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Posted: |
Sep 29, 2012 - 2:34 AM
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By: |
Rollin Hand
(Member)
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Darn near forgot the film was on TCM today, but I saw it and absolutely loved it! It was much better than I expected it to be.
Zigzag is a veritable Who's Who of '65-'75 TV actors--including the great Steve Ihnat--which I found a bit distracting at first because of the intricate plotting that's set up during the film's first half hour, but it's all effectively handled and the viewer is never lost in the proceedings.
This was a theatrical feature, but if it weren't for the few shots of George Kennedy's ass and some saucy language, this could have aired on broadcast television in 1970.
The location shooting was excellent, with footage shot on Sunset Boulevard at night. If one knew the area at that time, be prepared to have it all come back. the use of every TV director's trick in the book with rack focusing galore also reminded me that Zigzag has serious TV "cred."
There's enough Mid-Century Modern light fixtures to make admirers of that stuff to keep an eye open as well as the open smoking that would earn today's films an automatic PG-13 or R rating.
As for Oliver Nelson's score, it was wonderfully used throughout, with those hip pursuit cues and fantastic ending where Kennedy is shotgunned to death in overlapping slo-mo dramatic style which was oh-so '70s.
Oh! Roy Orbison's song "Zigzag" is employed as source music during a Go-Go style party. If Orbison wasn't already a frigging music deity, then his performance of the song would blast open the doors to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. 
Thanks for the rundown which explain a bit the use of music in some scenes.
I will order the DVD because of your insight.
Can you elaborate more on the relation of music and image, please?
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The Super Cops is possibly Fielding's most accessible score. It had completely passed me by until now that the film itself is available via the Warner Archive, so I've ordered that this evening 
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Way to go! Among my favourites too.
BTW, material used by Fielding for SuperCops can be found years back in unsuspected tv shows (C'est la Rose with Grace Kelly, etc).
Yes, I've come to realise that he was quite the re-cycler.....
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Don't be too swift to judge because they all have trade marks and signatures.
Remember Bernard Herrmann, Jerry Goldsmith, Lalo Schifrin.
Indeed, that's true Thomas. I think there's a difference between having trade marks and signature sounds and actually recycling tunes though (I'm thinking of The Big Sleep and Hunters Are For Killing for instance).
I'm not knocking him for it though - what he did, he did very well - he supported and underlined what was on the screen and even sometimes what wasn't. And then there are scores like Escape from Alcatraz which are fairly unique and avante-garde (and which alas I find nearly unlistenable).
I do - occasionally - think his credit should read Music Composed, Re-Arranged and Conducted by Jerry Fielding though.... 
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