THE PALERMO CONNECTION Dimenticare Palermo Edgy Morricone #30
This series is inspired by a controversy thread where someone posited the idea that besides THE MISSION and some Sergio Leone westerns Ennio Morricone hasn't written anything great. Rather than making my usual comment that most of Morricone's great scores are from Italy and trying to get Americans to listen to them is like getting them to see movies with subtitles, I decided to take another tact. Since I am at an age where I will only be able to make my case a finite number of times I decided to turn this into a series presenting each great score one at a time, sort of like recordman.
Francesco Rosi was a very prominent filmmaker in Italy and had as a soulmate in music Piero Piccioni. All his great films MOMENT OF TRUTH, CHRIST STOPPED AT EBOLI, THREE BROTHERS, LUCKY LUCIANO and THE MATTEI AFFAIR were scored by him magnificently and frequently starred the great Gian Maria Volonté. But in 1990 that changed. I can speculate that only ill health could keep them apart. But Morricone, who co-owned GM records at one time with Piccioni, stepped in for this politically edgy Mafia drug film that addressed current issues at the time (and now). Initially I was a bit disappointed this was another monothematic score but seeing the film there wasn't room for much else. And this one theme is a doozy:
It literally made the slow pace tolerable. And stuck out in Morricone's 90s films with it's energy and intriguing orchestrations. If the film lacks something it may be Rosi started to become more preachy in later films and James Belushi and Mimi Rodgers can't seem to deliver the gravitas that Gian Maria Volonté could. Or Rosi couldn't direct as flowingly as in his native Italian. But the score has almost a light Hitchcockian feel. That married with INVESTIGATION OF A CITIZEN ABOVE SUSPICION style brings another unique score home for me.
BTW I've just hit 30 scores. For some composers that is a career. For Morricone it doesn't even get near 1/10th of his filmic output. I hope for everyone who has listened to all of this I'm making my point. I'll keep going, you tell me what you think.
Not really feeling this one,would really Love to see a release of Piccioni's Cristo Si è Fermato A Eboli and the other two unreleased Francesco Rosi Films.
Holy Mackeral! No wonder some of these threads are so unpopular. First all I find of ADDIO FRATELLO CRUDELE is one copy on Amazon for $150. Now I look for this and all I can find is one on Ebay for $200. You guys must think I'm the ultimate tease. I swear I really didn't know some of these things were so rare. Indeed that must tell the labels re-issues are in order.
And it heartens me to find Morricone art film scores sell like Silvestri or Horner action pieces.
Did this get a full soundtrack release? I have only the main title on a 2-disc compilation, but I love it. It's good and thumpy.
Yeah, you see both sides of it on that Youtube picture above. But it has indeed disappeared and only goes for big bucks. Unless you get lucky. Which is what I would wait for when I began collecting.
BTW I've just hit 30 scores. For some composers that is a career. For Morricone it doesn't even get near 1/10th of his filmic output. I hope for everyone who has listened to all of this I'm making my point. I'll keep going, you tell me what you think.
Keep going! It was unfortunate for this worthy series to be interrupted by the sad death of another of the greats when you were in full flow, but this reader definitely appreciates it.
Listened to this over lunch yesterday. I like it. There are all sorts of Ennio ideas in there, some from previous films as Henry says, like Svegliati e uccidi and Investigation of a citizen, but even an Untouchables feel in a couple of tracks.
