On October 14, 1972, 50 years ago, Michael Jackson was number 1 on Billboard, a milestone because it was the first time that the singer held that position alone.
This was thanks to the song “Ben”, an emotional ballad that portrays the friendship between a boy and a rat, but what this single hides is that it was originally made for a horror movie regarding a bloodthirsty rat. The film that has the same name as the famous song is the sequel to Willard (1971).
In this film, Ben is a rat trained by a human, Willard Stiles, to act at his will, just like the other rodents that live in his house. This is how these animals kill when ordered, but in the end they turn once morest him.
In the second part of this thriller, a boy, Danny Garrison, befriends Ben, who is a huge rat. However, she turns evil and recruits more murderous rodents who attack and kill the citizens of Los Angeles.
Certainly, a plot that moves away from the tenderness of the ballad performed by Jackson.
“My first relationship with cinema came when I performed the title song for the 1972 film ‘Ben’. ‘Ben’ means a lot to me. I had never done anything before that excited me as much as going to the studio to put my voice in the film. I had a great time,” Michael Jackson mentioned in his book Moonwalk.
a song regarding friendship
Don Black and Walter Scharf were the authors of the theme. Black himself explained how he came up with the theme: “When I was approached to write regarding a rat, I said ‘You can’t write regarding a rat!’ I mean ‘I’m not going to use words like ‘cheese.’ I thought the best thing was to write regarding a friendship.” And Michael liked the proposal. “Michael is a huge animal lover, very sensitive. He enjoys anything that crawls or flies.”
Although Ben did not do very well at the box office, the song was a success exceeding 1.7 million copies in the United States alone. With this track the young Michael won a Golden Globe for Best Song and was nominated for an Oscar for Best Original Song in 1973.
