things privately nor involve the police.
 August Rush / int_8afadb7e
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August Rush / int_8afadb7e
 August Rush / int_8e20ae0d
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Child Prodigy
 August Rush / int_8e20ae0d
comment
Child Prodigy: August, though as noted, solidly in Artistic License – Music territory. (In Real Life, even Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart spent a few years studying music theory before he wrote his first simple compositions, whereas August is apparently able to compose for full orchestra within a few hours of the first time he ever sees music notation. Uh-huh.)
 August Rush / int_8e20ae0d
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August Rush / int_8e20ae0d
 August Rush / int_9186eded
type
Helicopter Parents
 August Rush / int_9186eded
comment
Helicopter Parents: Lyla's father forging adoption papers in order to keep Lyla on the path to success.
 August Rush / int_9186eded
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 August Rush / int_9186eded
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August Rush / int_9186eded
 August Rush / int_97ee3a58
type
Vicariously Ambitious
 August Rush / int_97ee3a58
comment
Vicariously Ambitious: Lyla's father is implied to be this way. His actions definitely lean towards this trope.
 August Rush / int_97ee3a58
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August Rush / int_97ee3a58
 August Rush / int_a10d8339
type
The Show Must Go On
 August Rush / int_a10d8339
comment
The Show Must Go On: Despite loss of their prodigy composer and conductor, Julliard evidently was still going to run the symphony without him and must have had a backup composer waiting.
 August Rush / int_a10d8339
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August Rush / int_a10d8339
 August Rush / int_a1a46946
type
Early Personality Signs
 August Rush / int_a1a46946
comment
Early Personality Signs: A shot of newborn Evan in the hospital nursery shows his hand waving to conduct the music in the room.
 August Rush / int_a1a46946
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August Rush / int_a1a46946
 August Rush / int_af4d6174
type
Setting Update
 August Rush / int_af4d6174
comment
Setting Update: On Oliver Twist. The most obvious parallel is "Wizard = Fagin."
 August Rush / int_af4d6174
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August Rush / int_af4d6174
 August Rush / int_b6e1d40b
type
Acceptable Breaks from Reality
 August Rush / int_b6e1d40b
comment
Acceptable Breaks from Reality: Most of the complaints about the film can be explained by this trope. The movie wouldn't be a Tear Jerker if it took six months of paperwork, 7 years for the kid to come of age, 5 years for him to be accepted into Julliard or longer for August and his parents to all reunite.
 August Rush / int_b6e1d40b
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August Rush / int_b6e1d40b
 August Rush / int_ba0791de
type
First Girl Wins
 August Rush / int_ba0791de
comment
First Girl Wins: Louis is a good-looking guy and he had at least one girlfriend in the years after meeting Lyla, who was only a one-night fling.
 August Rush / int_ba0791de
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August Rush / int_ba0791de
 August Rush / int_beb932ca
type
Big Applesauce
 August Rush / int_beb932ca
comment
Big Applesauce: The majority of the movie takes place in New York City.
 August Rush / int_beb932ca
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August Rush / int_beb932ca
 August Rush / int_c3b40ab8
type
Evil Redhead
 August Rush / int_c3b40ab8
comment
Evil Redhead: Wizard.
 August Rush / int_c3b40ab8
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August Rush / int_c3b40ab8
 August Rush / int_cc373fb1
type
Innocent Prodigy
 August Rush / int_cc373fb1
comment
Innocent Prodigy: Evan
 August Rush / int_cc373fb1
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August Rush / int_cc373fb1
 August Rush / int_cc427069
type
Hard Work Hardly Works
 August Rush / int_cc427069
comment
Hard Work Hardly Works: This kid just sort of... knows... Music Theory. To understand how realistic that is, simply click on that link, which would give you about a third of the grounding you'd need to actually write a symphony.
 August Rush / int_cc427069
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August Rush / int_cc427069
 August Rush / int_cf7ccd79
type
Orphanage of Fear
 August Rush / int_cf7ccd79
comment
Orphanage of Fear: Averted, for the most part, though it's clear the Walden Home for Boys is not the most nurturing place to grow up in.
 August Rush / int_cf7ccd79
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August Rush / int_cf7ccd79
 August Rush / int_da38c13f
type
Lamarck Was Right
 August Rush / int_da38c13f
comment
Lamarck Was Right: The title character is a musical prodigy whose parents were also talented musicians, although even Lamarck would probably say that the degree to which this movie takes it to is unrealistic.
 August Rush / int_da38c13f
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August Rush / int_da38c13f
 August Rush / int_dc579c91
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Contrived Coincidence
 August Rush / int_dc579c91
comment
Contrived Coincidence: The resolution of the film is the result of coincidence upon coincidence piling together.
 August Rush / int_dc579c91
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August Rush / int_dc579c91
 August Rush / int_dead632e
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Adoption Is Not an Option
 August Rush / int_dead632e
comment
Adoption Is Not an Option: While Jeffries tells Lyla that Evan was probably adopted when she comes searching for him, the start of the film shows clearly he was living in a group home and no explanation is given for why he wasn't adopted. See Hollywood Law below.
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August Rush / int_dead632e
 August Rush / int_e30c7ae1
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The Artful Dodger
 August Rush / int_e30c7ae1
comment
The Artful Dodger: Arthur.
 August Rush / int_e30c7ae1
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August Rush / int_e30c7ae1
 August Rush / int_e40f6792
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Design Student's Orgasm
 August Rush / int_e40f6792
comment
Design Student's Orgasm: This poster.
 August Rush / int_e40f6792
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August Rush / int_e40f6792
 August Rush / int_e596f27b
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Star-Crossed Lovers
 August Rush / int_e596f27b
comment
Star-Crossed Lovers: Lyla and Louis.
 August Rush / int_e596f27b
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August Rush / int_e596f27b
 August Rush / int_e603890a
type
Artistic License – Music
 August Rush / int_e603890a
comment
Artistic License – Music: Electric guitars without amps, a so-so composition that gets him into Julliard without the audition process, his sudden professional-grade skills at instruments and composition without any previous training. Generally the movie did not play well with musicians.
 August Rush / int_e603890a
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August Rush / int_e603890a
 August Rush / int_e6ab61d
type
Magic Realism
 August Rush / int_e6ab61d
comment
Magic Realism: A pretty plausible reason for the movie's factual inaccuracies. Keri Russell described it as a fairytale.
 August Rush / int_e6ab61d
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August Rush / int_e6ab61d
 August Rush / int_eb8ec7c8
type
Jerkass
 August Rush / int_eb8ec7c8
comment
Jerkass: The Wizard again.
 August Rush / int_eb8ec7c8
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August Rush / int_eb8ec7c8
 August Rush / int_f0089082
type
Early-Bird Cameo
 August Rush / int_f0089082
comment
Early-Bird Cameo: The musician Louis and Lyla see in Washington Square is Wizard. He plays the guitar and harmonica, and later on Wizard tells Arthur that Washington Square was his spot for ten years.
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August Rush / int_f0089082
 August Rush / int_f274e716
type
Serendipitous Symphony
 August Rush / int_f274e716
comment
Serendipitous Symphony: A lot.
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 August Rush / int_f64a9cf7
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Earn Your Happy Ending
 August Rush / int_f64a9cf7
comment
Earn Your Happy Ending
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August Rush

The following is a list of statements referring to the current page from other pages.

 AcademyAwardForBestOriginalSong
seeAlso
August Rush
 August Rush
hasFeature
Artistic License – Music / int_e1040775
 August Rush
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Child Prodigy / int_e1040775
 August Rush
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Concert Climax / int_e1040775
 August Rush
hasFeature
Convenient Miscarriage / int_e1040775
 August Rush
hasFeature
Deathbed Confession / int_e1040775
 August Rush
hasFeature
Elegant Classical Musician / int_e1040775
 August Rush
hasFeature
Is That the Best You Can Do? / int_e1040775
 August Rush
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Lamarck Was Right / int_e1040775
 August Rush
hasFeature
Serendipitous Symphony / int_e1040775
 August Rush
hasFeature
The '90s / int_e1040775