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Posted: |
Nov 17, 2013 - 1:47 PM
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By: |
ToneRow
(Member)
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Jerry Goldsmith must have 'spotted' and composed music for SHOCK TREATMENT in November of 1963. He had finished recording his all-percussion replacement score for SEVEN DAYS IN MAY by October 21; his score for SHOCK TREATMENT was recorded during 2 days in December: 12/10/63 & 12/17/63.
After SHOCK TREATMENT, Goldsmith apparently went on to write the music for the pilot episode of THE MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E. (The Vulcan Affair) over the 1963/'64 Holiday season because the recording session for this show's pilot occurred on January 7th, 1964.
Approximately 20 minutes of monaural mix-down of SHOCK TREATMENT was previously released within Varese Sarabande's 2004 Goldsmith at Fox box set. Nine years later, Intrada's special collection volume 237 presents about 33 minutes of SHOCK TREATMENT in stereo along with a few of the mono tracks as bonus extras.
The additional (& previously unreleased) minutes from this soundtrack, though not very long in duration, aid greatly in one's increased appreciation for this score's elusive aural tapestries.
I must admit that the truncated 2004 version of SHOCK TREATMENT, while very welcomed indeed, did little to entice the multiple revisits which Goldsmith's highly detailed music deserves.
SHOCK TREATMENT remained in the shadows of Jerry Goldsmith's established masterworks for almost 50 years until now, when it can (in its second incarnation on Intrada) reveal its hitherto camouflaged innovations.
Yet ... Intrada's edition is still not the complete score as heard in the film itself. I'll explain later on.
My following track-by-track analysis will attempt to illustrate how SHOCK TREATMENT serves as connective tissue between Goldsmith's early-period and his immanent artistic peak.
The Intrada cues will be placed into the context, as much as is possible, within the film's duration.
... here goes ... 
Alfred Newman's Fox CinemaScope fanfare occupies the initial 20 seconds.
From 21 seconds into the picture until around 1:40 is a pre-title prelude in which chauffer/gardener Martin Ashley (Roddy McDowall) is introduced trimming branches with garden shears. Portions of the "Nelson's Seduction" cue are tracked into this introduction scene - which leads to Ashley murdering his elderly employer with his shears at 1:46, with Goldsmith's frenzied Psycho-like outburst ushering in his main title music (which plays through until 4:13 into the picture).
1. Main Title 2:31. Goldsmith's 5-note main theme is initially heard via a tape played backward!
A pianist and percussionist perform their parts solo, with the piano sounding off each of the 5 notes in reverse order. When this recording is played backward (in what is called an "overlay") along with the other instruments in the ensemble, the result sounds as if it is an electronic effect but what we hear are sustained notes leading up to their mallet strikes… an 'echo' coming before instead of after.
Introduced within the main titles, these overlays return during this score only to accompany the scenes depicting shock treatment.
The rest of the orchestra is that Bartokian combination of strings and percussion so prevalent in Goldsmith's early TV and film scores. One might even state that this instrumental pallet represents Jerry's typical approach to his scoring of black-and-white material.
The remainder of this main title sequence witnesses passages written for low-register organ, harp and what sounds to me like an electric violin (though it could be a Theremin or another electronic instrument).
2.Home Work 0:57. From about 9:50 through 10:45 into SHOCK TREATMENT, we hear this short cue as Nelson (Stuart Whitman) prepares to study both psychology and botany to ready himself for his assignment to act his way into the state asylum in which Martin Ashley is kept.
3.Broken Glass 0:41. The briefest cue in SHOCK TREATMENT is a bit of recycling Jerry Goldsmith did. The 4-note motif played by a Mephistophelean violin solo (Israel Baker? Lou Kaufman?) and accompanied by pizzicato strings was previously heard within an episode of THRILLER entitled "The Grim Reaper" which Goldsmith had scored about 30 month prior. Here, this music plays as Nelson walks on a sidewalk leading up to when he shatters a store window (between 11:20 and 12 minutes into the flick).
4.The New Patients 1:26. Marimba rhythms usher in a bus-load of patients entering into the state asylum at 16 minutes into the story. Goldsmith weaves a succession of 4 & 5 note motifs on the strings throughout this track.
5. Night Scene 3:47. The solo violin now re-iterates the notes heard on marimba in the previous track, representing the patients as a group. This lengthy scene (from around 23:20 to 27:05) showcases a variety of strings techniques which develop Goldsmith's 4 & 5 note motifs into more extended passages.
6.No More Shock 1:01. The first person in the picture (32:55 to 33:55) to be brought into the shock treatment room (bound onto stretcher) is neither Ashley nor Nelson; he's a former asylum orderly (Ossie Davis) who has become an inmate. He yells "no more shock" to no avail, as Goldsmith amps up insistent strings & percussion with overlay effects.
7.Aftershock 1:46. This is not for a scene (46:20 to 48:00) with Ossie Davis but rather with Nelson and Cynthia Albright (Carol Lynley) conversing in the asylum garden at night. As Cynthia explains what brought her into the asylum, Jerry Goldsmith further mutates raw material cells of 2 & 3 & 4 notes with tremolo strings, percussion & electric violin culminating in a dramatic sting to communicate the Albright family's repression of Cynthia's (possibly nymphomaniac) sexual appetite.
Curiously, Intrada's liner notes claim this music went unused in the film because there was no slate number for this cue within the master tape recording sessions. Yet - there it is in the movie, as I have described it above.
8.Edwina Wants The Money 1:10. This is one of my favorite cues in the score because it 's one of the earliest occurrences of Jerry Goldsmith utilizing an echo-delay technique which he would later use to great effect during his late-'60s/early- '70s masterpieces. Here in SHOCK TREATMENT, Goldsmith applies the echo-delay to a single note plucked on a stringed instrument. This represents the drug-induced hypnosis whom Dr. Edwina Beighly (Lauren Bacall) inflicts on her patients - in this case Martin Ashley (54:24 to 55:32).
Ascending and descending 2-note cells accompany as rhythm in Herrmannesque fashion and the cue climaxes into electric violin delirium.
9.Martin Comes To 1:10. Following track # 8 after a mere 20 seconds, this cue (55:51 to 56:58) continues the echoed string motif but joins it with percussion strikes as Ashley is aroused out of Edwina's hypnosis. The track concludes with Goldsmith's brand of unusual string chord juxtapositions which foreshadow (to this reviewer's mind) passages within THE MEPHISTO WALTZ years yet to come.
10. Nelson's Seduction 2:02. Another night scene in the garden (59:42 to 61:38), with Cynthia this time attempting to seduce Nelson without success. Goldsmith's motivic cells get their most elaborate treatment thus far as they become long-lined themes. The "sting" at the end of this track forms a pattern: the topic of sexual frustration receives loud melodramatic climaxes, which in this case adds an organ chord to simple poundings on the piano.
The next piece of music heard in the movie comes between 62:08 and 64:12. This is the scene of Nelson's first shock treatment and, as far as I can discern, the music is from slate 9M2-S48 (with overlay S105). This selection of score does appear on the Intrada album - however, it's labeled as "Ashley's Plight" and positioned onto CD track # 13.
Realizing that Goldsmith designed the overlays to communicate the shock treatment process, this piece of music should be instead called something such as "Nelson's First Shock Treatment" and not entitled "Ashley's Plight" as Ashley does not even appear in the scenes depicting Nelson's forced introduction to shock therapy by Dr. Edwina.
11. Shot In The Neck 2:36. This scene between 65:49 & 68:20 has a bound-to-a-bed Nelson unwillingly participating in a drug-induced experiment by a Dr. Edwina hell-bent on determining Nelson's fraudulent intentions. Ominous chords are then accompanied by 2-note wailings from electric violin. Tension escalates as Goldsmith puts the studio string section through up-to-the-moment col legno techniques. One may ask whether Goldsmith, as early as November/December '63, had already acquainted himself with Krzysztof Penderecki's 1960 "Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima"?
Resonant gongs along with double-bass tremolos signal the overwhelming effect of the catatonic-inducing drug. As Nelson stares vacantly into space we hear the 5-note main theme echoed on a plucked string.
12. Another Treatment 2:25. Some listeners might recall Goldsmith's score to "The Invaders" from THE TWILIGHT ZONE when we hear the 2-note wailings on strings. Nelson is wheeled into the treatment room again (71:10 to 71:30). The music we hear in the film itself, though, has a more prominent sound from certain instruments (probably high-register organ along with either an electronic keyboard or an electric violin dominating the sound-mix). These instruments are barely discernible on Intrada's album. Perhaps Fox studios no longer have these tracks or maybe they are not salvageable.
If Mike Matessino had incomplete sound elements (or if he chose to emphasize certain instrument tracks over others), then an explanation of such would better serve Intrada's customers.
The next portion of music heard in SHOCK TREATMENT (running from 77:12 to 79:11) is absent from its soundtrack album. In this scene, Martin Ashley rolls a wheelchair-bound Nelson into the garden whilst an indoor dance is transpiring for all the inmates. It takes place at night and Ashley talks about his life's misfortunes. Ashley is just about the strangle Nelson before he is interrupted by Nelson's orderly and Cynthia.
The 2 minutes of music from this scene might, as above, be missing or damaged beyond repair or otherwise unavailable. If so, the liner notes should have mentioned this in a 'tech talk' section.
The existence of the caption "Ashley's Plight", though, indicates that this was a proper description for the music for this scene and was positioned correctly between "Another Treatment" and the cue which follows ... "Nelson's Escape"
14. Nelson's Escape 2:59. All manner of instrumental acrobats transpire during Nelson's jumping the orderly and also the asylum fence and running afoot to his employer's residence (from 79:57 into the move until 82:50). As Intrada's notes mention, this track offers an amazing taste of what Goldsmith would achieve in the future with PLANET OF THE APES.
15. Hot Money 5:13. This stretch of music covers 2 sections at the film's climax (from 85:43 to 87:07 and 87:22 to 91 minutes). The 2nd portion was released in Varese's 2004 box set as "Hot Money #2", but we get both in Intrada's edition. Initially beginning with piano ostinatos to continue along with Nelson's further running to Ashley's employer's estate, the cue recapitulates a number of the score's motifs as if in summary.
Culmination comes in the form of escalating organ chords and B-movie histrionics from the electric violin.
Hushed and serpentine organ notes following along with descending 2-note cells from electric violin telegraph the mental breakdown of Dr. Edwina.
16. End Title 0:55. With Nelson a free man and Dr. Edwina now a patient, the film ends at 93 minutes as each instrumental section in the orchestra play their descending notes until the last shot of the asylum gates is given a final loud organ chord, which is repeated several times.
Thanks to this Intrada release, SHOCK TREATMENT can come out from behind the shadows and present itself as a stylistic link between FREUD and SECONDS and as an exemplary specimen of monochrome Jerry Goldsmith.
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Great write up Mr. Tone. Thanks.
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Good job, Tone Row. Enlightening and concise. Thanks.
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Posted: |
Dec 28, 2013 - 10:00 AM
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By: |
Last Child
(Member)
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1. Main Title 2:31. Goldsmith's 5-note main theme is initially heard via a tape played backward!
The next portion of music heard in SHOCK TREATMENT (running from 77:12 to 79:11) is absent from its soundtrack album.
tonerow, I noticed some warbly music in THE OTHER isolated music track on the blu-ray, although the film audio sounded normal. Do you know if JG tinkered with some of the music or recorded it strangely, like he did here?
I also noticed a minute of music in THE OTHER film was tracked in from earlier in the score, so it wasnt on the isolated score (where it was tracked in later). Likewise, perhaps the missing 2 minute SHOCK TREATMENT music was also tracked in from elsewhere, and thus not repeated twice on the CD? You probably would have recognized it, but thought I'd offer that speculation. I know THE OTHER blu-ray was more a recording session, but even if it was edited, soundtrack CDs dont always include repeat cues.
The widescreen film really needs to be released.
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