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SIGNS was actually both a big box office hit and a well reviewed movie, no doubt about it, regardless of what any single person things about it.
But definitely relationships generally trump perceived "artistic quality" in a movie, because it is impossible to determine "artistic quality" in a movie while you are making it. That's just bogus. Lots of movies turned out to be crap but looked good on paper, and other movies looked like B-picture potboilers on paper but became bona fide classics... like CASABLANCA for cryin' out loud. Anyone who has ever been on a movie set knows how many components go into the finished products, few people can plough through all that and hold the strings together. (Obviously, those who can are good directors.)
James Newton Howard speaks highly of M. Night Shyamalan, so they definitely have a good relationship, and yes, that trumps all "will this be a masterpiece?" thinking when taking on a project. I (and I suppose most other artists) would much rather spend the day working with friends and folks you enjoy on whatever and hope it will turn out to be good than working with people I don't like on a what all want to be a "masterpiece". (In fact, you work on something because you like the idea and the people... there is no reliable way to foretell how a movie will ultimately be perceived and seen. That's for others do decide anway.
By all accounts Tommy Wiseau strived to make a "masterpiece" with THE ROOM, and many actors involved in STAR WARS were worried about the strange movie they were making. But how did it turn out in the end?)
(There's an interesting quote by one STAR WARS actor, I'd have to check who, who said they were all worried about what strange movie they were shooting, but they gave themselves hope, saying "Alec Guinness is also in it.. so how bad can it be"?)
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The best score I would of voted for was Jerry Goldsmith’s Under Fire. It was Original and to me didn’t sound like a A Jerry Goldsmith Score.
Regardless of whether one likes or dislikes UNDER FIRE... I don't think I have ever heard anyone say UNDER FIRE did not sound like a Jerry Goldsmith score? I don't mean this as a criticism, I'm just puzzled. I would have recognized it as a Goldsmith score right away even in the 1980s, when I had much less trained ears? That's to me as if one said BODY HEAT didn't sound like a John Barry score. I'd say "what"?
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Jerry Goldsmith rejected to score John Carpenter's THE THING; when I first read that way back in the 1980s, no reason was given.
I think it was basically a scheduling conflict, something that Carpenter later stated himself on Twitter that Goldsmith just had another project so he couldn't do THE THING. I guess Goldsmith had a comparably busy schedule; at that time, he often scored five movies or so a year.
Yes, that has to be right, Nicolai. Goldsmith's schedule was pretty consistently full then, and Carpenter's The Thing was still shooting in December of '81.
According to the FSM liners, in Early November of '81, the same month he recorded The Challenge, he saw an early cut of Poltergeist and started working on it immediately, recording it starting on January 25, 1982. That's just under three months for a big, full score. In a 1986 interview filmed while he was working on Poltergeist 2, he said that he tries to compose 2 minutes of music a day. It's hard to imagine him squeezing in another picture then.
Next was The Secret of Nimh, recorded at the beginning of May, another rich, lavish score. The Intrada liners have him starting this one immediately after Poltergeist, and taking the full 15 weeks to do just it. That takes us to mid-May, only a bit over a month before Carpenter's The Thing hit screens.
He was just packed!
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I remember having read a long time ago that James Horner declined FLESH AND BLOOD back in 1985. He didn't like the Paul Verhoeven movie. I don't know the exact reasons but I have my idea on the issue.
Years ago I read an interview with Paul Verhoeven in a Dutch film music magazine where he indeed mentioned that Horner turned down "Flesh and Blood" because he thought the film was too violent. They also approached Goldsmith but they couldn't afford him.
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Yeah..heard the same thing about Philip Kaufman. Something about a Rock - Sand - Desert, tried to explain to John Barry( Did Barry write any music?) Because in articles, Kaufman rejected someone’s score?(Barry) That is when Producers Irwin Wrinkler and Robert Chartoff brought in Bill Conti.
No, Barry left before writing any score. There may have been demos, but no score. The quote Barry gives is Kaufman giving direction like the music having to feel like a cactus growing through the foot.
Of course, I love Bill Conti's score, but it's pretty obvious what music the film was either temp tracked with, or that Kaufman picked as the thing to ape.
Cheers
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Posted: |
Aug 15, 2022 - 12:45 AM
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By: |
townerbarry
(Member)
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Yeah..heard the same thing about Philip Kaufman. Something about a Rock - Sand - Desert, tried to explain to John Barry( Did Barry write any music?) Because in articles, Kaufman rejected someone’s score?(Barry) That is when Producers Irwin Wrinkler and Robert Chartoff brought in Bill Conti.
No, Barry left before writing any score. There may have been demos, but no score. The quote Barry gives is Kaufman giving direction like the music having to feel like a cactus growing through the foot.
Of course, I love Bill Conti's score, but it's pretty obvious what music the film was either temp tracked with, or that Kaufman picked as the thing to ape.
Cheers
Bill Conti said in a interview, that Kaufman pushed for him to write the music to come close as possible without any legal problems.
I also think Phil Kaufman was 100% full of shit..yeah that kind of Director..and told Bill Conti not to write it like a John Williams score. To have one of the best Composers ever…John Barry and to let Barry walk..shows me ..u ain’t got it together. I do like Bill Conti’s score..except when he is sounding too much like others.
And when Bill Conti was announced, and Not Jerry Goldsmith..the Academy Once again Failed
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John Barry and The Incredibles.
Barry didn’t decline Incredibles because he didn’t like the film. He just didn’t wanted to do the ‘60 jazz the producers wanted. He even supplied a demo of an orchestral score.
Brad Bird had temp The Incredibles with John Barry’s James Bond Music. John Barry said he already had done that many times before. Barry sent demo’s in, but Bird was truly looking for what Barry wasn’t going to do.
Just to add a bit more to this:
Barry didn't write demos of the Bond-style "action" music Brad Bird wanted to hear, because, as he told Bird and his agent Richard Kraft, he felt he could write those in his sleep, or words to that effect.
Barry felt the more more pivotal and important thing to nail first was how to capture Mr Incredible's sense of lost glory and his desire for its return that drives us into the main part of the story.
He saw that as the musical hook and I get that. I can imagine a score driven by a theme that start's off heroic (first act), then gets yearning and lossfull (middle), but transforms back into returned glory working really well.
So, that's what Barry worked on and demo'd.
Bird and Kraft liked the demos, but they wanted to hear the action music, and pressed for it.
Barry did finally relent and write an action theme demo.
Brad Bird and Richard Kraft loved it. They were ecstatic. However, they felt there was one bit of it that sounded a bit like a Cowboy film, so they asked Barry to change it slightly.
That's where Barry, who seemed to be reluctant all along, decided it was getting too hard and backed off.
I cannot speak for John Barry's feelings as I wasn't there, but based on the full story as told by Richard Kraft, I can't help thinking that Barry was never really on board with this picture. Not emotionally, anyway.
Or, maybe he was on board with the picture as he saw it, but disenchanted with the idea of trying to rewrite music from 1964.
Mr. Kraft is our best witness on this.
Cheers
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