It's Marco Beltrami week!
We've got a triple dose of Beltrami for you this week with reviews of The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada, Underworld Evolution and The Omen set to hit the site in the next day or two. For now, here's an advance look at The Omen...
"Goldsmith’s score to Richard Donner’s original, of course, is a classic, and is one of my favorite Jerry Goldsmith scores. It works incredibly well as an album, and it adds so much to the film- in fact, many scenes are saved because of it. The Latin-chanting choir influenced an entire generation of horror scores that followed. Perhaps if was wise, then, of Beltrami not to take the new Omen score in a new direction, or to try and mimic exactly what Goldsmith did. Beltrami is not the type of composer who deals with clichés. However, by not crafting a score as audacious as Goldsmith’s, and creating one that merely serves the film as a routine horror flick (which this film definitely is), he has made himself into a sacrificial lamb of sorts. Indeed, the critics have blasted the score in most reviews of this update. The tense moments are there. The sweet family music is still there. But there’s no choir… just little nods to what Jerry did. The result, is a score without the gravitas and fire of a typical Marco Beltrami horror score, and one that gets unfairly scrutinized against one of the most brilliant horror scores of all time."
And an excerpt from Three Burials...
"I’ve always been sort of hot and cold with Beltrami as a composer. I admire the fact that he’s managed to craft a distinct and recognizable musical voice (far more than most film composers of his generation have achieved), but something has always seemed just a bit muted and distant about his large-scale orchestral works, impressive as the best of them are. Three Burials changes that perception for me. If you’re one of the many who adamantly love his orchestral pyrotechnics from the likes of Hellboy and I, Robot, you’ll likely be disappointed with this one as it’s an entirely different animal, but if you’re like me, you’ll relish its off-kilter mingling of and heat-stroke induced hallucinations and heartfelt lyricism. Like the excellent film it accompanies (Tommy Lee Jones’ contemporary revisionist Western is very likely the best film Beltrami has scored to date), Beltrami’s score is a quirky and often brutally macabre animal, but it carries an affecting human touch throughout and is touching as it is perverse."
More soon...
"Goldsmith’s score to Richard Donner’s original, of course, is a classic, and is one of my favorite Jerry Goldsmith scores. It works incredibly well as an album, and it adds so much to the film- in fact, many scenes are saved because of it. The Latin-chanting choir influenced an entire generation of horror scores that followed. Perhaps if was wise, then, of Beltrami not to take the new Omen score in a new direction, or to try and mimic exactly what Goldsmith did. Beltrami is not the type of composer who deals with clichés. However, by not crafting a score as audacious as Goldsmith’s, and creating one that merely serves the film as a routine horror flick (which this film definitely is), he has made himself into a sacrificial lamb of sorts. Indeed, the critics have blasted the score in most reviews of this update. The tense moments are there. The sweet family music is still there. But there’s no choir… just little nods to what Jerry did. The result, is a score without the gravitas and fire of a typical Marco Beltrami horror score, and one that gets unfairly scrutinized against one of the most brilliant horror scores of all time."
And an excerpt from Three Burials...
"I’ve always been sort of hot and cold with Beltrami as a composer. I admire the fact that he’s managed to craft a distinct and recognizable musical voice (far more than most film composers of his generation have achieved), but something has always seemed just a bit muted and distant about his large-scale orchestral works, impressive as the best of them are. Three Burials changes that perception for me. If you’re one of the many who adamantly love his orchestral pyrotechnics from the likes of Hellboy and I, Robot, you’ll likely be disappointed with this one as it’s an entirely different animal, but if you’re like me, you’ll relish its off-kilter mingling of and heat-stroke induced hallucinations and heartfelt lyricism. Like the excellent film it accompanies (Tommy Lee Jones’ contemporary revisionist Western is very likely the best film Beltrami has scored to date), Beltrami’s score is a quirky and often brutally macabre animal, but it carries an affecting human touch throughout and is touching as it is perverse."
More soon...
posted by Ryan @ 6/15/2006 02:04:00 AM
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