Scores Which You Simply Cannot Fathom
- Dette emnet har 21 svar, 7 deltakere, og ble sist oppdatert 1 måned, 1 uke siden av
.
-
Innlegg
-
I’m talking about scores where you just fail to see what the composer was trying to do. You just don’t “get” it. It’s even more frustrating when you know of people who think VERY highly of such works. I’ll start with Maurice Jarre, and in particular his End Titles from FIREFOX. Is that circus music? I can picture chimpanzees on a flying trapeze. Is this a musical representation of the aircraft? Whatever, it’s also a bloody awful tune.
Not so much a score per se, but I really disliked Terrence Malick’s use of music in A NEW WORLD, that was all over the place… snippets of Wagner, Mozart and Horner, that were like oil and water, they neither mixed, not did they contrast with each other, not sure what Malick wanted to accomplish or say with that, worse, I didn’t even know if he wanted to say anything at all with that, so I found the music in that film both distracting and annoying. (Even though I love all the music used in that movie, just not how it was used in the movie.) I remember I especially disliked how Mozart was used, constantly more or less the same snippet from the piano concerto repeated instead of actually PLAYING the piece, at least the movement, that was really, really annoying. I thought while I was watching this “I dare you to do that one more time”, and there it was…
I have a really hard time coming up with an example here, because in most cases — even when I find the score choice unusual and odd — I can always twist my mind, and my interpretation, to make it fit. For example, the electronic score in IN THE NAME OF THE ROSE; obviously achronological, but fitting in perfectly with the chilly ambiance of the film. Or LADYHAWKE, one of my favourite scores that everybody likes to rag on. The drum kit/pop elements aren’t very widespread in it (much less than what people think), and they do – in fact – add appropriate energy to the riding and fighting scenes.
But I suppose I’ll think of an example if I think long enough.
I somehow never realized that the IN THE NAME OF THE ROSE score was synth before I heard the album years later… I only saw the movie on TV so probably the sound helped 😉
LADYHAWKE is a great fun score which I really like – you know I like Alans Parsons Project – but it is putting me off in the movie, too. Perhaps especially because those synths+drums primarily appear in action scenes and stand that much out. I think that would have really worked without the sythns and drums already.
I thought THE NAME OF THE ROSE worked very well, I thought LADYHAWKE did not (as a film score for that movie). I’ve come around to enjoying it on its own since though.
Dune by Hans Zimmer… I just don’t get the hype, it’s basically boring loud noises to me and not music, not sure what he was trying to achieve with that, particularly after earing what Graeme Revell does on the TV movie.
Part 2 was a bit better or better spotted. But in part 1 I often wished the music wouldn’t overpower everything for example in rather calm desert scenes.
I love the DUNE scores, and yes — the second is far superior. But I can understand it dividing the waters. In either case, it’s very much a score I can “fathom” — all the weird sonorities Zimmer created for an alien world make sense, in my ears.
I very much enjoy DUNE, both part 1 and part 2, and the DUNE Sketchbook too. Wonderful sonorities and engrossing soundscapes, very melodic actually. I think it’s one of Hans Zimmer’s best scores.
Yes, the sounds make sense in general. I just found it didn’t leave enough room for breathing. It was all just loud in the first movie.
Besides that I like both movies a lot (actually I do like Lynch’s version, too), although I didn’t buy the character development in the 2nd, too rushed.
I have just watched Dune part 1. And the music managed to make a long slow movie even longer and slower.
In that sense, I fathom the score and its effect.A score I couldn’t fathom was Ludwig Göransson’s score for Tennet. Most of the time to my ears it was just distracting annoying noise.
Another example, the German movie “Das Leben der Anderen”. The score sounded often like a String quartet from the room next door but had very little to do with the action on screen. At least it felt like that.
LADYHAWKE is a cult classic and so is the score for me. While the Pop Guitar didn’t do much for me- anachronistically speaking the score is odds with the genre. But it does play itself seriously. Its fun and has a great romantic theme. Hardcore orchestral film music fans panned it of course but I grew to love it. Same thing for DUNE (Toto)
I haven’t warmed up to Zimmers DUNE Universe but we shall see.
Score which were or are still hard to get into is for me are the works of Alex North.
I just bought a lot of his RSNO Rerecording’s and now Im getting into A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE, 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY and CLEOPATRA.
I know Thor loves LADYHAWKE, which is surely one of the most controversial film scores of all time. First time I saw LADYHAWKE, the music really put me off, and I know I was not the only one. It’s not so much that it is “anachronistic”… I mean, one can rightly argue a romantic film score performed by a symphony orchestra in BEN HUR is just as “anachronistic”. It’s a film score, not source music, so it doesn’t have to be “of the time”.
The synthesizers in Vangelis’ score for THE BOUNTY were certainly “anachronistic”, and the electronic music approach for a historical drama a new one, but it worked well, the music supports the movie. That’s where LADYHAWKE failed for me… the music did not support the movie, it distracted from it, it often felt like an intrusive distraction in the movie and worked even against it. I have since come around to enjoy it on album though. 🙂 (Haven’t seen LADYHAWKE in decades.)
Obviously, I disagree with that. All of the important bits of the film are scored traditionally symphonically (with one of the most gorgeous love themes ever written), or with medieval tropes. The backbeat is only used for goofy action setpieces and transportation scenes, in which case it works wonderfully as a pace setter, and in line with the tone.
The backbeat is only used for goofy action setpieces and transportation scenes, in which case it works wonderfully as a pace setter, and in line with the tone.
Have to disagree as well. I think without the drum kit especially the action themes as they are (which I otherwise find great fun) would not throw me out of the mood that quickly.
- Du må være innlogget for å svare på dette emnet.