It may be Apples-to-Oranges to compare POSEIDON to TOWERING INFERNO.
Remember the tonal differences in the story material; in POSIEDON, most people die at the beginning of the story, T. INFERNO lets the killing build, from individual deaths to mass death.
That lets T. INFERNO have a certain insouciance that would be inappropriate for the all-around nautical mass death of POSEIDON.
THE POSIEDON ADVENTURE score played it as straight as it could, yet still thrilled. A nice accopmlishment.
One of my holy grails is to experience this film in 70mm 6-track surround in a large theater. It's on my bucket list!
You likely won't be disappointed if you get the opportunity to see "The Towering Inferno" this way.
The experience in a cavernous theater brings out all the brilliance of "The Towering Inferno" in a way that just is simply diminished in any other smaller viewing experience, much like "2001: A Space Odyssey".
The opening John Williams fanfare blasts through the theater with fury and joy and the special effects throughout are amazing without the obvious pixels of more modern times.
The composer's rousing creative fire so inspiring in his following project "Jaws" is here at times.
A re-recording of the score would be thrilling, to say the least!
I like "THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE" as a film much better, but find the score to be unremarkable in most ways.
agreed about the film, with the music the difference is the energetic fast passed INFERNO in comparison to the elegiac irony of POSEIDON's main title...when I was 11 I would trek to the local 4 plex just to listen to POSEIDON's main and end titles which I found spellbinding. Yes some of the internal cues are subtle (exceptional cues like when Red Buttons is persuading Carol Lynley to join them, when other survivors are found with the doctor and nurse and the engine room themes) but those main and end titles was some of his best.
