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Posted: |
Dec 6, 2000 - 1:04 AM
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By: |
Andy
(Member)
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some time ago i read an article (or it was im the book of tony thomas) that he (or leonard rosenman , don´t know it for sure) didn´t like the music of maurice jarre,
it was said, that he wasn´t able to set in the right note or so.
any information about this ??
btw, thomas didn´t mentioned jarre in his book, perhaps a proof of this
Andy
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Posted: |
Dec 6, 2000 - 9:22 AM
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By: |
OHMSS76
(Member)
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Buonosera Andy!Its true, Ive read the same thing...Elmer Bernstein and I believe Miklos Rozsa didnt like Jarre's music...the quote is something like "all those wrong notes.." something like that. Well, can't dogg Rozsa, but Bernstein has written plenty of tripe, and much of his music is too cartoonish to listen to, even the serious scores. However....Jarre always writes gorgeous themes and his orchestration is untouchable IMHO.
So how 'bout a Jarre favorite/confession thread!
Oddly enough one of the scores that got me into this was NO WAY OUT. Love the synth chamber ensemble there...
Then I eventually discovered his orchestral work, like MM BEYOND THUNDERDOME and THE BRIDE.
There are so many to mention! NP:The Usual Suspects(Ottman) Ciao!
Sean
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"but Bernstein has written plenty of tripe, and much of his music is too
cartoonish to listen to, even the serious scores."
that was a nice little laugh.
and basically they were right. Jarre is a joke. The Zimmer of his time. (Except Jarre has a thimbleful of talent over minijarre, actually composed three good scores, whereas midiventurer number one "composed" none so far)
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Posted: |
Dec 6, 2000 - 12:27 AM
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By: |
Graham Watt
(Member)
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Andy,Here are some quotes from Irwin Bazelon's book "Knowing The Score": "...Maurice Jarre's Lara's Theme from Doctor Zhivago is an exercise in melodic futility, marked by musical imperfections such as wrong notes and badly chosen harmonies and progressions..." "During a scene (in Is Paris Burning?) inside the office of the high command, Maurice Jarre, for no apparent reason except an absence of musical taste and dramatic insight, punctuates the dialogue with cymbal clashes. These ringing interpolations coming between narrative exchanges are absolutely meaningless." "Incompataability marks Maurice Jarre's main titles for the brilliant Visconti film The Damned. The initial music over factory backgrounds has a mechanized, contemporary, rhythmic thrust. Suddenly and with no preparation, Jarre switches idioms and introduces a romantic theme with movie-music flavoring. This clumsy change of style is incomprehensible, unless the composer or director naively believed that it would influence the audience to respond with new associations analogous in some way to the decadence of Visconti's characters. The mixture of prosaic, unctious music with Visconti's baroque expressionism - including imaginative use of weird colors and unorthodox makeup - seems to be entirely incongruous. And even if it was meant to create a musical flow contrary to the visuals for dramatic purposes, the cinematic effect of the stylistic change is dubious..." I could go on, but I think we can see that Bazelon is no Jarre fan! And I think that his statement about the "wrong notes" in Doctor Zhivago DID come from quotes by Leonard Rosenman. It's still a great book.
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Posted: |
Dec 6, 2000 - 12:30 AM
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By: |
SPQR
(Member)
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Mr. Jarre's knack for wonky modulations in a great many of his earlier Hollywood scores explains the criticism. And it's true, for the most part...instead of doing what every other composer would normally do to reach another key: making pit stops through the 'circle of fifths' to get there, Mr. Jarre invariably took the short cut, right across the 'circle of fifths'. He also demonstrated a marked inability to master or incorporate the use of the 'dominant seventh' and its various inversions to accomplish a cadence. So, what you end up hearing of course are, what sounds like, "all those bad notes" in scores such as 'Dr. Zhivago', 'Ryan's Daughter', 'Night of the General's' where the melody is leading you in one direction, when all of a sudden, CLUNK, he decides to change gears and doodle in another key (this generally occurs when he wants to introduce a second theme). This 'tendancy' of his was corrected, more or less, by the '80's when he developed a 'creative' partnership with Christopher Palmer who, I can only guess, helped Mr. Jarre iron out these sort of technical glitches. He also, most obviously, brought with him an orchestrational style that shone the best light on sometimes weak material: 'The Bride', for instance.[This message has been edited by SPQR (edited 06 December 2000).]
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I have a distant admiration for Tai Pan (86), Mad Max III (85), and Enemy Mine (85) but never paid it much heed. I relish the days when every score didn't automatically get five star reviews just for being old: Page Cook from FIR:
"Maurice Jarre's illiterate maunderings for the abysmal epic, Mohammad Messenger of God, borders on the obscene. Jarre's musical rubbish fails to evoke either the milieu or the title character. The terrorists who briefly succeeded in halting this film's showing were obviously not only acting out of religious political fervor but must have been music lovers as well. Jarre's wailing ondes martenot sound effects (so illy conceived for his wretched score for Lawrence of Arabia) are even more pointlessin this coarse pastiche of EVERY desert filmusic cliche imaginable." "...Yet bathos, turpitude and downright trumpery are the lifeblood and playthings that permeate Jarre by Jarre, a hideous onslaught of suites and themes from such Jarre abominations as Lawrence of Arabia, Ryan's Daughter, Doctor Zhivago [excuse me while I fight the urge to throw up!--ed.] and A Passage to India. It's been said that David Lean brings out the worst in Jarre, and hearing these puerilities anew should be enough to convince even the town idiot....this is clearly a recording for Jarre's admirers, and as such CBS Records can be assured of a sale of at least ten albums." "Maurice Jarre, the zomboid "composer" of the --thankfully-- sparse score for Fatal Attraction, has become in the past several years almost astute enough a filmusico dramatist to be called mediocre, giving one a strangely forlorn hope that the bilge on which he forged one of the cinema's most execrable [FIR evidently didn't have a Sherrif Joe to get torqued over choice adjectives!--ed.] excuses as a career, would even prove to be merely the relentless stirrings of a hack destined to move up to be coming a semi-hack. Unfortunately, the abysmal maunderings of his dredgings of the bottom of the new fetid barrel of his vacuous well-shaft leads to the belief that once a composer of small talent and lesser resource, always a POSEUR of incredible tenacity and the good fortune of being shamlessly aligned with a grisly host of tin-eared but clever agents, producers with as much musical perspicacity of a Marvin Skiles (no, excuse me, Skiles was like Mahler compared to M. Jarre) and directors weaned on the trash of an odious mixture of the joys of larcenous musical trivia, a fifth rate avant garde and overblown-- and I hesitate to even debasing the word in this context-- theatricalism, plus a tapeworm's conception of melody, never a strong suit in the Jarre lexicon of twisted tunes. Time magazine's recent cover story on Fatal Attraction linking this flotsam to, of all films Hitchcock's Vertigo and Psycho, reveals their flouting of cinematic responsibility bordering on the puerile.
Jarre's score for the recent No Way Out, more electronic sound effects than music, was quantitively more nightmarish (sic) than the drool he has concocted for Fatal Attraction, which my faithful friend Jack Van Natter has incredulously informed me has jsut been issued all twelve minutes or so on records, sans the original Puccini Madama Butterfly utilized in Fatal Attraction's original ludicrous denoument: hara kiri might be preferable than suffering through this album."
"LAWRENCE of ARABIA-- 0 rating-- This lavish new recording may be the most unnecessary resuscitation of a film score of the past. One of the best examples I know of a fine film consistently undermined and compromised by a score of staggering mediocrity, Maurice Jarre's schoolboy portrait of Lean's vison is one of puling impossibility, oscillating between two clumsy leit-motives of equally puerile naivete. The dominating 8-note main theme, ostensibly reflecting Lawrence's fascination with the desert, remains one of the ghastliest of screen themes. It recurs ad nauseum like chronic musical diarrhea throughout the film's 216 minutes with an appalling lack of invention...Jarre's contribution as heard alone on this new CD version falls apart in a welter of such incredible musical flotsam as has ever ridden the coattails of greatness.."
[This message has been edited by kaijuu-oyabun (edited 06 December 2000).]
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Posted: |
Dec 6, 2000 - 1:38 AM
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By: |
Andy
(Member)
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jepp, thanks for the infos
but to be honest, in my "early" years i bought some of jarres soundtracks, (at a time i thought, if it gets an oscar it must be good  http://www.filmscoremonthly.com/board/biggrin.gif">)
but the jarre albums didn´t visit my cd player very often.
perhaps some titles, because of loving the films (Gorillas in the Mist, Moon over Parador) but you are totally right
but i wonder, how he was able to make a full orchestra with synth sounds quite good as in Ghost
thats something, i believe, only Goldsmith is able to do ( you remember Total Recall http://www.filmscoremonthly.com/board/wink.gif"> ) Andy
NP: THe Univited (gullivers TraveL)
some cues sound very very much like Silvestries current work (Stuart Little Kind of Music)
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Posted: |
Dec 6, 2000 - 2:10 AM
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By: |
SPQR
(Member)
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quote:
I relish the days when every score didn't automatically get five star reviews just for being old
I''d hasten to add that I'd relish the day when every score didn't automatically get five star reviews just for being new.
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Jarre has his own style of composing film music, I have always enjoyed those patent all of sudden moves. But hey that is Jarre's style, not always go with the flow of the scene. Bernstein is still pissed off for 1962, everyone thought his excellent score To Kill a Mockingbird would win best score, OPPS!!!
Someone forgot to tell Elmer, you did not win, it was Maurice Jarre. I like both Arabia and Mockingbird, but Arabia is more lush, much more thought provoking. Mockingbird had a pretty theme. But not always a pretty theme wins. Though there was not much music for Arabia, the film clocked in over 31/2 hours but the score was very small. Like he also did for Dr. Zhivago, and also A Passage to India, both great scores That won best scores with Arabia, I would be happy with that, three Oscars. Cry babies, Elmer, and whoever else bitches about Jarre. NP: A Passage to India Maurice Jarre ***1/2
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Irwin Bazelon spewed out some of THE MOST unbelievably stupid nonsense I've ever read."Knowing the Score" is a huge waste of time. Bazelon makes so many mistakes you'd swear he never saw any of the movies he discusses. Don't go running out to find this one, folks...it's a waste of paper.
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quote:
Originally posted by SPQR:
I''d hasten to add that I'd relish the day when every score didn't automatically get five star reviews just for being new.
I just have to add a Humongous AMEN to that, but I'd like to point out that compared to the vast majority of scores being produced in the "now," the crap of the 60s and 70s are 5-star masterworks. I know, you think NOT....at least, not all. I choked when I read all thos 5-star/4-star raves of the Ryko series releases....the Bacharach scores for goodness' sake???!!! Not one rates 3 stars with me...fun?? Maybe. Good film music? Uh-Uh. Worth 5 stars alongside each of the Star Wars Special Edition sets???? WHO THE HECK IS FOOLING WHOM??? The trouble with anything-goes reviewing is that there is no editorial standard....you need one reviewer reviewing one genre (vice ONE composer) of score....take turns doing it...but I've had problems with some of their "honesty" with such excuses as "I usually hate this type of score, but....". WHY -- OH why -- would anyone LET someone review a "type of score" he hated??? It's horrible! Rant over. : ) Ron
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Posted: |
Dec 6, 2000 - 4:24 AM
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By: |
SPQR
(Member)
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I'm in full agreement with ya Ron. It just amazes me that alot of the quackery that passes for filmscoring these days gets such an easy ride by both critics and so-called film music lovers alike.
Call me a fuddy-duddy, but I'm still a stickler for those two novel devices of the trade: dramatic insight and inherant musical value.As regards Mr. Jarre's exploits throughout the '60's and '70's: one could certainly slight him for some very sloppy writing but, in some instances, such as 'Ryan's Daughter' and 'Night of the Generals', those same quirky Jarre-isms lent these films a sort of oddball charm. Of course, sometimes, many times, his dramatic interpretations came so totally out of left field it could be said to he single-handedly ruined a scene or scenes.
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Gee, maybe sometimes it's NICE to get an oddly-modulated break from the usual Hollywood pap. All these accusations of "wrong notes" and my favorite, "musical imperfections (!)" remind me of the musical Puritans who didn't like Lester Young for daring to experiment with their precious scale. I'd like to know where Bernstein criticized Jarre; he says that they are "great mutual friends."
"musical imperfections...." LOL. Too many notes, Mozart...
NP: The Company of Wolves (G. Fenton)
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Posted: |
Dec 6, 2000 - 8:31 AM
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By: |
SPQR
(Member)
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But, just to play devil's advocate...Jarre's main title music for 'Dr. Zhivago', for example, ain't exactly cut from avant garde cloth, so one would naturally expect a certain degree of formal precision when aping idioms used by late 19th Cent. Romantic composers.I like Jarre. Always have. Despite his occassional clumsiness. NP: Wild, Wild, West
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Posted: |
Dec 8, 2000 - 12:44 AM
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By: |
Ron Pulliam
(Member)
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'>quote:
Originally posted by kaijuu-oyabun:
I relish the days when every score didn't automatically get five star reviews just for being old:Page Cook from FIR:
"Maurice Jarre's illiterate maunderings for the abysmal epic, Mohammad Messenger of God, borders on the obscene. Jarre's musical rubbish fails to evoke either the milieu or the title character. ...are even more pointlessin this coarse pastiche of EVERY desert filmusic cliche imaginable." "...Yet bathos, turpitude and downright trumpery are the lifeblood and playthings that permeate Jarre by Jarre, a hideous onslaught of suites and themes from such Jarre abominations as Lawrence of Arabia, Ryan's Daughter, Doctor Zhivago [excuse me while I fight the urge to throw up!--ed.] and A Passage to India. It's been said that David Lean brings out the worst in Jarre, and hearing these puerilities anew should be enough to convince even the town idiot....this is clearly a recording for Jarre's admirers, and as such CBS Records can be assured of a sale of at least ten albums."
As appropriate as all the above was to the thread of Maurice Jarre, it would not be quite fair to quote Page Cook on Jarre without also citing Cook on such icons as John Williams and Jerry Goldsmith and Elmer Bernstein from the same time period.
He hated all of Williams' work up until 1977, including Jaws....Goldsmith was thoroughly trashed by Cook in the 70s except for such goodies as "The Other" and "Logan's Run" and "The Wind and the Lion." Cook was one man with one opinion...and some people who knew him did not believe Cook knew what he was talking about -- musicologically -- all the time. Ron
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Re: Cook--Some of them, Hugo Friedhofer, Alfred Newman, Ken Darby, seemed to believe he knew what was up, unless there was other subterfuge going on. If he was making up the words attributed to them I find it hard to believe they would let it go without libel suits etc. I disagree with a lot of those columns, particularly his misunderstanding of Fielding, and Rosenman, but then his points more often than not were valid-- Rosenman in a sense was more conventional in application of his avant garde technique than not, sometimes piling up a lot of showy musical verbiage to express something very simple (I remember Rosenman going on about how his Trek 4 whale fugue was an exceptionally modern piece of music- say what?). On Goldsmith, yeah that modern style was thrashed as technique over humanity, though Cook tended to reverse his harshest opinions and anyway Goldsmith's early 70s work was cited as impeccable when appropriate (Patton, The Chairman, Mephisto Waltz, The Other)-- the negatives were found in Cook's view that Goldsmith often went for broader strokes and ornamentation from without over interior clarity and insight found in something like Patton. Not something I'd bother arguing over (The Last Run? why bother with that? Papillon, at first glance I'd take exception to his critique as I think it is one of those times Goldsmith did have a lot to say about the relations between men, but then his point that the score lacked organic cohesion is borne out by the careening mix of ideas-- a trait found in Islands in the Stream -- profound sentiments but all over the place at the same time) Williams--it's not unheard of to assert that Williams was a talented composer who found his full powers somewhere on the way from Jaws to StarWars/Close Encounters-- the gap between in terms of style, power, authority, and facility is really huge. No question that in raising the bar to the heights of complex and honest communication plus musicianship established by people like Newman, Rozsa, Herrman etc., Cook, along with a couple of others, wielded a tough standard. That's extremely important. Nobody has that now. Maybe it's due to fear of composers' retribution or angry agents and nixed interviews, or just that the people writing those unduly happy reviews believe they're really that special, I don't know. I'd love to see a one star review of anything. Jarre just bores me, maybe as a musician but mostly as somebody who prefers the best over the mundane. Lookit, Tom Cruise may have demonstrated the ability to do a flying fall down kick or whatnot and every hack personality/actor in Hollywood may think he's training in kungfu right now, but none of them is the grandmaster like Chan Pui or Pan Qing Fu just because Hollywood is impressed with itself. Same thing with every composer plugged as the "master" of the week with those overburdened four star reviews I keep skimming over lately. Talent, skill, resource, training, discipline, ability to express what it is to be a human being, all that makes up a worthy body of work, and it's a level of respect that has to be earned. Lowering expectations to a few website owners' limited experience is not the way to establish norms when some of our most perceptive composers are saying things those people may not know how to respond to. There's an opposing opinion also. [This message has been edited by kaijuu-oyabun (edited 08 December 2000).]
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Posted: |
Dec 8, 2000 - 4:13 AM
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By: |
SPQR
(Member)
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quote:
Cook, along with a couple of others, wielded a tough standard. That's extremely important. Nobody has that now. Maybe it's due to fear of composers' retribution or angry agents and nixed interviews, or just that the people writing those unduly happy reviews believe they're really that special, I don't know.
Digging in Pandora's Box again, are we? As far as I can tell, nobody cares about the value of informed criticism anymore, just as they don't beleive in the relevance of filtering the here and now through an historical perspective. It doesn't sell movies, books or music. The marketplace is designed to sell, not to teach. And, so long as the marketplace satisifies their commercial needs, they couldn't care a hill of beans if it doesn't have any credibilty outside the marketplace. quote:
Jarre just bores me, maybe as a musician but mostly as somebody who prefers the best over the mundane.
Still, in this day and age, with the septic tank brimming over with excrement from Horner, Newton Howard, Kamen, Silvestri, Zimmer, et al...I would tend to prefer the better over the mundane. Jarre may not hold a candle compared to Goldsmith...but compared with Horner???
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I remember when I was a youth and going to my schools' library and reading Films in Review, and had a great pleasure of reading Page Cooks' reviews of film scores. That man never liked Williams, Barry, or Goldsmith.
Only on a rare occasion would he let his guard down, he like E.T. Poltergeist, Lifeforce, and Superman. BUT he would rake Jarre and even Williams best over the coals.
But Cooks' opinon is just that. One mans thoughts about film music. I think as he got older and older he couldn't hear a damn thing anyway. It never matter to me. It is what you and me like. I like Williams, Barry, Goldsmith and NOT HORNER. Jarre, scored what his main man told him to score, and won three Oscars of that main man: David Lean Like Williams, who has won 3 Oscars for scoring those Spielberg film. his main man. NP: Chicken Run ****
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