FILM SCORE FRIDAY 6/16/06

It's frustrating that it's taken two years after his death for mainstream film critics to finally appreciate Jerry Goldsmith, and perhaps it's only fitting that it is one of Goldsmith's pupils, composer Marco Beltrami, that has given them the opportunity to acknowledge Goldsmith's great gifts. For more details, look below at THE OMEN section of DID THEY MENTION THE MUSIC?

Battlestar Galactica Season 2 - Bear McCreary - La-La Land
Hercules/Hercules Unchained - Enzo Masetti - Digitmovies (import)
I Vampiri/Caltiki: The Immortal Monster - Roman Vlad/Roberto Nicolosi - Digitmovies (import)

Coastlines - Charles Engstrom
The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift - Brian Tyler - Score CD due June 20 from Varese Sarabande
Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties - Christophe Beck
The Lake House - Rachel Portman - Score CD due June 20 from Varese Sarabande
Loverboy - Michael Bacon
Nacho Libre - Danny Elfman, Beck

June 20
The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift - Brian Tyler - Varese Sarabande
The Lake House - Rachel Portman - Lakeshore
June 27
Roving Mars - Philip Glass - Lakeshore
A Scanner Darkly - Graham Reynolds - Lakeshore
Superman Returns - John Ottman - Rhino
July 4
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest - Hans Zimmer - Disney
Stargate: The Deluxe Edition - David Arnold - Varese Sarabande
July 11
Death on the Nile - Nino Rota - DRG
The Descent - David Julyan - Cooking Vinyl
Little Miss Sunshine - Mychael Danna, songs - Lakeshore
July 18
Monster House - Douglas Pipes - Varese Sarabande
Date Unknown
Amazing Stories: Anthology Two - Jerry Goldsmith, David Newman, David Shire, Fred Steiner & various other wonderful composers - Intrada Special Collection
Amazing Stories: Anthology Three - John Williams & various other incredible composers - Intrada Special Collection
Dark Skies - Michael Hoenig - Perseverance
Dark Victory - Max Steiner - Screen Archives/BYU
Farscape Classics Vol. 2 - Guy Gross - La-La Land
Film Music Collection (12-CD set) - Elmer Bernstein, Bernard Herrmann, Alfred Newman, Alex North, Miklos Rozsa, Max Steiner, Dmitri Tiomkin, Franx Waxman - Film Score Monthly
The Film Music of Ralph Vaughan Williams Vol. 3 - Ralph Vaughan Williams - Chandos
Joe 90 - Barry Gray - Silva
Murph the Surf - Philip Lambro - Perseverance
The People That Time Forgot - John Scott - JOS
The Prophecy - David Williams - Perseverance
The Prophecy II - David Williams - Perseverance
Remo Williams: the Adventure Begins - Craig Safan - Perseverance
The Three Musketeers - Max Steiner - Screen Archives/BYU

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)
June 18 - Paul McCartney born (1942)
June 18 - Bernard Herrmann begins recording score to Blue Denim (1959)
June 18 - Frederick Hollander died (1976)
June 19 - Johnny Douglas born (1920)
June 20 - Jeff Beal born (1963)
June 20 - Fred Karlin begins recording his score to Westworld (1973)
June 20 - Chinatown released in theaters (1974)
June 21 - Lalo Schifrin born (1932)
June 21 - Philippe Sarde born (1945)
June 21 - Elmer Bernstein begins recording score to 7 Women (1965)
June 21 - Gerald Fried's score for the Star Trek episode "Catspaw" is recorded (1967)
June 21 - John Ottman begins recording his score to Cellular (2004)
June 22 - Todd Rundgren born (1948)
June 22 - The Guns of Navarone opens in New York (1961)
June 22 - Darius Milhaud died (1974)

CARS - Randy Newman

"But as the movie slows down to take in the scenery in and around imaginary, iconic Radiator Springs - a dusty Shangri-la out of 'Happy Days,' a paean to tail fins and sunsets and mesas and neon, embroidered with some of Randy Newman's prettiest songwriting about little pleasures - 'Cars' opens, gently and delicately, into something even more shimmering and soulful than the computerized glint of sunlight on car metal."

Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly

"With the price of oil gurgling upward, and even the President conceding that the nation's fuel consumption could use a trim, Pixar has produced a hymn to the ecstasy of driving. The entire film dreams woozily of a chrome-bright past, and especially of the glory days of Route 66, when, as we are told, 'cars didn't drive on it to make good time -- they drove on it to have a good time.' Cue a Randy Newman song, one of his weakest, that begins, 'Not so very long ago, the world was different, oh yes it was.' Along came the interstate, apparently, and ruined everything. Just like that darned Internet, I guess, or that superhighway stuff, or those dumb movies they make with computers nowadays. Oh yes."

Anthony Lane, The New Yorker

"Yet it's also director John Lasseter's most elegiac offering, an ode to the bygone days of dusty roads winding through small towns in which nothing ever happens except the crawling of time. That probably explains the turgid pace, with all the traction of a boxcar going uphill in molasses. The movie begs its audience to slow down and appreciate the roadside attractions passed at light speed from the freeway. Even the music, by Pixar stalwart Randy Newman, sounds like a 45 played at 42 rpm."

Robert Wilonsky, Village Voice

"It's hard to miss the direct similarities between 'Cars' and 'Doc Hollywood,' though 'Cars' owes nearly as much to every other film about a city slicker who gets a taste of country living and winds up reluctant to return to the hustle and bustle. 'Cars' is a fine example of the formula, with pleasant chemistry, the patented Pixar cleverness, and the usual sweetly melancholy nostalgia courtesy of songwriter Randy Newman."

Tasha Robinson, The Onion

"Directed by Pixar whiz and guiding honcho John Lasseter ('Toy Story'), 'Cars' wrestles with the American need for speed, as well as our yearning for a more thoughtfully paced era. If you don't get this, there's a James Taylor-sung ballad, 'Our Town,' written by Randy Newman."

Lisa Kennedy, Denver Post

"Even Randy Newman's score isn't particularly distinguished, or too frequently gets drowned out by the sound of racing tires."

Brian Lowry, Variety

"Settling the score, meanwhile, is Randy Newman, whose fourth [sic] Pixar collaboration ambles along agreeably, accompanied by drivin' tunes performed by Rascal Flatts, Sheryl Crow and Brad Paisley that are perfect for coasting along those alternate routes."

Michael Rechtshaffen, Hollywood Reporter

THE KING - Max Avery Lichtenstein

"Then everything gets smothered by an innocent-but-spooky plinkity-plink piano score like something out of a 1970s movie about a telekinetic adolescent girl."

Kyle Smith, New York Post

THE OMEN - Marco Beltrami

"And Marco Beltrami's adequate score is helped greatly by its borrowings from Jerry Goldsmith's Oscar-winning original (which [director Richard] Donner has acknowledged as the best thing about his film)."

Andy Klein, Los Angeles Citybeat

"Released in 1976 on the coattails of the demon-child craze ignited by 'Rosemary's Baby' and "The Exorcist,' the original 'Omen' may not have been a masterpiece of horror, but it was a classy, creepy affair, gussied up with lively character turns by the likes of David Warner, Leo McKern and Billie Whitelaw -- and oh, that apocalyptic Jerry Goldsmith music!"

Scott Foundas, L.A. Weekly

"He [writer David Seltzer] hits the same high notes as before: a horrifying moral paradox driving a taut, detective-like story ahead, well-lubricated by highly choreographed murders engineered from down under by His Satanic Majesty. Impalements, burnings, beheadings, hangings, all those nasty things done to witches in days of yore. Here they're done again, to the tune of malodorous choral music, only the victims are the chaste, the good and the pure. And on top of that: You get to see Mia Farrow get creamed."

Stephen Holden, Washington Post

"New director John Moore just doesn't have original director Richard Donner's filmmaking flair, so the same scenes done the same way on phony-looking Prague locations without the benefit of Jerry Goldsmith's Oscar-winning score just seem terminally slow and flat."

William Arnold, Seattle Post-Intelligencer

"Yet another remake no one needs is 'The Omen,' based on an empty 1976 horror vessel that caught the public's imagination largely because of a juicy Jerry Goldsmith score and a state-of-the-art Rube Goldberg plate-glass decapitation. With minor variations, John Moore's version is a beat-for-beat copy. It feels predetermined -- and I don't mean it was predicted in Revelations."

David Edelstein, New York

"Eventually the atheistic Roger [sic] comes around, and his suspicion turns 'The Omen' into a chase picture, not unlike 'The Da Vinci Code,' in which he and the photographer try to solve the mystery. But Moore shows greater interest in concocting a chic-looking movie than in making our skin crawl, and the violently loud score works harder than he does to spook us. (It succeeds only in producing migraines.)"

Wesley Morris, Boston Globe

"And even though the new 'Omen' has a nearly identical plot, it is missing the best part from the original film and its sequels -- that totally sweet 'Sanguis bebimus! Corpus edimus!' chanting in Jerry Goldsmith's musical score, which got cranked up every time Damien did something particularly evil. (The words translate to 'We drink the blood! We eat the flesh!' How cool is that?)"

Paul Hartlaub, San Francisco Chronicle

"And while Marco Beltrami has delivered an evocative score, a snippet of the late Jerry Goldsmith's masterpiece 'Ave Satani' over the closing credits stirs a hunger for more."

Brian Lowry, Variety

"One element that should have been recycled from the original, Jerry Goldsmith's supremely chilling musical score, has been jettisoned, with the new score by Marco Beltrami proving thoroughly ordinary."

Frank Scheck, Hollywood Reporter

FROM: "Steve Garland"

Regarding "The Replacement Composers" -- Bravo! I loathe the nonproprietary, wall-to-wall carpeting that passes for an MV/RC "score." Tumid and scarcely engaging pablum like "Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl" is maddening enough to stomach for 2+ hours without even being engaged by what really ought to be lively and thematic musical accompaniment instead of a sustained and aimless orchestral orgasm. While I concede to enjoying individual efforts composed by graduates of Zimmer's stable (Gregson-Williams' "Sinbad" and Powell's "Mr. & Mrs. Smith" scores have their distinctive charms), this Identikit process of mix 'n' match that plagues contemporary film scoring may ultimately end up producing little save the sound of a death knell for thoughtful, truly meritorious film music.

In my article I neglected to mention an earlier attempt at the Media Ventures/Remote Control model: Cinemascore, a group of composers (brought together, I think, by Quincy Jones) including Chris Boardman and Tom Bahler, who scored 1986's Raw Deal. Cinemascore was apparently short-lived, but conceptually years ahead of its time.

FROM: Sean O'Neill

I just wanted to point out that Hans Zimmer was replaced on Kingdom Of Heaven by Harry Gregson-Williams. Zimmer had actually written music for this film, when it was still called "Crusades": In an audio press conference that was available on the official soundtrack site for The Last Samurai, Zimmer mentioned that he was going to to Morocco to visit Ridley Scott on set and share ideas on the score he had been composing. Shortly after this it was announced that Zimmer would no longer be scoring and would swap with Harry Gregson-Williams on Madagascar.

This next part is just a theory, but I would guess that much of what Hans Zimmer composed for King Arthur (announced around the time of this change-up) is actually themes he'd written for Kingdom Of Heaven. It's just a guess on my part, but I think there's some weight to it. King Arthur, IMO, is a far superior score to HGW's music for Kingdom Of Heaven, which should have been a bit more heavy-handed and heroic in a lot of the action music; something that HZ's King Arthur does so well, in comparison.

I much prefer Kingdom (especially its outstanding "Director's Cut") to Arthur, both score and film, though the temp tracking in Kingdom is disconcerting.

1. Cars -- 60
2. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (not yet released)
3. Mission: Impossible 3 -- 127
4. Superman Returns (not yet released)
5. X-Men: The Last Stand -- 202
6. The DaVinci Code -- 189
7. Click (not yet released)
8. Over the Hedge -- 130
9. Poseidon -- 54
10. Miami Vice (not yet released)

So though Poseidon is an expensive flop, it has still grossed a lot more than The Island and Stealth did last year. One film missing from my ten was The Break-Up, which has grossed $73 million in its first ten days -- its 38 million dollar opening weekend was more money than any of composer Jon Brion's previous films (Eternal Sunshine, I Heart Huckabees, Punch-Drunk Love, Magnolia) made during their entire runs.
 

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