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Posted: |
Aug 7, 2010 - 11:05 AM
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By: |
AlexCope
(Member)
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This is a handsome, overwhelming release. While I admire Alex North's music, I really hadn't heard much of Spartacus apart from the main titles (haven't got around to the film yet), so I came into this with eager ears.
I listened to the mono presentation first and maybe I was too enamored with the music to really pay attention but it sounded superb. The only parts where I took notice of substandard quality was during some of the really high, atonal battle moments for the Romans and a little hiss during one of the source cues. But truly this is amazing, powerful music, and I was too swept up in it all to really care.
It's impossible for me to talk about all of this music right now, but I do want to say that the one part of the score that took me absolutely by surprise was track 26 on disc 2, the cue "Vesuvias Camp." I was absolutely floored by this euphoric, stirring march. A perfect two minute cue. It's just stunning. Definitely the highlight of the score for me and might be my favorite Alex North cue.
As for the Love Themes discs, I've listened to most of them, and aside from the beauty of the Bill Evans track which towers over the set, so far it's the Patrick Doyle cue that did it for me. There's something very pure about it. His arpeggios are already transfixing anyway, but in the last minute when he changes key taking the melody even higher... man, forget it... "Niagara Falls."
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Posted: |
Aug 7, 2010 - 11:11 AM
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By: |
Morricone
(Member)
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Moved from other thread:
The one thing that surprised me and I think is the best thing about this box. Nothing delights me more than someone, a friend, who sits me down, has me listen to a score and then proceeds to tell why it is so special to them. It is so anti-internet. No "this is a cool score, you wont regret it" about it. It is personal, relating it directly to you. YOU. This time it happens to be John Williams, Alexandre Desplat, Robert Townson, Christopher Young, Mark Isham and a few others who are sitting me down. Alex North was not my favorite composer nor SPARTACUS my favorite score but both have risen greatly in my esteem. Not because I have been "convinced" of something but because they have taught me what to listen for. They saw something in the man and score that I could not see but now I am aware of. And I thank them for it.
This thing is extremely cheap, considering it is an act of pure love.
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Posted: |
Aug 7, 2010 - 12:26 PM
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By: |
Ed Nassour
(Member)
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The "Poem" cue was previously available where? I think I had both previous unmentionable releases and I don't remember hearing it on either.
Not to name drop, but I was talking to Danny Elfman recently and I wish I could relate what he said about the Spartacus score. It's unprintable but VERY enthusiastic. 
Of course I wasn't around to hear the movie during its original release but the "Desolation Elegy" doesn't sound too far removed from what's in the film--I think the mix towards the climax of the vocal favors the orchestra more than in the film but overall the preservation is pretty good.
I finally got to listen to the entire mono score and alternates and apart from the overture (as noted in the booklet), it all sounds fantastic. And the booklet is beautifully produced and informative--I loved learning about all the players involved in the score and about Kubrick firing the original actress playing Varinia. In the book Varinia is blonde, kind of a Nordic Viking woman, but the blonde pictured seemed too slight and fragile--too conventionally pretty--to be convincing. A lot of this stuff I either didn't know or had forgotten over the years.
Does the book mention that Kubrick wanted to show far more violence and gore?
Or how Dalton Trumbo accused Kubrick of changing much of his script? It seems Kubrick never liked the script. There was much improvisation done on the set with actors rewriting their lines.
Or that another studio was planning a similar epic with Martin Ritt to direct, Yul Brynner cast as Spartacus and Anthony Quinn playing the role of Crassus with a script by another blacklisted Hollywood writer, Abraham Polansky? That project was based on Anthony Koeler's book, "the Gladiators" which dealt with Spartacus and the slave revolt.
Does it mention that early on that besides David Lean being considered, they were also thinking about asking Carol Reed to direct?
Does it mention the original budget was $4.5 million?
Then there's the fact that Kubrick wore the exact, same outfit to the set each day until Douglas pleaded with him to change his cloths. Kubrick showed up the next day wearing a completely different outfit which he continued to wear for the remainder of the shoot. Assistant Editor Bud Hoffmann told me Kubrick owned probably two pair of pants, a couple of shirts and maybe a couple of pair of shoes.
Oh, the original film editor was Bob Swink with Hal Ashby assisting him. Both left when Anthony Mann was fired. Ashby went on to later become a successful director on such films as "Harold and Maude" and "Shampoo." Irving Lerner was hired as the editor with Bob Lawrence assisting him. Lerner ended up supervising second unit photography so Lawrence was bumped up. It was Lerner that directed the location shot of Olivier walking by the pool at San Simeon.
It appears that Laurence Olivier and Charles Laughton never got along. At one point Olivier demanded that someone else feed him Laughton's off-stage lines.
During the filming of the notorious 'snails and oysters' bathtub scene, Olivier asked Tony Curtis where he got his powerful biceps from. Curtis said "follow me" and took Olivier to a corner of the sound stage. Tony then said "Get down on your face." Olivier got this perturbed look, but did as he was told. Curtis then blurted out laughing, "You were worried, right?" Curtis then got down onto the floor next to Olivier demonstrating how he did push-ups each day to build up his arms.
By the way, that 'snails and oysters' scene appeared in the London print which was passed by the British Board of Censors. It remained in that print when it was screened for the British press, but was cut out by the time the film was released there.
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BTW I knew someone who worked on the film restoration and he told me the music tracks were certainly there and did NOT suffer from vinegar syndrome.
Always "I knew someone"...never a positive, factual first-person account. Did he say they were purely music tracks...that they were full stereo?
Whatever...I think this person LIED.
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BTW I knew someone who worked on the film restoration and he told me the music tracks were certainly there and did NOT suffer from vinegar syndrome.
Always "I knew someone"...never a positive, factual first-person account. Did he say they were purely music tracks...that they were full stereo? I don't think.
I think this person LIED.
Right on, Ron- Mr. Ed is a huge bore and needs to find another passtime, besides bothering the adults. Mr Ed is more like a horses ass.
Actually, I was quoting Joe Caps.
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