NOW PLAYING LI

It’s certainly one of the more interesting scores of late, but once again the album presentation made me lose interest halfway through. Still, can’t wait to hear it within context of the film.

Oh yes, Hart is certainly a composer to admire rather than love or be emotionally moved by. I consciously said it’s an ‘interesting’ score for a reason. I’m interested to see The Green Knight because this type of film is (on paper) exactly right down my alley, but I’m also cautious since David Lowery’s previous films left me cold as well.

NP: QUEEN OF THE DESERT (Klaus Badelt)

Werner Herzog's 2015 epic was lambasted by critics (I was also unimpressed, giving it 2 of 5 stars on MUBI). But Badelt's score is gorgeous -- obligatory Arabic sonorities meet classical, western modalities (with some very Chopin-like piano solos). A tad long at almost 80 minutes, but a hearty reminder that Badelt is criminally underused these days.

It's no surprise that I'm listening to James Newton Howard's Jungle Cruise. It gets more enjoyable each listen. I wasn't blown away immediately, like I was with Hidalgo, but after seeing the movie (did the on-demand home theater option) it made more sense and now I keep putting it on repeat. So much energy and fun, and I'm really loving it a lot!

I'm hesitant to "kill" your enthusiasm for this, but I was not that impressed. Much like RAYA, I think there's some 30 minutes worth of highlights here that I'll weed the album down to at some point, whereas the rest was more bland (mickey mousey and frenetic). Best bits were the Metallica adaptations and the awe and wonder music towards the end.

Yeah, I saw the film. It was fun to see Collet-Serra attempt to mimic Stephen Sommers rather than Luc Besson, which he usually tends to do. But while it was always exciting to anticipate the next setpiece, he didn't quite take the pulpy material seriously in the way Sommers does. It was too family friendly/wholesome Disney entertainment, and too frenetic -- which, as you say, is also mirrored in the music.

Not really. They don't really have anything to do with each other for me. But it no doubt helps to EXPLAIN why the soundtrack is the way it is.



I love Stephen Sommers too! But I don't quite think Collett-Serra succeeded in nailing that particular aesthetic, even if it may have been a goal.

If I’m honest that’s a problem with soundtracks nowadays. Years ago when I was in my heyday of collecting soundtracks and listening to them, usually a soundtrack was a condensation of all the music that would make up a good listening experience on its own, whereas music that was too bland, or chaotic or another reason why it would work well in the film but not on its own would simply be left out of the CD. Plenty of scores got 40 or 50 min. releases, because the score justified such a length on its own. Which didn’t necessarily mean a 40 min score would be less good than a 70 min score, it just meant it was a different kind.

Nowadays, however, they throw everything on digital for the listener to sort out, all of a sudden EVERY score is a 70 or 80 min score, of even more, and you need to see the film to understand why music is a certain way to explain it. If you ask me, the soundtrack experience should just stand on its own.

Having heard Jungle Cruise a couple times now I’d say it’s a solid 50 min score that is stretched to 73 minutes. I now retort to just listening to the suite, just like I did with Maleficent. And the whole album situation nowadays is more and more making me listen to film music a lot less than I used to.

NP: NAVY SEALS (Sylvester Levay)

I love Levay. My colleague's walkthrough of his career recently spurred me to relisten to this classic (that I have fond memories of seeing on VHS). As with HOT SHOTS!, the Faltermeyer influence is all over this, but in a good way. Beautiful sequencer-led tracks, and heroic fanfares in the style of Silvestri's THE DELTA FORCE. Great mix of orchestra and synth.

I've only heard the score once in and once away from the movie, so I feel like I haven't been able to digest it much yet, but I though parts of it were really fun. I'm happy to have a new JNH adventure score! It's got some great highlights.



It was a different style of film for Collet-Serra. I thought it was fun, but too derivative of The Mummy, Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl, and Indiana Jones, without being nearly as good as any of those. But each of the main characters made me laugh pretty hard at least once, so I was entertained.

Ah! Sorry to hear it. Soundtracks only make out a tiny portion of what we're talking about (it's mostly all kinds of other issues), but I can understand the medical situation. Best wishes!



I sampled it too just now, as it happens. It has some cool pieces -- love the propulsive guitar and rock sound that Murphy always does well, but there were a lot of tracks that just plodded along. Won't make it into my collection, I'm afraid.

Yes that’s it, it’s got quite an entertaining sound that probably suits the film well, but it doesn’t have enough thematic or melodious construct to carry your interest throughout. I won’t return much to it, even though it’s a pretty compact 51 minutes (for today’s standards - probably because most of the film is littered with songs, as I’ve heard).

NP: EL LABERINTO DEL FAUNO - Javier Navarrete

I knew it was good, but I almost forgot exactly how good it is. It’s such a shame Del Toro didn’t keep him as his standard composer for his next works. Navarrete would’ve been perfect for Crimson’s Peak and The Shape of Water, to name a few.

NP: BROTHERS (Johan Söderqvist)

A collision of geographies -- Eastern-European cembalom meets twangy Americana meets Scandinavian melancholy meets French accordions. It's very fitting that Thomas Newman scored the remake of this film, since it's very much in his ballpark, but I think ultimately I prefer this original Söderqvist more. The Söderqvist/Bier collaboration is vastly underrated.

Sure, FIREFLIES is great, but that's still within the 2000s. Jane Cornish's score for the US version is also wonderful.