About the the girl. Noah Cross didn't know where she was. THAT was why he hired that surrogate wife to hire him in the first place. His granddaughter has been hidden from him by Hollis and his own daughter.
Maybe. But I doubt Cross would be duping a private eye (Gittes) in those sensitive circumstances. He'd get his own guy (Mulvehill) to track her down (it's not as if she was hiding under a rock, anyway). And would he really want her picture splashed all over the newspapers?
Chinatown - both film and score - just keeps getting better with time, and it's one of those times when Goldsmith's sudden and swift involvement with the movie now seems like one of Hollywood's best 'lightning-in-a-bottle' moments.
It's true that Chinatown's score isn't entirely lengthy, but I'm wondering whether anyone in the film music album publishing business (for want of a far better descriptive phrase) had ever toyed with putting together a CD pack of Goldsmith's noirish scores that encompassed The Detective, Chinatown and LA Confidential, just to beef things up and finally get Chinatown out on plastic for admirers like myself.
I'm curious: has Roman Polanski ever said something about Goldsmith's contribution? It is probably Goldsmith's most acclaimed score, with everyone from Thomas Newman to Ryuichi Sakamoto praising it and listing it as one of their favorites. It is also a favorite among directors too, with David Lynch citing it as his all-time favorite score.
I'm curious: has Roman Polanski ever said something about Goldsmith's contribution? It is probably Goldsmith's most acclaimed score, with everyone from Thomas Newman to Ryuichi Sakamoto praising it and listing it as one of their favorites. It is also a favorite among directors too, with David Lynch citing it as his all-time favorite score.
I remember reading somewhere that he complimented Goldsmith on the score after the fact, something along the lines of "that's a fine score you wrote for my movie" or something like it (it's not an exact quote, I would have to look it up).
Just to add a few collector tidbits to the conversation:
(1) CHINATOWN LASER DISC (Widescreen Edition) (Paramount LV 8674-2WS) The entire score is isolated as a mono "Music & Effects" track. As I can recall, there are not that many "effects" to speak of spoiling the listen. I don't know if they continued this feature in later DVD and Blu-Ray releases, but I don't think so.
(2) PARAMOUNT 10.5-inch REEL-TO-REEL Mono Mixdown tape. Years ago, a retired sound engineer who had worked on the film personally made me a 10.5 inch reel-to-reel direct copy of the 15-ips mono mixdown score tape. As I can recall, it didn't have too much more music than the Varese commercial release, but such an entity does exist, for what it's worth.
I can concur (and own them) isolated, mono score channels on CHINATOWN, as well as ISLANDS IN THE STREAM * THE BOYS FROM BRAZIL, that were never carried to any other format release.
Now with excellent complete scores of all, they are more of a one time curiosity listen.
Just to add a few collector tidbits to the conversation:
(2) PARAMOUNT 10.5-inch REEL-TO-REEL Mono Mixdown tape. Years ago, a retired sound engineer who had worked on the film personally made me a 10.5 inch reel-to-reel direct copy of the 15-ips mono mixdown score tape. As I can recall, it didn't have too much more music than the Varese commercial release, but such an entity does exist, for what it's worth.
Ron Burbella
I think I compared the Laserdisc material to the Intrada release once upon a time and there wasn't anything new.
As for your reel-to-reel transfer, this might be the same as the Intrada release but I'd have to hear it or see a listing of the tracks with timings to know for sure.
This is easily my favorite score. An incredible piece of work that seamlessly marries the romantic and the avant garde.
"By the way, I wonder if some of those low piano rumblings are created by rubbing the piano strings themselves. Anyone know? "
Going by ear...
I think the sweeping, ethereal glissandos in the main title are produced by reaching inside the piano and strumming across the strings as if it were a giant autoharp. The first known use of this effect was by the American Henry Cowell in IIRC the 1920s.
In a witty aural pun Goldsmith answers this here and there throughout this score with other instruments which are played with the same motion-- harp glisses, that wooden scratch-stick thingy (what's it called? When JG has it played very slowly it sounds like someone riffling a deck of cards), and an actual autoharp.
In "Noah Cross" and in "The Captive" a technique similar to the "autoharp" one is used, except instead of strumming crosswise across all the strings, you scratch lengthwise along one single string. This produces a baleful, almost croaky sound. I don't think this technique was heard before the 1960s in the piano music of George Crumb.
Then toward the end of "The Captive" it sounds as if a stick is used to do a kind of quick stutter against a single piano string.
In "The Last of Ida" and "The Boy on a Horse" there is the staccato doomy thud produced when you reach inside the piano, stop a low string by hand, then strike that note with the key.
BTW if you want to hear a kind of sonic encyclopedia of these kind of extended inside-the-piano techniques check out George Crumb's great 4 volume cycle of piano pieces 'Makrokosmos'.
Great post. I recently figured out the the moaning, almost human-sounding tone in "The Captive" is a friction mallet (a superball on a stick) dragged across the metal armature of a grand piano. Hear it beginning at 1:53 here.
He also used a waterphone in several cues, which is appropriate for a film that has water as a central point.
