Scores Which You Simply Cannot Fathom
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It’s fine to disagree; reaction to these things is obviously personal and subjective. I saw LADYHAWKE once in the late 80s, and found the music obnoxiously annoying, as if it actively worked to undermine the action on screen. Literally all music? Of course not, I didn’t even remember most of the music, but I did remember that it repeatedly worked against the movie, enough for me to tune out of the movie (and I haven’t seen it since). But if you love the movie or the score, well, good for you, more power to you. I sure don’t want to talk anyone out of it.
Indeed, I like the music on album now as it is. 🙂I like unusual approaches, or perhaps challenges, to generic conventions. Same as I found the contemporary pop songs cute in KING ARTHUR, for example. LADYHAWKE managed to balance that line between conventional and unusual JUST right, in my opinion.
Interessting is that I knew the Ladyhawke score years before I actually saw the movie. Maybe I paid more atention to the music here than I would have done the other way round. In King Arthur the songs didn’t bother me that much. There was another knight movie which also used lots of rock songs. Can’t remember the name but that to me had a bit of a parody effect if I recall right.
I like unusual approaches, or perhaps challenges, to generic conventions.
Sure, if they work, if they are good. In the same way that a score obviously is not good merely for following convention, I don’t think a score is good merely because it is unusual or challenges convention, it has to proof itself with the result.
There was another knight movie which also used lots of rock songs. Can’t remember the name but that to me had a bit of a parody effect if I recall right.
I guess, you are referring to A Knight’s Tale with Heath Ledger, that already promoted the movie in the trailer with Queen’s We will Rock You.
In that context Highlander might be worth mentioning as well even though the rock songs are here reserved rather for the modern times scenes.I saw Ladyhawke in cinema when it came out. Never seen it since. But remember feeling the pop music being ou of place. But after this discussion here I want to watch it again. Maybe in the meantime it feels different. At that time as a relatively fresh film music fan I was of course looking out for something different. But maybe the movie was ahead of its time. I will re-evaluate.
A KNIGHT’S TALE
Ah, thanks, that was indeed the movie title I didn’t remember! If we refer to Pemberton’s KING ARTHUR – LEGEND OF THE SWORD and not the Zimmer one it also had songs and modern elements in the score which somehow didn’t bother me.
In that context Highlander might be worth mentioning as well even though the rock songs are here reserved rather for the modern times scenes.
Yes, that exactly that makes the difference here to me. The only song in the “past” scenes is “Who wants to live forever” and that was not that much arranged as a pop/rock song. Although probably that would have fitted here for me because of the different times.
Has anyone seen CORRUPTION? It’s a 1968 piece of Brit exploitation, with Peter Cushing (he HATED the film) as a surgeon who has to kill young women for their glands (or something). To see Peter Cushing on a train letching over some bird opposite him in a mini skirt, then killing her (and getting his tongue down her throat and everything), later killing another young girl, stripping her and rubbing his blood-drenched hands all over her tits… then he cuts her head off. How he could go home to his beloved wife Helen and chat cheerfully about the day’s filming I’ll never know.
Bill McGuffie did the score. It’s like somebody has suddenly put on a “Live at Ronnie Scottt’s” jazz record. And all this for scenes of Cushing chasing dolly birds along the beach so that he can mutilate them. Perhaps if there had been a backstory of Cushing as a frustrated jazz musician….
I was watching through OBI WAN KENOBI again last week, on Disney+. It’s my favourite TV show in the STAR WARS universe, and I’m bummed that it was cancelled after just one season. But there’s one thing I cannot FATHOM with it, and that’s the score. For the first couple episodes, it’s scored by an absolutely atrocious, trailer-like wishy-washy sound (composed by Natalie Holt, I believe). A couple of episodes in, I believe for a light sabre duel, they called upon the talent of William Ross to provide a more orchestral backdrop – which they then follow from thereon out. Not terribly exciting orchestral music, just a lot of movement without any theme or form. But it was at least a small step up. And until the very last episode, there are NO references to the existing John Williams themes.
I mean, yes, it’s fine to do your own thing, and in some cases that’s even preferred. Nobody will reach Williams’ level anyway. But when you’re dealing with so many CLASSIC characters from the CLASSIC films, you’re obligated, I think, to use the existing themes, at least to some extent. Feel free to mix it with our own themes or music, if necessary.
This was a show that absolutely SCREAMED for pastiche and references, and they failed so miserably.
So yes, while this may not be exactly what Graham asked for, this is a score I absolutely cannot fathom.
they called upon the talent of William Ross to provide a more orchestral backdrop
Any reason you didn’t mention that Williams actually wrote a new OBI-WAN theme for it and that Ross adapted it for various tracks? Holt’s tracks are indeed typical bland as many TV scores are. The Ross-Williams ones are at least somewhat entertaining. I have not seen the show, actually any of the newer shows besides bits and pieces. Just don’t have Disney+ and don’t want to invest into it currently.
Yes, of course, Williams did the theme – which is fine, but also rather lacklustre by his standards. But that is even MORE reason to weave your own music around the Williams benchmark in this particular case, IMO. Something John Powell did wonderfully in SOLO, btw.
Yes, not William’s best but hard to work around the fact that Obi-Wan already had a theme… Indeed, Powell’s SOLO score is more fun than the movie and William’s theme is also better 😉
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