FSM # 31: Musical Depiction of Longing
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I’ve always been a sucker for music that “longs” for something (or “yearns”, alternatively)…a religious feeling, hope, freedom, what have you.
The quint-essential example would have to be the “Binary Sunset” scene from STAR WARS, where both visuals and music underline the sensation of longing….expressing Luke’s wish to leave the desert planet (but also, on a more universal level, his strong connection to the Force). Starting off with a pianissimo version of Luke’s theme on flute, it crescendos into the Force theme as he reaches the hill top. A magnificent moment.
Another example is the opening of FIRST BLOOD, where John Rambo walks along a deserted country road in greyish weather tones. While there is nothing in the picture that necessarily signals longing per se, Goldsmith’s haunting trumpet solliquoy (sp.?) in minor mode associates a sense of longing for redemption/salvation, and also a sort of “echo” from a traumatic past that needs to be dealt with (I guess the ambiguity of “It’s a Long Road” is not accidental).
As you can see, there are many ways to read longing into scenes and music that aren’t necessarily as obvious as the STAR WARS example.
Do you know of any other film music scenes in which you sense a feeling of longing for something? If so, how?
Yeah, I was unsure if I was going to re-post this “oldie” from 2004. It’s rather vague, and I usually hate it when parameters of threads are too vague.
But I suppose there are plenty of examples, if we put our minds to it.
I consider these three themes “siblings”, of sorts: David Raksin’s LAURA theme, Bernard Herrmann’s “Scene d’Amour” from VERTIGO and John Williams’ skull theme from THE KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL. They hover around the same tonal mid-range, uncomfortably so, connoting some sort of intense yearning and “pull” towards something not quite defined. Two about love, one paranormal. It’s pretty heavy on the ears, and I can’t say it’s my favourite type of “longing music”, but I can’t deny that they have this quality.
I find Sakamotos gorgeous theme from Wuthering Heights expression this more or less throughout all of the movie.
Stickig with Star Wars, the rendition of Han Solo and the Princess by the end of Empire is for me even stronger than Binary Sunset.
I find Sakamotos gorgeous theme from Wuthering Heights expression this more or less throughout all of the movie.
Indeed, and these types of things are often tied to love themes. They don’t have to be, but they very often are. It has to be something more, though, than just a love theme. It has to be repeated almost incessantly, it has to have a certain obsessive intensity to it that moves it into ‘longing’ or ‘yearning’. Your WUTHERING HEIGHTS example is a good one, another one is “Across the Stars”, again from STAR WARS. The longing, the quest for connection (maybe across space and time), becomes kind of an entity in itself, that is about more than just love.
Listening to Williams’ SEVEN YEARS IN TIBET at the moment, and that opening theme definitely connotes longing and yearning – perhaps for some sort of spiritual redemption. Well, the score as a whole does, really.
I don’t know why I sometimes hear something in something. When I listened to Rose’s Theme from THE LAST JEDI for the first time the main melody reminded me immediately of Silvestri’s main theme from BACK TO THE FUTURE. I know why and could explain the similarity. But nobody else seems to hear that.
When I listened to Rose’s Theme from THE LAST JEDI for the first time the main melody reminded me immediately of Silvestri’s main theme from BACK TO THE FUTURE.
I hear Harry Potter, more specifically a rather non-descript, unused cue from Harry Potter.
When I heard Harry Potter first I heard Witches of Eastwick.
Yes, indeed that is in there, too. Really I ditched Potter at first as a routine work and came to like it more later only.
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