FILM SCORE FRIDAY 7/19/02

This year's Emmy nominations in the music categories:

A Day In Their Lives
Mark Leggett

First Monday
Bruce Broughton

Justice League
Lolita Ritmanis

Six Feet Under
Thomas Newman

Wolf Lake
David Schwartz

Blue Planet: Seas Of Life
George Fenton

JAG - Adrift (Part 2)
Steve Bramson

24 - 7:00 a.m - 8:00 a.m.
Sean Callery

The X-Files - The Truth
Mark Snow

Xena: Warrior Princess - A Friend In Need II
Joseph LoDuca

Dinner With Friends
Dave Grusin

Jim Hensonís Jack And The Beanstalk: The Real Story - Part 2
Rupert Gregson-Williams

Last Call
Brian Tyler

The Mists Of Avalon - Part 1
Lee Holdridge

Shackleton - Part 2
Adrian Johnson

We Were The Mulvaneys
Patrick Williams

The Carol Burnett Show "Show Stoppers"
Song Title: "A Mackie Rag"
Mitzie Welch, Musical Numbers by
Ken Welch, Musical Numbers by

The Fairly OddParents - Christmas Every Day
Song Title: "I Wish Every Day Could Be Christmas"
Guy Moon, Songs by
Butch Hartman, Songs by
Steve Marmel, Songs by

Family Guy - Brian Wallows And Peter Swallows
Song Title: "Youíve Got A Lot To See"
Walter Murphy, Composer
Seth MacFarlane, Lyricist

Judging Amy - Beating The Bounds
Song Title: "The Best Kind Of Answer"
Peter Himmelman, Music by

The Simpsons - The Old Man And The Key
Song Title: "Ode To Branson"
Alf Clausen, Music by
Jon Vitti, Lyrics by

Buffy The Vampire Slayer - Once More With Feeling
Christophe Beck, Music Director
Jesse Tobias, Music Director

Dinotopia - Part 1
Geoffrey Alexander, Conducted by

The Kennedy Center Honors
Elliot Lawrence, Music Director

Opening Ceremony Salt Lake 2002 Olympic Winter Games
Mark Watters, Music Director

Ultimate Manilow!
Steve Welch, Music Director

Percepto Records has announced two upcoming Vic Mizzy double feature discs. The first pairs Mizzy's scores for THE CAPER OF THE GOLDEN BULLS and THE PERILS OF PAULINE. The second joins two scores for comedies produced by horror specialist William Castle and starring Sid Caesar: THE BUSY BODY, based on the comic caper novel by Donald E. Westlake (whose "Parker" novels formed the basis for our own recent double feature disc, POINT BLANK/THE OUTFIT), and THE SPIRIT IS WILLING.

As one who had waited over twenty five years for the score to be available, I would like to thank Percepto for releasing Mizzy's THE NIGHT WALKER on CD. And no, they didn't send me a free copy.

The Varese Sarabande CD Club will announce their four newest releases on July 29th. On August 20th, the regular Varese label will release Nicholas Pike's score to the horror film FEAR DOT COM, a film whose release answers two questions -- 1. Did someone really make a film called Fear Dot Com?, and 2. What should go on my video shelf next to 976-EVIL?

Universal Records will release Danny Elfman's score to RED DRAGON on September 24th. This fall, Sony Classical will release James Horner's score to the remake of THE FOUR FEATHERS.

Halloween: Resurrection - Danny Lux - Varese Sarabande
K19: The Widowmaker - Klaus Badelt - Hollywood Records
My Big Fat Greek Wedding - Chris Wilson, Alexander Janko (17 min. of score, plus songs) - Sony/Playtone
Stuart Little 2 - Alan Silvestri (only 2 score cues) - Sony

Eight Legged Freaks - John Ottman - Score Album on Varese due July 23
K19: The Widowmaker - Klaus Badelt - Score Album on Hollywood Records
Stuart Little 2 - Alan Silvestri - Song album on Sony, including 2 score cues

ROAD TO PERDITION - Thomas Newman

"Those shades are matched by Thomas Newman's symphonic score, which infuses a sweeping Coplandesque evocation of the American flatlands with Irish folk motifs."

Stephen Holden, New York Times

"Thomas Newman's inventive score, while appropriately serious toward the end, seems intent upon lightening the mood earlier on with some overly busy and cutesy orchestrations and melodic doodlings."

Todd McCarthy, Variety

"The evocative score is by Thomas Newman."

Kenneth Turan, Los Angeles Times

REIGN OF FIRE - Edward Shearmur

"It might make a good subject for "Mystery Science Theater 3000" if that show still existed, or if you could hear the robots talking beneath the deafening pseudo-Wagnerian score that now accompanies all action movies."

Andrew O'Heir, Salon

Walkabout
Lyrics by Don Black, Music by John Barry

Walkabout
And as you wander on
Reflect and ponder on
The dreams today forgot to bring

Go somewhere where you're out of reach
Find a distant beach
Where the wind blows free
Walkabout with me

Originally published by Edwin H. Morris & Company Inc.

Our latest buddy cop team are two composer/songwriter/arrangers who began their careers with thrillers, yet became most commonly associated with lighter entertainment - Henry Mancini and Marc Shaiman.

Blind Date - One Night at McCool's
A Family Upside Down - Stuart Saves His Family
Ghost Dad - Heart and Souls
House Calls - Patch Adams
Little Miss Marker - Disney's The Kid
Once Is Not Enough - The First Wives Club
So This Is Paris - Forget Paris
The Thief Who Came to Dinner - What's the Worst That Could Happen?
Tom and Jerry: The Movie - South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut
Two For the Road - The Story of Us
Victor/Victoria - In & Out
Wait Until Dark - Misery
W.C. Fields and Me - Mr. Saturday Night

From: Jeffrey Thomas <maestrojw2002@yahoo.com>

Scott, I have a question that seems to be right up your alley. I was in line to see Minority Report a couple weeks ago and I was saying to a friend of mine how, if Minority Report makes $100 million than John Williams will have three $100 million movies under his belt in one year. These would be Star Wars Ep. 2, Minority Report and Chamber of Secrets, which is sure to hit $100 million in the first week alone. I then realized a couple days later that Spielberg's "Catch Me If You Can" comes out in December. Any Spielberg flick has a shot at $100 mil, since most of his have done over $100 million. This has to be some kind of feat. I can't even think of another year in which Williams himself has had this many blockbusters let alone any OTHER film composer. Has anyone else come close? I thought this might make a nifty "Film Score Friday" topic. By the way, I love the composer comparisons, please keep doing them!

Alan Silvestri had a similarly remarkable hit streak in 2000: What Lies Beneath (155), What Women Want (182) and Cast Away (233!), followed by The Mummy Returns (202) in 2001. In 1999, James Newton Howard had The Sixth Sense (293) and Runaway Bride (152), followed by Dinosaur (137) in 2000. In that same period, Thomas Newman had three consecutive 100 million plus hits -- American Beauty, The Green Mile and Erin Brockovich, which is especially impressive since they were all Best Picture nominees as well.

This year, however, Williams is getting a run for his money from Danny Elfman, who has Spider-Man (401!), Men in Black II (132 and counting) and the upcoming Red Dragon. There have also been unconfirmed rumors that Elfman will score Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, which is likely to make at least a couple bucks.

From: "Johannes Ehn Hellstrand" <carnotaur76@hotmail.com>

Hi! I'd read the Dinotopia article by Jeff Bond and the music seems very interesting. Does anyone out there know when (and if) Trevor Jones Dinotopia score is going to be released on CD?
 
Kind regards : Johannes, Swedish music fan

Shortly after, Contemporary Media Recordings released a 12 cue, sixty-one minute CD of Jones's score, which is virtually impossible to find. I first found a stack of a half dozen copies in the used section of an L.A. record store -- all sealed, only seven bucks each. I bought one, and a week later they were all gone. I've since seen only one other copy, also in an L.A. used section.

Contemporary Media Recordings is reputedly Jones' own label, which would make sense since they also released his score to the mini-series of Cleopatra (starring Timothy Dalton, Billy Zane, Rupert Graves, and a gorgeous chick who couldn't act in the title role) which was at least easier to find.

Screen Archives' Upcoming Releases list claims that Disney will be releasing a CD of it in October. CDNow says that Varese Sarabande will, which seems extremely unlikely. Amazon.com doesn't list it at all.

Happy hunting!

From: "Wayne Whited" <hispro@bright.net>

Thanks for printing such a informative and entertaining list of Rejected Scores. It has always baffled me as to why a director/producer would go though the trouble of hiring a composer to do the work and then reject their vision just because it doesn't match their own. I've always believed that a film is the sum of many visions, which each person bringing their own interpretation to the screen.

Anyway, what I wanted to ask is this. Didn't Michael Kamen write a score for the 1998 film version of "The Avengers"? I remember reading an interview with him about the score in your magazine a few years ago before the film's release where he said that he didn't use the theme because no one would recognize it. (Really?) However, the finished project was released with a score by Joel McNeely.

Laurie Johnson's Avengers theme is one of the all-time coolest TV themes, and Kamen would have to be a dork not to use it. Though Kamen is a talented composer and a very nice man, he's not the strongest melodist. I think it's no coincidence that many of his early scores were based partly on pre-existing songs (Brazil, Mona Lisa, Someone to Watch Over Me) and classical music (the Die Hards).

From: "Mike Atkins" mkat71@aol.com

When I saw the title of the article for July 9th, I had to check it out, and I knew which great partnership I was NOT going to find listed. It boggles my mind that Jerry Fielding/Michael Winner and Quincy Jones/Sidney Lumet are listed but Lalo Schifrin/Don Siegel are not.

Don't get me wrong, those first two collaborations are certainly worth attention. Fielding is a great composer, although Michael Winner is something of a joke. Sidney Lumet is one of the greats, and Quincy is very good at emulating Mancini's darker side, but he's melodically-challenged and has a tendency to confuse musical gimmickry with genuine innovation. Having said all that, I like both Fielding and Quincy.

But how could you guys leave out one of the industry's greatest and most overlooked and under-appreciated collaborations? Don Siegel was one of the most brilliant directors in Hollywood, even though he was never given the credit he deserved. And it hardly needs to be said that Lalo Schifrin was one of the greatest film composers of all time. The Schifrin/Siegel teamwork was a textbook in how to use music in a film properly. Schifrin didn't knock himself out trying to imitate "avant-garde" 20th-century composers, or rely on a lot of annoying gimmicks. He was just a genuinely great musician and composer, who had style, class, and subtlety. What made Schifrin's work of the sixties and seventies so much better and more important than anything John Williams ever did was his appreciation of silence, and his innate understanding of when to use music and when NOT to use music. Most modern film scores are wall-to-wall Wagnerian orchestral rubbish. Modern filmmakers and modern film score composers don't know when to shut up.

So now, I will shut up.

From: Kirk Henderson <kirksworks@attbi.com>

Theremin fans may be interested in knowing that their favorite electronic instrument - invented by Russian scientist Leon Theremin - was a major player in the new film BARTLEBY, now playing in limited release theatrically across the country. BARTLEBY is based on a Herman Melville story, "Bartleby the Scrivener," about a file clerk in a records office who suddenly decides to stop working one day, giving the line "I'd prefer not to" as his only excuse. The only person who seems to take an interest in the man's strange behavior and ultimately his well-being, is the owner of the business, and the at first amusing story becomes a more somber tome about humanity. The film stars Crispin Glover as Bartleby and David Paymer as the man who heads up the office and hires him. The other office workers include Glenne Headly, Joe Piscopo and Maury Chaykin.

I was the storyboard artist and digital matte painter on the film and was with the production from its early stages. I was able to see the score progress throughout production via the tapes I received of the various rough cuts. Right from the start the music was in the hands of the director, Jonathan Parker, who is also a musician and who wrote the music to his earlier short films and previous feature, MASHIE NIBLICK, the golf comedy I first worked on with him.

Initially, the music for BARTLEBY was quite simple, much like the music Jonathan used on his earlier, less ambitious projects, but BARTLEBY had a depth to it that called for a fuller score. The film's editor, Rick LeCompte, and myself suggested to Parker and his co-writer/co-producer, Catherine di Napoli, that it would be a good idea to hire an experienced film composer, however, Jonathan was determined to do the score himself.

Although Jonathan did not hire a film composer, he eventually came to realize the music needed to be developed beyond what he had and so he did go back into the studio to record a more fully fleshed out score and added the theramin in the process. This was a good choice, and, although the score is still fairly simple, the choice of the theremin was perfect, and I have to say, for a non-film composer, Jonathan came through with a pretty effective, off beat score. There are few subjects these days where the theramin would fit, but the story of BARTLEBY was weird enough, and Parker's exaggerated style was caricatured enough to make it work. He wrote and recorded the score with Seth Asarnow, who played the electronic instrument. The score is a small ensemble, with the theremin taking the lead in many cases, backed by vibes, piano, drums, violin and some sort of mouth organ - kind of like a clarinet with a keyboard attached. The final effect is a bit like "Henry Mancini in the Twilight Zone," and is also an amusing listen on its own.

The soundtrack is available at www.bartelbythemovie.com for $10. plus $2. shipping. There are samples of the music at the web site. Be warned that the CD includes less than 15 minutes of music, however, if you see the film, you may be interested, and besides, there isn't much new theremin music being written these days. Neither is it a full-price CD. The packaging is bare bones, and one track, which is a Mozart piano piece, is titled simply, "Mozart." Yet, for those who are seeking something different in both movie and music, and perhaps as an antidote to all the summer blockbusters, BARTLEBY might be worth checking out. It is much better at capturing the essence of Melville than did the earlier British version made in the mid 70s (very much a product of its time).

I believe the film may have had much of its run, but it is still playing in some cities and will be released in others late July. There is even a small bit on the website about the theremin, which also informs that contrary to popular belief, the theremin was not used by the Beach Boys on "Good Vibrations," but a sound-alike instrument. There is also a trailer (with a couple of my matte paintings included!), downloadable posters, stills from the film, information on writer Melville, cast and crew, and release dates with theaters listed.