FILM SCORE FRIDAY 6/11/04

On July 20th, Varese Sarabande will release the scores to two of this summer's highest profile thrillers. Marco Beltrami (not Trevor Jones, as we originally reported) is the composer of I, ROBOT, a futuristic thriller inspired by the classic Isaac Asimov stories, starring Will Smith in what the studio must be praying is another Independence Day/Men in Black sized sci-fi hit for him.

John Powell returns to familiar turf with THE BOURNE SUPREMACY, the sequel to the surprise hit Robert Ludlum spy thriller of two years ago, with Matt Damon reprising his title role as the amnesiac spy, and Bloody Sunday's Paul Greengrass directing instead of Doug Liman.

The Laemmle's newest series, "The Wild Bunch: A New Look at the Old West," begins this weekend, and will feature showings of My Darling Clementine (Cyril J. Mockridge), High Noon (Dimitri Tiomkin), Shane (Victor Young), Johnny Guitar (Young), The Searchers (Max Steiner), Decision at Sundown (Heinz Roemheld), The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (Mockridge), A Fistful of Dollars (Ennio Morricone), The Professionals (Maurice Jarre), and The Wild Bunch (Jerry Fielding).

For more information on locations, dates and screening times, go to www.laemmle.com.

I first became aware of the film's resurgence in an article by Douglas Wolk in the magazine The Believer, which used the film as an example of the concept "So Bad It's Good." As a combination of jaw-dropping awfulness and genuine entertainment value, this film puts its contemporaries Xanadu and Can't Stop the Music to shame. The production is surprisingly elaborate (filmed in West Berlin) and features nearly nonstop original musical numbers. The film's music arranger and lyricist is none other than Austin Powers' George S. Clinton, who also appears in a small but oddly memorable role as "Joe Pittman," a nosy reporter whose newspaper gets bought by the villainous BIM corporation and he's forced to become their lackey.

There are a handful of familiar faces in the cast, including Catherine Mary Stewart (a few years before Last Starfighter) as the heroine, Vladek Sheybal (the SPECTRE chessmaster Kronsteen from From Russia With Love) as the villain, Mr. Boogalow (for some reason, many of the characters pronounce it "Boogaloo." Similarly, in Golan's Over the Top, the characters couldn't seem to agree on whether Stallone's character's last name was Hawk or Hawks), Miriam Margolyes (who went on to much better things, from Little Dorrit and The Age of Innocence to the Harry Potter series) as a Jewish landlady, and Joss Ackland in two roles, as a "hippie leader" and another role which I won't describe -- to quote Douglas Wolk's article, "I will not spoil the last twenty minutes, except to say that no other dramatic production has ever embraced every meaning of the phrase 'dues ex machina' quite as vigorously as 'The Apple.'"

The other lead actors didn't go on to such notable careers. The hero is played by George Gilmour, whose imdb.com filmography lists no other roles, and who spends most of the film wearing the tightest pants you've ever seen. Similarly, his romantic rival was played by Alan Love, whose only other credits are Bill Forsyth's first two films and who suffers the rare indignity of performing a song and dance number dressed only in a shiny gold thong. Overall, this film's vision of the future is remarkably gay, and for some reason also includes a lot of escalators.

MGM Home Video is planning to release The Apple on DVD this August, but it is guaranteed to have much more impact on the big screen. And if you have a copy of the original soundtrack LP (at the film's premiere, angry audience members tossed them at the screen), for BIM's sake hold on to it.

Battle of Britain - Ron Goodwin/William Walton - Varese Sarabande
The Chronicles of Riddick - Graeme Revell - Varese Sarabande
Dirty Harry - Lalo Schifrin - Aleph
The Lion in Winter - Richard Hartley - Varese Sarabande
The Notebook - Aaron Zigman - Varese Sarabande
The Punisher - Carlo Siliotto - La-La Land
Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation - John Morgan, William Stromberg - Varese Sarabande
Van Helsing: The London Assignment - John Van Tongeren - Decca

The Chronicles of Riddick - Graeme Revell - Score CD on Varese Sarabande
Garfield: The Movie - Christophe Beck
Imagining Argentina - George Fenton
Napoleon Dynamite - John Swihart
The Stepford Wives - David Arnold

June 15
Around the World in 80 Days - Trevor Jones - Disney
The Great Escape - Elmer Bernstein - Varese Sarabande
The Terminal - John Williams - Decca
June 22
The Door in the Floor - Marcelo Zarvos - Decca
Salem's Lot - Christopher Gordon - Varese Sarabande
Two Brothers - Stephen Warbeck - Decca
June 29
The Clearing - Craig Armstrong - Varese Sarabande
Man on Fire - Harry Gregson-Williams - Varese Sarabande
July 13
Monk - Jeff Beal - Varese Sarabande
July 20
The Bourne Supremacy - John Powell - Varese Sarabande
I, Robot - Marco Beltrami - Varese Sarabande
Date Unknown
The Big Empty - Brian Tyler - La-La Land
The Brave Little Toaster - David Newman - Percepto
The Enemy Below - Leigh Harline - Intrada Special Collection
Foxes of Harrow - David Buttolph - Screen Archives
Godzilla - Akira Ifukube - La-La Land
The Keys of the Kingdom - Alfred Newman - Screen Archives
Killer Klowns From Outer Space - John Massari - Percepto
King Arthur - Hans Zimmer - Hollywood
The Reluctant Astronaut - Vic Mizzy - Percepto
Son of Fury - Alfred Newman - Screen Archives
Terror Tract - Brian Tyler - La-La Land
Timeline - Jerry Goldsmith - Varese Sarabande
Vic Mizzy: Suites and Themes Vol. 2 - Vic Mizzy - Percepto

CORRECTION: Last week I inadvertently and inexplicably printed THIS week's THIS WEEK IN FILM MUSIC HISTORY. To make up for it, here are two weeks worth of entries:

June 4 - Oliver Nelson born (1932)
June 5 - William Loose born (1910)
June 5 - Amanda Kravat born (1966)
June 6 - Aram Khachaturian born (1903)
June 6 - Michel Legrand begins recording his rejected score for The Man Who Loved Cat Dancing (1973)
June 7 - Charles Strouse born (1928)
June 7 - Don Peake born (1940)
June 7 - Daniele Amfitheatrof died (1983)
June 8 - George Antheil born (1900)
June 8 - Jean Wiener died (1992)
June 8 - Herschel Burke Gilbert died (2003)
June 9 - James Newton Howard born (1951)
June 9 - Louis Gruenberg died (1964)
June 10 - Hugo Friedhofer begins recording score to Above and Beyond (1952)
June 10 - David Shire begins recording score to Farewell, My Lovely (1975)
June 11 - Carmine Coppola born (1910)
June 14 - Cy Coleman born (1929)
June 14 - Marcus Miller born (1959)
June 14 - Doug Timm born (1960)
June 14 - John Williams begins recording his replacement score for The Man Who Loved Cat Dancing (1973)
June 14 - Henry Mancini died (1994)
June 15 - Robert Russell Bennett born (1894)
June 15 - Meredith Willson died (1984)
June 15 - Manos Hadjidakis died (1994)
June 16 - Fred Karlin born (1936)
June 16 - Jerry Goldsmith begins recording score to Justine (1969)
June 17 - Jerry Fielding born (1922)
June 17 - Dominic Frontiere born (1931)
June 17 - Barry Manilow born (1943)
June 17 - George S. Clinton born (1947)
June 17 - Alfred Newman begins recording score to How to Marry a Millionaire (1953)
June 17 - Paul Giovanni died (1990)

HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN ­ John Williams

"Once again, the production is technically superior, with the grimmer tone reflected even in John Williams' score, which seems to heighten the sense of menace in its elfin theme."

Brian Lowry, Variety

FROM: "Christian Kuehn"

SUBJECT: Two Things (about the new poll and Thomas Newman)
 
1) Portman's The Emperor's New Clothes is available from an English label; 40 minutes of score, nothing too special, very Portman-y.

2) A stroviol is a viola-like instrument with some kind of gramophone-like speaker attached to it.

FROM: "William Bracone"

SUBJECT: Review of Yared's "Troy"
 
Thank you, David Coscina, for your thought-filled and responsible review of the now famous rejected score of "Troy." Your opening remarks concerning Prokofiev were truly appropriate. It's good to know that there are film music aficionados who can reference music from the concert hall, as well as voice an appreciation for scores that date prior to the emergence of John Williams as the composer of choice for symphonic scoring.

Essays of this caliber will help FSM maintain its position at the forefront of criticism/reviewing in the arena of film music.

SUBJECT: Troy Review
 
The Gabriel Yared Troy review's a bit over the top, isn't it? Throwing in references to Eisenstein, Empire Strikes Back, and half-a-dozen classical composers it comes on as if the score were one of the finest works of art, denied to the world by those evil Hollywood suits. The first paragraph suggests that had this been in the film it would have changed the course of film-making -a ridiculous statement. Especially as the Holst influence and Eastern singing is along the lines of Gladiator, a score which actually did change things (not necessarily for the better).

Yared's score is pleasant enough, obviously influenced by certain classical works (which your reviewer spends plenty of time trying to justify), but is hardly the groundbreaking piece suggested here. Too clever for it's own good, perhaps? Seems to me this score has been elevated to greatness simply by the noisy rejection and subsequent replacement by someone most film music fans don't like.

I enjoyed the film itself, but the lukewarm reaction and so-so box office suggests it wasn't really the score that was a problem but that was the only thing they could fix so late in the day. While I wish the studios would learn more from the Lord of the Rings films other than casting Orlando Bloom and doing big CGI battle scenes I don't think eulogising rejected works to this extent is going to change things.

FROM: "Bruce Younger"

SUBJECT: Three/Four Musketeers
 
I share the same emotions you do regarding the scores for The Three/Four Musketeers, but in reverse order. When I first saw The Three Musketeers, I loved the Michel Legrand score. When I saw the advance poster for The Four Musketeers (the only way we could find out who was scoring a film back then) and saw Lalo Schifrin's name, I was disappointed. Mind you, I like Schifrin a lot more than Legrand, but Legrand's music for Three was so perfect, the thought of anyone else scoring Four was right up there with anyone else but John Barry scoring a Bond film. I immediately felt a pang upon hearing Schifrin's score. I was very disappointed in it and as a result, I liked Three a lot more than Four. Even though, objectively, Four seems just as good as Three. Ironically, there is nothing wrong with Schifrin's score. But it doesn't soar like Legrand's themes do. Years later, I've come to terms with the Schifrin score and enjoy Four much more than I used to.

MailBag@filmscoremonthly.com