LOVE FIELD (US 1993) movie *** score *1/2 album ½

After sitting on the shelf for two years, when LOVE FIELD was finally released much of Goldsmith’s score was wisely replaced with some far more authentic and accomplished blues piano work.

Kaplan’s ‘road-movie’, set against the backdrop of Kennedy’s assassination, is actually a pretty good film. Michelle Pfeiffer and Dennis Haysbert are excellent in character roles – okay, so the agenda of the movie is pretty familiar, but LOVE FIELD is an accomplished and fulfilling ‘little movie’.

Goldsmith’s score, as he intended it and as it appears on Varese’s album, has a main theme that promisingly opens with a blues piano structure – however, Goldsmith’s main theme unfortunately descends into ghastly marmalade and molasses blandness with unholy rapidity. The theme is remarkably redundant – this is a prime example of Goldsmith giving the movie absolutely nothing musically - rather than bolstering the movie’s agenda and enhancing the mood, Goldsmith’s music merely trails behind the visuals like a lame dog unwillingly following its master in a drenching rainstorm. In fact, such is the exceedingly banal nature of the theme and orchestration, Goldsmith’s music actually damages the effectiveness of the movie. This is Goldsmith imposing his own misguided sensibilities onto the movie rather than practising the art of CMS (Contemporary Musical Sensibilities) and providing a score that effectively reflects and enhances the movie’s agenda.

The blues piano opening is about the slightest, vaguest and most insubstantial concession Goldsmith could have made (being apparently narrow-minded and conservative in his approach to scoring) to the movie’s ‘road-movie’ attributes. As I say, the rest of the main theme serves no purpose whatsoever – it’s merely another sickly-sweet variation on the SLEEPING WITH THE ENEMY theme – featureless, sexless, characterless and ultimately hollow, not to say derivative, uninventive, artificial, bland and ‘sub-shopping mall music’ – it’s not even worthy of being called muzak.

The rest of the score, as heard on the album, includes a brief cue in which the blues piano at last comes to the fore – but this two minute segment is hardly worth mentioning and was deleted from the movie anyway. Goldsmith recycles some of his WIND AND THE LION ideas (the Brian Keith/Roosevelt theme) to score the death of the president – one might call this Goldsmith’s ‘US President theme’ rather like the way Goldsmith often quotes his PATTON military theme (though usually for lampooning purposes) – however, this Goldsmith ‘presidential motif’ is far less interesting than his echoing Patton-brass for instance, and though maybe appropriate in the context of the movie, is of no purely musical interest whatsoever. That said, the scoring of the death of the president in LOVE FIELD develops into a smooth and quite powerful string elegy, similar in texture to Mahler’s Adagios, but without the lilting intensity, thematic brilliance, and chromatic range, of course.

A few action-orientated segments turn up later in the album and these are preserved in the movie – this is standard 90s Goldsmith action stuff – heavy and ponderous brass, cumbersome and hollow acoustic percussion, and the very minimum of electronic colour.

Virtually all traces of Goldsmith’s half-baked, artificial, lacklustre and insincere use of the blues piano is expunged by the movie’s producers from the film itself, including Goldsmith’s opening-credits cue. In its place, authentic bluesey piano music is wisely inserted.

Goldsmith’s score to LOVE FIELD is wholly inappropriate and does very little to enhance the movie. Being partly a ‘road movie’, Goldsmith makes no attempt whatsoever to incorporate ‘road-movie’ stylistics – there’s no guitar, light percussive synths or folky and ‘country’ feel to the music – Poledouris got the balance just right with his fine score to the excellent modern classic BREAKDOWN.

Even though Goldsmith composed it in 1991, his score to LOVE FIELD fits in snugly amongst his legion of disappointing movie scores from the middle to late 90s period.

THE VANISHING (US 1993) movie *** score ***

Though THE VANISHING may compare unfavourably with its Dutch original, this Hollywood version is a quite acceptable entertainment. Jeff Bridges is fine as the demented kidnapper, and the supporting cast is more than equal to the task. The movie is well-crafted, the story unfolds nicely and there is a distinctive atmosphere of tension throughout.

Goldsmith’s score serves the movie well also. A jauntily dreamlike and ethereal theme captures the essence of Bridges’ cruel machinations. However, though this theme is at first disarming, because it is rather overused and sadly little-developed, it soon palls and outstays its welcome.

Goldsmith’s work on THE VANISHING is, for Goldsmith, unusually mood-enhancing – rather like BASIC INSTINCT – but, unlike BASIC INSTINCT, Goldsmith’s work here becomes rather strained for ideas by the end of the movie. The ‘action’ climax to THE VANISHING is good, and though Goldsmith’s scoring is suitably loud and frenetic, it soon takes on the bland characteristics that have plagued most of his 90s scores – ponderous and clumsy brass, clunky, outmoded, and hollow-sounding acoustic percussion, and far too noisy and ear-shattering orchestral hits.

The closing credits cue is a very effective ‘RUSSIA HOUSE-esque’ jazz-orientated piece – very effective, and it makes one wonder why Goldsmith doesn’t apply such stylistics more often – he’d be a far better film composer for it.

THE GOLDSMITH CHRONICLES (1992-1999) – part V subsection B

DENNIS THE MENACE (US 1993) movie ***1/2 score ***1/2 album *

Goldsmith’s score to DENNIS, in my opinion, includes much of Goldsmith’s best post-BASIC INSTINCT work. However, as is usual for soundtracks (particularly for Goldsmith scores), the album is worthless as a source of purely musical interest, though there are small pools of meaningful compositional cohesiveness during the album - apart from the exuberant main theme, there is a delightful cue that begins with the tinkling synths representing the jewels that Christopher Lloyd is about to steal; this leads into a magnificently overblown Wagnerian sequence for the once-in-a-lifetime blooming orchid, and ends with a tremendously exciting and inventive passage as the kid hurtles down a lane on his bicycle. Apart from that, there are many musical highlights during the score, but almost all are best heard in the movie where the music takes on some sort of meaning.

The opening credits cue to DENNIS THE MENACE is very exuberant, and very reminiscent of Goldsmith’s earlier THE FIRST GREAT TRAIN ROBBERY (1978). However, the fact that Goldsmith has created a main theme with a strong theme, interesting development and more detailed and colourful orchestration is something to be thankful for. The harmonica is a most welcome departure from Goldsmith’s usual ‘factory-fitted’ flute, massed-strings, harp and oboe instrumental combination. The opening credits main theme even incorporates a careful and subtle passage that is sweet without being sickmaking – this is when the scene switches to a rural scene complete with grazing deer – the music here is both mellow and mellowing.

DENNIS THE MENACE is a very funny film – it’s one that the kids absolutely adored because of its HOME ALONE styled cruel humour – but there is also plenty to keep the grownups interested. There’s one particular bit that had everyone in hysterics – the villainous Lloyd consumes a barrel load of baked beans that have been warming over an open bonfire in an attempt to find a key that had fallen into the vat – afterwards, he lets out the most enormous fart that causes the bonfire to resemble a nuclear explosion – lovely stuff. Walter Matthau and Mrs Olivier are great as Mr and Mrs Wilson, Mason Gamble is fine as Dennis, and most importantly all of the kids are great – the ‘baby rump kisser’ scene is wonderful. In fact, there are at least half a dozen well executed comic scenes – DENNIS THE MENACE is a real winner.

Almost inevitably, Goldsmith’s score is not without its faults. Though thematically strong, and often orchestrationally rich, Goldsmith really should have opted for a more contemporary-styled flesh on the thematic framework of the score. The only discernible electronics are employed to portray the creepy and creeping Christopher Lloyd villain – another effective element to the score, particularly his first appearance when we see him on a freight train bound for Dennis’ home town. Having said that, there is also a remarkable synth passage that makes an appearance towards the end of the movie – just as Paul Winfield’s policeman turns up – needless to say, this small, but interesting section is not included on the album.

So, Goldsmith’s DENNIS THE MENACE, despite the prominent harmonica and some electronics, is very much symphonically orientated, and much of it winningly enters into the farcical spirit of the movie – there’s some good tuba work also, a very fitting accompaniment to Mr Wilson.

Could Goldsmith maintain his good form when scoring Malice……?

MALICE (US 1993) movie **1/2 score * album ½

MALICE opens with a very promising credits sequence cue from Goldsmith. A rudimentary ‘plucked synthesizer’ effect, based on a piano theme actually heard within the movie, heralds the entry of an ethereal-sounding female choir – this opening to the movie is both surprising and disarming. As I say, the theme is based on source music heard within the movie that is actually relevant to the plot – so whether or not this theme was composed by Goldsmith remains unclear. In fact, the whole opening credits cue, that some have described as Elfman-esque, is based on this simple but interesting piano theme, and Goldsmith expands on this basic and almost banal musical idea inventively – the opening credits cue is a delightfully surreal and mysterious waltz-like piece. In fact, the main theme serves at least two major purposes – firstly, it incorporates that important bit of source music, and secondly it musically portrays Alec Baldwin’s almost God-like presence within the movie – certainly Baldwin gives an impressively imperious performance as a charming surgeon with ‘hidden depths’. George C Scott and Ann Bancroft enjoy cameo performances, and Bill Pullman and Nicole Kidman round off the useful cast list.

For all of its larger-than-life performances and situations, the trouble with MALICE is the small-scale appearance of the movie – it comes across more like a television movie rather than the product of top cinema talent. Following the enjoyable (though now terribly dated) SEA OF LOVE, Harold Becker’s output has declined considerably, firstly with MALICE and then with the dreary and insubstantial CITY HALL, for example. MERCURY RISING was only a slight improvement.

Not only that, Goldsmith’s work on MALICE represents another noticeable decline in this composer’s approach to scoring movies, in my opinion. The television movie feel of MALICE partly came about because of Goldsmith’s low-key and lacklustre score. After the fabulous opening cue, the score descends into threadbare and undernourished musical redundancy. I suppose Goldsmith was hampered in his ambition to score MALICE by the rather uncinematic atmosphere of the movie – Hitchcock and Herrmann would have given this sort of movie that all important veneer of style – Becker’s direction is too mechanical, too matter-of-fact.

Of course, being a thriller, Goldsmith incorporates one of his BASIC INSTINCT-type themes – a lush and ominous string passage that comes and goes all too briefly – but, this sort of thing from Goldsmith had already become far too familiar, and the whole of his score to MALICE indicates that Goldsmith may have run out of ideas for scoring thrillers while he was working on THE VANISHING. There’s plenty of drum hits during MALICE, but most of the percussive elements of the score are clumsily acoustic. What Goldsmith seems to fail to do more than anything with movies outside of the action/fantasy genres is to create a smooth ambient sound and periods of orchestral, electronic and solo instrumental subtlety – his music is just too staccato-like – perhaps that explains the almost complete absence of Goldsmith-scored movies outside of the action/horror/fantasy genres during the 90s.

During MALICE, Pullman’s discovery of the truth about his wife is particularly disappointingly scored – an urgent-sounding cello and flute passage is embellished with some amazingly simplistic electronic drum passages – one of many familiar and unwelcome Goldsmith traits in recent years. The rest of the score ranges from the obligatory flute/harp/string marmalade-music passages to some dissonant and musically uninteresting shock/creeping around music.

RUDY (US 1993) movie ** score * album *1/2

RUDY was never going to be a popular movie - it was competent but extremely bland, unlike Anspaugh’s previous and excellent HOOSIERS that had a truly fine and CMS-rich score from Goldsmith. But, Goldsmith’s laborious scoring of RUDY merely reinforced the air of lethargy that pervaded this film. Goldsmith’s main theme to RUDY does have the germ of a good idea, though it sounds about as Irish as Nelson Mandella. It is a good theme……but it is applied in the most unimaginative of ways. All of the Celtic spirit locked up in Goldsmith’s RUDY theme remains ‘bound and gagged’ for the duration of the movie, thanks to the ultra-conservative and frankly stale method in which the theme is presented. This despite the presence of choir - sadly, not only wordless, but also barely audible.

As it is, Goldsmith’s RUDY has about as much romance in it as a rusted hubcap…..and yet the potential is there in that great theme. It’s like what THE RUSSIA HOUSE theme would be like without the sax……oops….but we’ve all heard that in Goldsmith’s concert performance….here, the beautiful theme to THE RUSSIA HOUSE is reduced to the lowly ranks of the suffocating marmalade music that Goldsmith has been pummelling us with ever since FOREVER YOUNG. You see, that’s what RUDY needed - it needed Celtic inspiration, it needed Celtic tempo, it needed an injection of Celtic fire. The theme required exposure in a number of different guises, as Goldenthal attempted in COBB (interesting music, but I think the composer was more concerned with ‘showing off’ than with providing the movie with the music it really needed). It just shows that great music is more than just a great theme……it is how the thematic material is deployed…..indeed, I believe, with film music, the thematic material is far less important than the way the music is presented…..its CMS factor, or its ability to communicate with the audience; you don’t need great thematic material to do that, but you do need to present the music in a way that contemporary society can relate to.

Thus, we are in the peculiar position of having RUDY, though having stronger thematic material, being a far lesser film score than Horner’s skilfully judged THE DEVIL’S OWN. This Horner movie, also Irish in its sound, had much less music than RUDY, and was far less thematically distinct…..but, it did evoke the time and place, the essence of the movie, through its brilliantly authentic use of instrumentation and styles.

I’m afraid that with film music, it is often a case of style over substance. To put it another way, I would rate Goldsmith’s score to RUDY as one star, but Horner’s score to THE DEVIL’S OWN I would rate as four stars…….that’s how I rate the effectiveness of the music in its proper purpose…..to enhance the movie.

Paradoxically, Goldsmith’s music to RUDY makes for a far more worthwhile stand-alone listen than Horner’s DEVIL’S OWN…..mainly because RUDY’s basic thematic material is stronger……though as I have said, its potential is not realized one-tenth.

As a stand-alone listen, I would rate RUDY as one and one half stars, and DEVIL’S OWN as one star……so to say Goldsmith’s RUDY is a more worthwhile stand-alone listen is certainly no compliment.

RUDY is unrelentingly dull and one-dimensional, and so is Goldsmith’s score. A few moments of the soundtrack threaten some sort of subtle ambience, but any such moments are usually shattered by the intrusion of a too-obvious flute melody or the thunderous brass and clunky acoustic percussion that Goldsmith relies on far too heavily these days. The finale to the album revisits all of the movie’s main themes and certainly has its moments….though one finds it extremely hard to believe that Goldsmith and wife were moved to tears on hearing the playback during the recording session…but then again.

Goldsmith’s scores, especially 93-98, fail to really enhance his movies, and also, usually, make wretched stand-alone listens….like most soundtrack albums in my opinion.
But, though Horner or Zimmer’s scores are sometimes even more wretchedly unsatisfactory as stand-alone listenings as Goldsmith’s albums, they do enhance their movies to an outstanding degree and with amazing consistency - after all, surely that is all that is important – having music that enhances the movie by communicating agenda and emotion to the audience - the successful application of CMS - something that virtually all current film composers succeed in doing (to varying degrees) - that is, all except Jerry Goldsmith.

THE GOLDSMITH CHRONICLES (1992-1999) – part VII subsection B

SIX DEGREES OF SEPARATION (US 1993) movie *** score ***

Here, Goldsmith tantalizingly hints at what he can achieve as a film composer. His extremely brief score, that amounts to less than twenty minutes, is extremely well-judged. The opening tango is very derivative, but it’s a tango, so it has to be derivative. The rest of the score is completely different in sound to what we’re used to from Goldsmith….the orchestration and arrangement is sharper and more professional….it’s as if Goldsmith, not having to create a full scale score felt more confident about giving the movie exactly what is musically needed.

The movie itself is fine, especially considering it is directed by that conspicuous underachiever Fred Schepisi. Early Will Smith and late Donald Sutherland combine well, and Sir Ian McKellan is a welcome member of the supporting cast. However, because the nature of the movie isn’t very cinematic, very few people went to see it.

ANGIE (US 1994) movie ***1/2 score * album 1/2

Despite bombing at the box office, ANGIE was a very fine movie – it was warm, witty and often very amusing – though the marmalade factor became a little too pronounced by the end of the movie. Geena Davis was great as an Italian-American from Brooklyn who, on the verge of marriage, decides that something is missing from her life. There’s a great supporting cast, led by Stephen Rea, and a reasonable script from Todd Graff.

However, Goldsmith’s score had the effect of throwing a bucket of ice-cold water over the proceedings. I can only begin to describe Goldsmith’s music on this film as cringe-making. The worst thing about the music was its pace - positively funereal. The fake ‘Italian’ instrumentals and plodding base guitar only reinforced the score’s defunct nature. Fortunately, the music was hardly noticeable during the movie…..only Goldsmith’s successfully-CMS bus trip music making any impression. That is the frustrating part….here Goldsmith gives us a brief indication of just what he can do.

ANGIE was a really nice movie….likeable characters and plenty of drama, comedy and emotion. However, all of these attributes were apparently lost on Goldsmith, whose score merely amounted to an exercise in ponderous, sugar-coated marmalade and molasses nothingness. Goldsmith’s approach was so poorly judged that the music deserved to belong to a bad Abbott and Costello movie (not all their movies were bad).

ANGIE needed an assured, contemporary sound….a smooth, cool and diverse soundscape incorporating ’real’ soloists, electronics and maybe a strong bittersweet melody, not the Noddy in Toyland simplicity of Goldsmith’s actual theme. Goldsmith did a far better job on the somewhat similar LONELY GUY ten years before…though that score was very 80s and therefore not as sophisticated as what we have come to expect these days. On the other hand, Zimmer’s immaculate, and masterfully CMS approach to AS GOOD AS IT GETS, though almost wholly classical in nature, may have been just as appropriate in the context of ANGIE.

Goldsmith’s work on ANGIE is simply terrible. From the phoney sounding mandolin and accordion to the embarrassing repetition of the movie’s simplistic main theme, Goldsmith’s ANGIE is a study in how not to score a modern and sophisticated movie.

BAD GIRLS (US 1994) movie ½ score * album *

BAD GIRLS is a wretchedly awful movie - it is hideously bland, despicably contrived, utterly unconvincing, deadly dull and desperately tame.

Goldsmith’s score to BAD GIRLS isn’t quite as bad as the movie itself, but that is like saying that chewing on live maggots is preferable to being eaten alive by them.

Now then, what was BAD GIRLS all about? Oh yes, it was a Western, it was about four ladies of the night who also happen to be expert cowgirls.

BAD GIRLS is extraordinarily badly made – it is ineptly directed, woodenly acted and childishly scripted – in every way BAD GIRLS is naff – apart from some wonderful photography that is.

Goldsmith’s score is a lumbering, inappropriate and flavourless exercise in redundant film scoring – just like the movie itself, the score is stale, weak and simply ghastly. Goldsmith seems to make every effort to avoid using genuine-sounding Western stylistics and orchestration, and what’s worse is the clumsy and ponderous playing of the National Philharmonic Orchestra. The pace of the playing is funereal, it’s like the score has been recorded and then played back in slow motion – this is musical composition of Sunday-School dinginess.

Goldsmith’s score barely suggested the nature of the movie’s colourful genre, owing to the spartan orchestration and crushingly dull thematic material. There was the germ of a good idea in the theme…just as there was with RUDY….but once again Goldsmith applies his thematic material in the most uninventive fashion imaginable. The fact the music sounds as though it’s being performed by an infants’ school orchestra, or a colliery brass band overdosed on sleeping drugs, really doesn’t help. The snails-pace playing accentuates the obvious and simplistic emptiness that this score represents. BAD GIRLS was crying out for a smoother, speedier and more defined ‘western’ sound…..only one cue during the movie provides this sound (also heard on the trailer when Robert Loggia is in shot), but does not appear on the album. And that omnipresent and ponderous acoustic guitar is applied with about as much gusto as an arthritic turtle. A hideous score to a hideous movie…..at least the film and music deserved each other.

Indeed, as we approach the ‘season of goodwill’, I respectfully ask of board administrator PeterK that he reconsiders the long-standing ban on vulcantouch from posting at this message board, and welcome this most popular and valuable contributor to board discussion back into the fold.

THE SHADOW (US 1994) movie * score * album 1/2

Goldsmith’s score to THE SHADOW is also a pale shadow of Elfman’s brilliant BATMAN theme.

From the alternately dull bombast and nauseatingly gooey ghastliness of BAD GIRLS, Goldsmith managed to create a somewhat different, and yet equally horrendous score to THE SHADOW…..a poor movie, though not without some merit. This time it was the unbelievably derivative nature of Goldsmith’s thematic material that was so startling. Elfman’s brilliant BATMAN theme was the obvious ‘inspiration’ behind Goldsmith’s main theme. And yet, despite the compelling nature of the Elfman on which it was based, somehow Goldsmith makes his Shadow theme one of the most redundant and weak of musical creations. So, on hearing the Shadow theme, everyone goes ‘Hey!….that’s Batman’, and then, after a few more notes the music gets set into a banal and ordinary rut, such is it’s vacuous and pointless nature, and everyone goes, ‘Oh no, it’s not as good as Batman’. The rest of Goldsmith’s score is a tired and clapped-out variation on just about every element of Goldsmith’s banal 90s approach to scoring. Not once did you feel the music was doing anything other than padding-out the movie…..an already bloated, childish, derivative and bland cinematic experience.

Having said all of that, one has to register admiration for the movie’s magnificent sets, the costumes and the special effects – beyond that, THE SHADOW is a particularly feeble movie – even the kids, or I should say, especially the kids, thought it was pants (that’s, ‘it sucked’ for any American readers). I suppose that elements of the adult audience may have been more likely to forgive THE SHADOW its many and varied weaknesses, but such was the blandness of the lead performances and the puerility of the script, just about every age group would have good reason to regard THE SHADOW as a witless and infantile piece of cinematic nothingness. That said, much of the supporting cast is effective, particularly Peter Boyle’s cabby – though in THE SHADOW, the usually excellent Sir Ian McKellen is rather poor as the movie’s obligatory absent-minded professor.

Goldsmith’s score begins badly, and never improves. Some extraordinarily dated electronic pings herald the Elfmanesque main theme. Immediately derivative, it quickly becomes thematically static and the secondary theme is embarrassingly unimaginative and poor. Much of the rest of Goldsmith’s score to THE SHADOW is a combination of abominable derivativeness, poorly conceived orchestration, obvious and redundant thematic development, and conservative stylistics – it’s as though the orchestra are playing submerged in a huge vat of treacle – not only is Goldsmith’s music stodgy and compositionally handicapped, but that hideously sentimental and treacly secondary ‘love theme’ keeps descending on the movie like a London smog.

And then we get to the ‘Hotel’ music that one might assume, judging by the sound and style, Elfman had written, had it been at all good. Later on in the movie, between the usual bouts of repetitive, monotonous and redundant action music, Goldsmith even manages to rip-off Horner when he uses the triumphant brass fanfare that was such a remarkable feature of Horner’s superb landmark score to ALIENS. Various passages of heavy acoustic percussion work serve only to underline the score’s inspirationally bankrupt, ponderous and clumsy nature.

***I LOVE THE SHADOW****

-the main theme is awesome. It gets stuck in my head, and its easy to whistle to.
-The 30's style song is actually fun!-
-The wolf cry sounds are really creepy and set the mood perfectly in the film and on the album.
-The drum machine sounding sections, with its mass of percusion is simply amazing. It sounds really great played loudly

I bought the cd at a used cd store a few years ago, and it has been in constant play ever since. I really wish there was an expanded release (anyone have a bootleg?).

**now back to the regularly scheduled Daniel2 yawn-fest!**

Thank you for remembering what I wrote about THE SHADOW at the FSM board…..it is very satisfying to know that people are familiar with my “Goldsmith’s LAST ORDERS” musings from elsewhere on the internet (numerous other locations, I might add).

Thank you also for sharing your thoughts about Goldsmith’s score to THE SHADOW, and also the song that Goldsmith didn’t write.

I certainly agree that the existing official album is a travesty of Goldsmith’s score, and as such is a woeful representation of the dramatic score Goldsmith provided for THE SHADOW.

PeterK, I know that he tormented you.
Even so, I believe he should be permitted to speak his voice here.

Forgiveness must rule.

DOMESTIC DISTURBANCE involves a divorced father (John Travolta) learning that the new stepfather of his eleven-year-old son is not the man he claims to be. He sets out to try to save his son from what becomes a life-and-death situation. The screenplay comes from Lewis Colick, who was also involved with ALONG COMES A SPIDER. Shooting is due to begin early in 2001, and based on Becker and Travolta’s recent work I am anything but optimistic. As far as Goldsmith’s scoring is concerned, DOMESTIC DISTURBANCE is ripe for a mixture of US MARSHALS’ bombast and slurping RUDY marmalade and molasses.

And then there’s Zucker’s RAT RACE, apparently a ‘road’ comedy in which a billionaire Las Vegas casino owner sets up a gambling scheme in which gamblers wage on which of six candidates can find the $2 million that is hidden somewhere in a locker – sounds really promising. This film is loosely based on the 1963 film It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad world – it gets even ‘better’. The movie includes such cinematic luminaries as Cuba Gooding Jr., Whoopi Goldberg, Jon Lovitz, Wayne Knight, Kathy Najimy and Rowan Atkinson (Mr Bean). Considering that RAT RACE seems to have been in production since Edwardian days, I wouldn’t expect this movie to be anything other than a straight-to-video non-event.

In both of these movies, and LAST ORDERS and ALONG CAME A SPIDER for that matter, I fail to see how Goldsmith’s input (based on his approach to film scoring since 1992’s FOREVER YOUNG) will do anything to enhance the proceedings. Indeed, several of these movies would seem alien to Goldsmith’s prevailing mono-stylistic, defunct and anti-CMS approach to scoring. Still, based on events over the past year or so, whether Goldsmith’s name appears when the credits finally roll on any of these upcoming movies is seriously in doubt.

That’s a reasonable question.

I don’t collect soundtrack albums to listen to them….anymore than I collect bus timetables to ride the buses (anyway, most of the really valuable timetables are seventy years out of date). Of course, I ride on some buses and I do listen to some of my soundtrack albums for pleasure, but I have found that even a good film score usually makes for a wretchedly unsatisfactory stand-alone listen, such is the simplistic, repetitive and disjointed nature of the music. So, it is often the case that a good film score makes a bad soundtrack album….and in many ways that’s as it should be, the film score is created to serve the movie first and should not be primarily designed for stand-alone listening…..such an approach from the film composer could sabotage the effectiveness of the score in the movie.

I collect soundtrack albums because I have a keen interest in all things cinema….amongst many other subjects, such as buses, trains, stamps, refuse collection memorabilia, meteorology etc.

The movie soundtrack fascinates me, and I am just as interested in collecting and studying ‘bad’ movie scores as I am good ones.

Goldsmith is of particular interest to me because of the various stages through which his career has progressed. In the past, Goldsmith’s output has been characterized by the inventive scoring of mainly mediocre movies. However, since 1992 Goldsmith’s output has become notable for the obvious and simplistic scoring of mainly mediocre movies. In other words, Goldsmith seems to have finally discovered the knack of musically matching the mediocrity of the movies he scores.

This 90s trend in Goldsmith’s approach to film scoring fascinates me almost as much as the high quality and invention of the bulk of his work 1960 through 1992….call it a morbid fascination, if you like. It’s like how a really bad movie can be just as entertaining and interesting as a good one.

The thing about Goldsmith is, amongst today’s accomplished and mainly CMS-excellent film scoring fraternity, he is unique for his application of defunct and outmoded stylistics, recycling of his worst material and his startlingly unfortunate choice of assignments.

I see Goldsmith today as a King Canute figure, vainly attempting to hold back the tide of sophistication, intelligence, variety and appropriateness of the contemporary film score. He’s tilting at windmills…..he’s almost quixotian in his courageous futility.

That’s what makes Goldsmith so interesting to me…..it is his seemingly incongruous position in modern cinema that makes his current output as fascinating to me as the wit and dexterity of Elfman, the sheer professionalism and appropriateness of Horner, the CMS-magnificence of the Zimmer school, the class of John Williams and the varied and accomplished output of dozens of other successful, proficient and enthusiastic movie composers.

THE RIVER WILD (US 1994) movie ½ score ½ album ½

Just when you thought things couldn’t get even worse than ANGIE, BAD GIRLS and THE SHADOW….along comes Goldsmith’s dismal score to THE RIVER WILD.

The movie itself is an excruciatingly inept farrago. Boring and formulaic, one wonders why they bothered to reject Jarre’s score, considering the poor quality of the movie in the first place….but they did….and they got Goldsmith at his most tortuous, clumsy and simplistic. The music plods like the hesitant and ponderous footsteps of an arthritic hippopotamus….and with about as much grace and confidence. The main theme wasn’t his, the familiar and pleasant ‘The Water is Wide’ was adapted by Goldsmith for the purposes of the movie. In fact, the only element of the movie that came anywhere near any musical interest was the fiddler playing this non-Goldsmith piece within the movie itself. The rest of the score is just dreadful…..from Goldsmith’s banalification of ‘The Water is Wide’ for his main theme, to the monotonous, clumsy and infantile suspense music….as redundant as every other aspect of this dog-eared and flea-bitten movie. This isn’t music – this is an aural soporific. This isn’t movie-making – this is audio-visual poison.

Anyhow, Daniel2, I ask you to please give us your credentials when it comes to speaking your thoughts on "political correctness." From whence you come does you no good in this arena, and I am left to laugh with hearty chuckles when you start going on about it!

LOL!

Personally I don't give a toss about the Royal Family, every one of whom is a parasite, unfortunately I don't have the typing speed or the time to give you a thousand word essay on why I think that.

I do look forward to Mr.2's reply though!

Whilst your comments may incur her Britannic Majesty’s displeasure, I do not have any affiliation with the Royal Family, and if the monarchy retained one ounce of authoritative or legislative power I would be a fervent proponent of a British republic.

As it is, the Royal Family exists today only as a symbolic, though ‘expensive’ symbol of British history, and mainly serves to provide American and Japanese tourists further reason to visit ‘mother England’. Indeed, the Royal Family is far more popular amongst Americans than it is with the British people themselves.

It is widely believed that Charles III will be Britain’s final monarch as the tide of global sophistication removes such arcane and redundant institutions as the monarchy. It is inevitable that Great Britain will one day become a republic, it’s just a matter of when….but seeing that the only reason for removing the monarchy at present is to reduce the tax burden (a minuscule fraction of a penny I should add), there are far fewer active republicans than there are those who are indifferent to the subject….in other words, very few people feel strongly for or against the monarchy. The classic example of this is in the recent referendum held in Australia in which the people overwhelmingly voted against a republic, rather than for the monarchy; thus, Queen Elizabeth II remains queen of Australia, New Zealand, Canada and so on. It is looking increasingly likely that the British people will vote to remove the monarchy before many of those British Commonwealth nations that retain the king or queen of England as the head of state.

I would not go as far as Timmer by describing the Royal Family as parasites, after all, the revenue that the Royal Family generates through tourism, you know, all those American and Japanese visitors to England, is a very positive factor. Add to this the prestige and positive influence the Royal Family has on many charitable and international aid organisations, and you have a whole raft of reasons to retain the monarchy….in light of this, the reasons for removing the monarchy begin to look somewhat less compelling….though it is sure to happen within the next 30 years.

So, since the monarchy is irrelevant as far as the governance of Britain is concerned, any arcane royal-related constitutional rules are also largely irrelevant. The Act of Settlement is one such outmoded institution, and though it seems preposterous and racist now, it was rules such as these that protected Britain from the threat of Roman Catholicism in the past. England has been a Protestant nation since the 1690s, and it is only during the 20th century that the need to maintain Britain’s Protestantism has evaporated. We may laugh at such archaic practices and rules today, but remember, it was only forty years ago that abortion and homosexual practice was illegal, it was only eighty years ago that women were denied the vote, it was only one hundred years ago that Catholics and Jews were barred from becoming members of parliament, and it was only 140 years ago Comrade K, that your great nation, the USA, indulged in slave trading on a massive scale, sixty years after Great Britain had outlawed slave trading throughout the British Empire. So, what I am saying is, sexual liberty, the right to abort a pregnancy, and the woman’s right to vote came about because of pressure from the people of Great Britain – such changes had to take place if society was to grow and sophisticate – the Act of Settlement means nix to most people, and is only of interest to certain American board administrators who don’t like their board members criticising the ‘pony-tailed one’.

And remember Comrade K, the American War of Independence, in which the British-American colonists rebelled against the British monarchy, came about partly because of Great Britain’s leniency towards the newly won French Roman Catholic territories in Canada. The mainly fervent Protestant people of the fledgling United States were frightened to death that Roman Catholicism would threaten their religious freedom. And another thing Comrade K, the term WASP (white Anglo-Saxon Protestant) is an American invention and so perfectly crystalizes the far greater historical conservativeness and intolerance of many Americans.

Whilst we’re talking about the American Revolution Comrade K, and since you’ve raised a couple of ‘amusing’ issues about the British monarchy, here are a few things you may not know about your glorious revolt against the English ‘despots’ in 1776.

Most Americans think they know all about the Revolution simply because they are Americans.

1) The British-American colonists of 1776 had the highest standard of living and the lowest taxes in the Western World – and yet, the tax burden imposed by his Britannic Majesty is seen as the most important reason for the British-American colonists’ revolution.

2) Farmers, lawyers and business owners in the 13 British Colonies were thriving, with some plantation owners and merchants making the equivalent of $500,000 a year. The British Crown merely looked for a slice of the cash flow to pay for the French and Indian Wars in which the British Army protected the American colonies from the French and their Indian allies.

3) John Adams defended the British Soldiers after the Boston Massacre.

Captain Thomas Preston led some British Soldiers to aid another British Soldier who was having things thrown at him and was also hit several times with a board. After their arrival, the people continued to pelt the soldiers and finally shots were fired and the infamous "Boston Massacre" was over. Captain Thomas Preston and eight soldiers were charged with murder. Future President John Adams took up the defence of the soldiers. He, along with Joshua Quincy, was able to get all but two acquitted by a local jury. Those two were found guilty of manslaughter, but claimed benefit of clergy. This means that they were allowed to make penance instead of being executed. To insure that they never could use benefit of clergy again they were both branded on the thumbs.

4) Benedict Arnold was the best general in the rebels’ army.

"Without Benedict Arnold in the first three years of the war," says the historian George Neumann, "we would probably have lost the Revolution." In 1775, the future traitor came within a whisker of conquering Canada. In 1776, he built a fleet and fought a bigger British fleet to a standstill on Lake Champlain. At Saratoga in 1777, his brilliant battlefield leadership forced the British army to surrender. This victory persuaded the French to join the war on the American side, without whose aid the British would have prevailed. Ironically, Arnold switched sides in 1780 partly because he disapproved of the French alliance.

5) By 1779, there were more ‘Americans’ fighting with the British than with Washington.

There were no less than 21 regiments (estimated to total 6,500 to 8,000 men) of American loyalists in the British army. Washington reported a field army of 3,468. Indeed, more than a third of Americans opposed the Revolution.

6) At Yorktown, the victory that won the war, Frenchmen outnumbered Americans three to one.

And Comrade K, we in Britain have found your recent presidential election farrago very amusing. Here is a ‘fun’ e-mail that turned up all over the place at the time –

NOTICE OF REVOCATION OF INDEPENDENCE

To the citizens of the United States of America, In the light of your failure to elect a President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective today.

Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchial duties over all states, commonwealths and other territories. Except Utah, which she does not fancy. Your new prime minister (The rt. hon. Tony Blair, MP, for the 97.85% of you who have until now been unaware that there is a world outside your borders) will appoint a minister for America without the need for further elections. Congress and the Senate will be disbanded. A questionnaire will be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed.

To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect:

1. You should look up "revocation" in the Oxford English Dictionary. Then look up "aluminium". Check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it. Generally, you should raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. Look up "vocabulary". Using the same twenty seven words interspersed with filler noises such as "like" and "you know" is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication. Look up "interspersed".

2. There is no such thing as "US English". We will let Microsoft know on your behalf.

3. You should learn to distinguish the English and Australian accents.
It really isn't that hard.

4. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as the good guys.

5. You should relearn your original national anthem, "God Save The Queen", but only after fully carrying out task 1. We would not want you to get confused and give up half way through.

6. You should stop playing american "football". There is only one kind of football. What you refer to as American "football" is not a very good game. The 2.15% of you who are aware that there is a world outside your borders may have noticed that no one else plays "American" football.
You will no longer be allowed to play it, and should instead play proper football. Initially, it would be best if you played with the girls. It is a difficult game. Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which is similar to American "football", but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like nancies). We are hoping to get together at least a US rugby sevens side by 2005.

7. You should declare war on Quebec and France, using nuclear weapons if they give you any merde. The 98.85% of you who were not aware that there is a world outside your borders should count yourselves lucky. The Russians have never been the bad guys. ("Merde" is French for "sh*t".)

8. July 4th is no longer a public holiday. November 7th will be a new national holiday, but only in England. It will be called "Indecisive Day".

9. All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap and it is for your own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we mean.

10. Please tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us crazy.

By the way Comrade K, the above is the version that Andre Lux recently posted at the FSM Message Board – thank you Andre.

Having explained that I have no royal blood flowing through my veins, I believe my ‘political-correctness credentials’ are in order, whatever ‘political-correctness credentials’ may be – just being a human being gives me credence.

Political correctness is modern society’s greatest weapon against bigotry, sexism, racism and prejudice. Anyone who cares about his fellow man is entitled to practice political correctness.

Political correctness serves to protect the interests of the minority until such time as ‘minorities’ cease and society becomes a harmonized whole – a society in which an individual’s sexual orientation, ethnicity or religious beliefs do not restrict that individual’s opportunities – that is the ultimate goal.

In this respect, Great Britain is leading the world…..and I am proud to be part of a nation that is championing the cause of multi-cultural and multi-racial harmonization.

In the words of the greatest American President of modern times, Bill Clinton –

”….fear of the other….that is society’s greatest evil….”

Overcoming this ‘fear’ will involve the continued erosion of prejudice, the ongoing assault on bigotry, and the championing of political correctness.

Sadly, it is often the case that political-correctness is abused by filmmakers – too often historical fact is tailored to suit the sensibilities of the filmmaker. Having said that, I would rather have a cinema full of rampant overuse of political-correctness, than a society based in hatred and persecution of the minority.

And Daniel, you will most likely save a few seconds if you just type "K" or even "PK" or even "PeterK" when addressing me. Typing out "comrade" steals precious time from tending to those pigs and things on the farm!

Thanks for the entertainment, though, D2.

Sincerely,

IQ (US 1994) movie *1/2 score **1/2

The arrest in Goldsmith’s barrel-scraping compositions surely had to come soon, and it did, but not before Goldsmith’s most embarrassing creation….the main theme to IQ. This even outdoes MR BASEBALL’s main theme for sheer baby-like simplicity….stuff like this really gives film music, and music in general a bad name. The combination of ‘Twinkle Twinkle’ and 50’s jive music sounds like something one could only witness during a particularly frightening nightmare….but that’s exactly what Goldsmith concocts for IQ. Thankfully, the rest of the score is okay…..light and jazzy….but the movie itself is the epitome of cinematic lameness.

Schepisi maintains his abysmal 90s directorial record, completely losing the plot during IQ’s final third. IQ provides the perfect example of why Schepisi is not suited to cinema….apart from his obvious failings in pulling all of the disparate elements of his movies together, as any good director should (especially when they also co-produce), Schepisi also fails in those crucial areas of directorship that make movies an all-round and multi-faceted entertainment. Schepisi’s style is leaden and stilted….something one can get away with when directing a stage-play, but a fatal flaw when attempting to create a truly cinematic product.

Only a director of Schepisi’s profound weaknesses could have failed to create a box office winner with IQ. A top-rank cast and impressive production values are squandered by the director/producer, who manages to create a movie as puerile, lame and inconsequential as Eminem.

Mr. 2, no one else in the world plays American football because it is a uniquely American game, far more so than baseball (which can be almost as boring as cricket at times). American football is less about sport or even excellence than it is a certain kind of psychodrama: it's about the conquest of territory. It's less about sportsmanship or athletic excellence than simply about WINNING: advancing from this part of the field to the next, taking out enemy "soldiers" as brutally as possible ... every football game, to my mind (and I'm not particularly a fan, although I always enjoy the bizarre hullaballoo that surrounds the Super Bowl), is a recounting in miniature of North America's expansion through the Wild, Wild West. American football is WAR, pure and simple. Since the teams are always also American, one could even argue that any given game recounts the American Civil War. (I somewhat regret having chosen THIS season to move away from New York -- how fascinating it must have been to see the atmosphere surrounding the Yankees taking on the Mets at long last. Used to rooting simply for the home team, even in Florida I found myself rather conflicted watching this. On a similar note, I was astonished to see the sorry-ass New York Jets whip the Miami Dolphins a few weeks back ... this too evoked an odd crisis in my mind: Go New York! vs. "Isn't Miami *my* town now?")

American pro wrestling (which is aped in many other countries) offers a similar dynamic, albeit more cartoony. I'll be very curious to see what happens with pro wrestling king Vince McMahon's upcoming "XFL" games, apparently a virtual parody of existing pro football.

Another sport I can think of that mimics its birth nation's oddities: Japanese sumo wrestling, which is more about attitude and formality than actual conflict. These mammoth fellows (bulked up to a bizarre degree in this country populated by relatively tiny people) scowling and lumbering up and down their opposite ends of the ring, throwing water and salt over themselves interminably before actually deciding to tangle. Like American football, this could never take off anywhere else because it speaks so clearly to the psyche of the people who were predisposed to invent it.

CONGO (US 1995) movie **1/2 score ** album *

Goldsmith’s in much safer musical territory with CONGO. Bang in a few jungle drums, some ethnic chants, and a noble theme and you’ve got an adequate film-score to a fun kiddies adventure.

The movie opens with Goldsmith’s useful main theme. Beginning with mysterious electronics, the music leads into a choral representation of the main thematic material, before a bold brass-led statement of Goldsmith’s theme is made by the full orchestra. As the opening credits sequence ends, a brief and ethereal segment beckons the appearance onscreen of an orbiting communications satellite – the ethereal style of the ‘satellite’ music will be very familiar to anyone who has followed Goldsmith’s career, it being very much in the same mould as the brief glittering satellite segment that appears in his masterwork STAR TREK: THE MOTION PICTURE. Goldsmith’s use of the ethnic voices for his main theme ‘song’ is sadly remarkably uninventive, and the ‘song’ was understandably nominated for a Golden Raspberry.

The rest of the score is characteristically parsimoniously orchestrated – much like all of Goldsmith’s mid-90s scores – there is a clumsy, hollow feel to the whole composition, as though it were recorded inside a draughty village hall and performed by an amateur youth orchestra. This makes the album particularly uninteresting and uneventful, but the score works well enough in the movie. A little bit of ethnic colour here, and a little bit of electronics there, complements Goldsmith’s overriding use of traditional orchestra, with the emphasis on brass and percussion. There’s a typically cutesy theme for the cutesy talking gorilla, there’s some typically 70s styled Goldsmith action music at the Congolese airport, and an awful lot of creeping-about-in-the-jungle music. The main theme is quite good, particularly when heard at its most powerful with brass and drums during some of the jungle scenes.

CONGO is a fun movie – though ridiculed by most critics, it still managed a healthy box office return, and Goldsmith’s scoring was certainly an improvement on his dire immediately preceding output. However, the album-closing version of the song is very disappointing. It repeats the same musical phrases over and over again and easily outstays its welcome before even halfway complete. The lyrics are particularly juvenile, and often cringemakingly and embarrassingly politically correct.

Overall then, Goldsmith seemed to be pulling himself out of the compositional mire into which he had sunk during 1994 – but, let’s get things into perspective, at least fifty other contemporary film composers could have done better than Goldsmith on CONGO, in my opinion. Though Goldsmith’s skill at interpreting the agenda of his movies is second to none, when it comes to the execution of the task, Goldsmith has proved himself to be woefully inadequate on at least twenty five occasions during the 90s.

FIRST KNIGHT (US 1995) movie ½ score * album *

FIRST KNIGHT was one of the lousiest movies made during the 1990s – overall, this movie is tame, weak, wooden, stilted, lame, and bland. It is the sort of movie that many will describe as naff, and few will admit to liking.

In its favour, FIRST KNIGHT is beautifully photographed in North Wales, and many of the computer-generated images of Arthurian England are splendidly incorporated. However, that’s about it, as far as positive attributes go. The story is lacklustre, the scripting is inept and the acting is atrocious – apart from Ben Cross’s excellent villain.

Goldsmith’s derivative and phoney trivia-drenched score fits in perfectly with the stuffy, enervated and artificial sensibilities of the movie. Only the occasional fleeting moment of originality or vitality creep into the musical proceedings.

The comparisons between Williams’ Duel of the Fates and Goldsmith’s Arthur’s Farewell perfectly illustrate the inspirationally bankrupt nature of Goldsmith’s score to FIRST KNIGHT. Putting to one side the fact that neither film was particularly good, indeed, FIRST KNIGHT was positively dire…… Duel of the Fates had a depth and complexity that made it instantly more interesting than Arthur’s Farewell, and those qualities also make Duel of the Fates a more satisfactory stand-alone experience, AND the listener is able to appreciate more, and benefit from, repeated listenings of Duel of the Fates.

In its favour, Arthur’s Farewell was energetic…..though in the end it really only amounted to YET another bombastic, noisy, clumsy, simplistic and ponderous congestion of orchestral hits, hollow acoustic percussion, banal thematic material and hugely derivative overtones from Goldsmith. I believe Goldsmith’s Arthur’s Farewell to be far MORE Orff-ian than even his OMEN score. Goldsmith’s decision to compose Arthur’s Farewell quite as he did is a mystery to me…..once again the issues I raised in past threads such as ‘The Goldsmith Paradox’, ‘The Goldsmith Enigma’, ‘The Goldsmith Hoodoo’, ‘Goldsmith – Composing or DE-composing’, ‘Goldsmith and the Price of Fish’, ‘Jerry WHO?’, and ‘Goldsmith – Chameleon or Charlatan?’, among others, come to mind.

I must concede that I believe Goldsmith’s score to THE OMEN to be somewhat overrated and badly dated…..though I can understand its importance at the time of the movie’s release. However, the Goldsmith Hoodoo struck once again here…..Goldsmith’s sole Oscar was for a score to a movie that most people would prefer to forget…..THE OMEN has dated rather badly. Goldsmith would have been a much more deserving winner on any one of a dozen other occasions, and for far more prestigious projects…..but isn’t that always the way? Instead he won what, with the passage of time, has become a booby-prize…..I’m sure that many film-makers, consciously and subconsciously, instantly link Goldsmith and THE OMEN music….leading to a certain degree of ‘type-casting’…..perhaps Goldsmith’s reputation as a scorer of more prestigious and serious movies would have been improved if he had won for, say, CHINATOWN. You see, THE OMEN was such a distinctive score, and probably earned Goldsmith a ‘fantasy/sci-fi/horror’ label that he has had trouble shuffling off ever since…..and yet, to compound the insult, as I have said before, whenever anyone recalls THE OMEN, as far as the music goes, despite Goldsmith’s distinctive score, they think Carmina Burana…..that must heartily disappoint Goldsmith and his fans.

The thing is, Goldsmith’s music to THE OMEN, though overrated in my opinion, isn’t that bad of its type…..it isn’t even THAT derivative of Orff. Though choral music had been used frequently in film before….Goldsmith’s distinctive use of choir and orchestra here did redefine the use of such devices in subsequent movies…..much like the movie itself has served as the inspiration for a trillion Omen rip-off movies. Indeed, though Goldsmith’s Omen is clearly ‘inspired’ by Orff….I mean, without Carmina Burana Goldsmith would probably NOT have written what he did for THE OMEN…..Goldsmith’s music to THE OMEN is a worthy composition of its kind, it does exist as a distinct composition quite separate from Carmina, and doesn’t deserve to be swamped by the Orff piece to quite the extent that we have witnessed in subsequent years. Goldsmith’s Omen score works in its own way, and is no more derivative of Carmina Burana than Beethoven’s First Symphony is of Haydn……they are just two DIFFERENT compositions, of the same type.

Okay, one came before the other…..so one piece is more ‘original’ than the other……but with film music especially, this can be, and usually is, a positive aspect of the score…..the familiarity of musical style DOES help the audience relate to the essence of the movie by communicating in a recognizable musical language…..that’s the essence of CMS. Horner is my favourite ‘current’ composer……not because he writes ‘original’ music….because he doesn’t very often…..but because he gives his movies exactly what they musically require….whether it is Orff, Holst, Prokofiev, Stravinsky, Khachaturian, Enya or ‘Horner’ himself……when it comes to film music, that’s more important to me than the composition of ‘original’ music….though SOME ‘original’ music is necessary and always welcome…..but not Goldsmith’s thematically anaemic collection of 90’s banality.

The extraordinary thing is, that with FIRST KNIGHT, Goldsmith composed a choral piece, namely Arthur’s Farewell, that can only be described as heavily reliant on Orff’s Carmina Burana…..far more so than his Omen…..note for note there may be differences, but the most important thing is that Arthur’s Farewell is PERCIEVED, at least by some, as being very derivative of Orff. What makes this situation almost absurd, is the fact that Goldsmith had suffered twenty years of somewhat UNFAIR comparison between Omen and Carmina, to the point where Orff has replaced Goldsmith in the public consciousness when it comes to the Omen movies, and yet he then chose to create Arthur’s Farewell that is MUCH closer in every way to Orff’s Carmina………..AMAZING!

I should add…….to me, Orff’s Carmina knocks spots off of THE OMEN and Arthur’s Farewell of course…..Orff’s work has a passion and soul that is absent from Goldsmith’s similarly styled compositions. However, Goldsmith’s very different and Wagnerian FINAL CONFLICT is a wonderful composition by whatever standards you judge it.

The Goldsmith/Arthur’s Farewell situation crystalizes in my mind how Goldsmith has ‘thrown it all away’ during the 90’s. FIRST KNIGHT was not only exceptionally derivative of Orff, but also of Wagner and Holst, and of Goldsmith’s LIONHEART itself of course. But whatever composer he emulates during FIRST KNIGHT, Goldsmith’s music is an infinitely inferior, extremely weak and unbelievably laboured version of what came before….whether it was Goldsmith’s own glittering LIONHEART or Wagner’s Tristan and Isolde.

When Horner emulates, borrows, or plagiarizes…..which is admittedly often……at least he does it wisely and skilfully……Goldsmith either comes up with extremely limp and diluted versions of what has gone before, like his SHADOW/Elfman ‘homage’, or merely copies note for note (virtually)…..as with his Leonard Bernstein in LA CONFIDENTIAL. Horner’s BRAVEHEART, one of the best scores of the 90s in my opinion……and there were many, many great scores composed during the 90s……is very derivative….not only in its application of extremely fashionable Celtic folk stylings, but also in its thematic similarities to Holst and Goldsmith’s own PAPILLON…..but that’s not a criticism of Horner….quite the reverse, it is a tribute to Horner’s intelligence as an interpreter of the contemporary movies’ requirements as well as his skill as a composer and manipulator of musical forces.

Apart from the Arthur’s Farewell cue, there is Arthur’s Fanfare – a brief and shiny fanfare that promises more from the score with which it is linked. Indeed, Arthur’s Fanfare was even used during the Atlanta Olympic Games, such was its distinctiveness. However, beyond that, the main theme to FIRST KNIGHT is crushingly bland – made worse by the fact that it does put one in mind of Goldsmith’s earlier and far superior masterwork LIONHEART. The love theme is a nice idea – very Barry-esque – but its execution and thematic development is completely and stultifyingly inept, thus rendering the makings of a good theme utterly useless – as with Goldsmith’s main theme to BAD GIRLS, there was the germ of a good idea there, but it wasn’t nurtured.

The rest of Goldsmith’s score to FIRST KNIGHT is conspicuously action-orientated – the material based on much-repeated and simplistic base-line acoustic percussion and brass figures obviously modelled on Holst’s Mars – it all becomes just too much – the music is loud, bombastic and overly intrusive in the movie, whilst being repetitive, monotonous, eardrum-shattering and totally uninteresting on the album. The thematic development is wholly unimaginative. Along with the banal action music there are extended periods of lame marmalade and molasses, most notable at Arthur’s funeral – here the music is utterly redundant. Whilst sounding like a very weak and diluted version of Wagner’s Tristan and Isolde, the music here has all of those banal 90s-Goldsmith trademarks – flute, harp, oboe and strings, and a complete absence of instrumental colour, thematic interest and emotional depth.

At the end of the movie, the choir returns, and even they sound relieved that it’s all over.

THE GOLDSMITH CHRONICLES (1992-1999) – part XIV – subsection B

POWDER (US 1995) movie *** score **1/2

Sean Patrick Flannery stars as the title character, an enigmatic albino genius who wields strange powers and is thus despised and victimized by the local community. Lance Henriksen is particularly effective as a sympathetic local cop, and the movie deals with the painful issues of prejudice with some conviction.

However, POWDER is a ‘little’ movie, and the messages about tolerance, and acceptance of others, are too obviously conveyed to be really effective – this is political-correctness applied with a shovel, and not with the necessary care and tact to make the message truly compelling. Perhaps the under-10s may appreciate the movie’s sentiment more, but to anyone else POWDER is a well-intentioned failure.

The movie does have its moments though, as does Goldsmith’s scoring, but in the end, POWDER lays on the marmalade too thickly and with a clumsy trowel.

The character of Goldsmith’s score is very much in keeping with the majority of Goldsmith’s scores from this period, it being conservative and superficial, but as always, there are moments when Goldsmith hints at better things. I don’t know what it is about buses and trains, but Goldsmith revels in scoring them. His skill at evoking the rhythm and velocity of the locomotive is well represented throughout his career, but during the 90s his synth-orientated bus music in ANGIE was certainly the highlight of that score, and during POWDER there is a beautiful piece of string-work during another bus-trip. Being an avid collector of bus timetables, this is of particular interest to me, it being one step away from the bus timetable being set to music.

Goldsmith’s score to POWDER is a little more than adequate, which is a big improvement over the general standard of his 90s output, but it was during this period that his apparently and not surprisingly inappropriate score to TWO DAYS IN THE VALLEY was rejected, and his work on CITY HALL registered a new low-point in Goldsmith’s compositional creativity.

And CITY HALL is next on the list of “Goldsmith’s Catalogue of 90s Movie-Scoring Mediocrity”.

To be continued…..

CITY HALL (US 1996) movie *1/2 score * album ½

Harold Becker fails again. A great cast and Grade-A production values are squandered on an uncinematic story. Actually, there is quite a bit of depth to the behind-the-scenes mayoral shenanigans, but it all gets bogged down in tedium, and the movie’s sudden descent into melodramatic nonsense during the latter part of the movie only makes matters worse.

Goldsmith’s score is truly abysmal. The already static nature of the story is petrified further by Goldsmith’s musical treacle. Goldsmith opts for an ON THE WATERFRONT feel to the movie’s opening, as pounding timpani presage one of the most banal and destitute thematic ideas of Goldsmith’s career. The main theme to CITY HALL is an utterly inappropriate and sickly continuation of Goldsmith’s unwieldy, ponderous, laboured and intensely unimaginative mid-90s output – it’s positively diseased.

CITY HALL had an urban setting – it was crying out for some authentic contemporary jazz stylistics. Instead, Goldsmith yet again relies on the hollow-sounding traditional orchestra with a few clumsily outmoded electronics awkwardly tacked on to the acoustic instrumentalists – and it sounds dreadful. Not only that, Goldsmith’s score actually works against the agenda of the movie. It wouldn’t be so bad if one could say, “Oh, I didn’t notice the music”. Okay, so there’s not much score to CITY HALL anyway, but what there is just doesn’t fit the movie at all. Some of the scenes with Landau for instance – Goldsmith’s score sounds as though it’s not part of the movie at all – in fact, the music has so little to do with the movie, it sounds like someone’s playing a very bad LP in the next room.

CITY HALL’s album is utterly worthless – not only that, if one were to listen to it without having seen the movie or without knowing the movie’s subject, one could understandably come to the conclusion that Goldsmith was scoring a particularly sentimental episode of THE LITTLE HOUSE ON THE PRAIRIE….but without any of the instrumental colour.

EXECUTIVE DECISION (US 1996) movie ***1/2 score *** album ½

Following the sleep-inducing CITY HALL, Goldsmith surprised with his most professional work on EXECUTIVE DECISION – the scoring is fluid and cohesive, and importantly the orchestra’s playing is smooth, and the orchestration and acoustics are unusually detailed and well balanced for this composer’s 90s output. The movie’s main theme is catchy and appropriately militaristic – there is little development of the thematic material, but this adds to the effectiveness of the theme as a slick and no-nonsense counterpart to the precise military planning that takes place within the movie – Goldsmith’s main theme to EXECUTIVE DECISION serves as a clever musical device. The quality of the recording is good also – there is a closely-knit studio feel to the sound, and since the score is heavily percussive this works well. The highlight of the score has to be the Seagal rescue attempt with its powerful but smooth heavy electronic percussion. On top of that, there is a flashback sequence that Goldsmith scores extremely well with heavy electronic percussion and sampled Arabic instrumentation – unfortunately, this cue does not appear on Varese’s album.

THE GOLDSMITH CHRONICLES (1992-1999) – part XVI subsection B

CHAIN REACTION (US 1996) movie * score * album 1/2

CHAIN REACTION is an exceptionally puerile movie – it is laughably inept in just about every possible way. The action scenes are unimaginative, the story is too stupid for words, the script is unutterably dire, the performances of the leads are unholy in their wooden-ness and Goldsmith’s score is the ultimate in infusorial film-scoring inadequacy.

It always makes me chuckle to think that Goldsmith actually bothered to rearrange his CHAIN REACTION score for the album – as if to bring out the best qualities of the composition away from the images – ha, ha - do me a favour! Such is the redundant, dispirited and dispiriting nature of the thematic material in the first place, nothing or nobody, not even Ludwig Van Beethoven, could make Goldsmith’s score to CHAIN REACTION remotely palatable to anyone other than the stone-deaf, without starting from scratch and creating a whole new composition. A blank CD would be infinitely preferable to the mind-numbingly dilapidated nature of Goldsmith’s approach to scoring this most dire of movies.

Of special note is Goldsmith’s hilarious use of an extremely fake-sounding sampled electric guitar – as if to score Reeves’ youthful student. This is just too laughable for words – the electric guitar stopped being a symbol of the ‘rebellious’ or ‘independent youth’ twenty five years ago, now the electric guitar is as much a symbol of conformity as motorbikes, body-piercing, tattoos and blue denim. If Al Gore ever turned to film composing, then something very similar to Goldsmith’s CHAIN REACTION would probably be the result.

The action music is excruciating enough within the movie, but, at the time of CHAIN REACTION, nobody was to know that the extraordinarily simplistic nature of Goldsmith’s ‘Ice Chase’ action music would reoccur in so many subsequent Goldsmith scores. The action motif in question is like something out of a 1950s science fiction B-movie – it’s terrible – it’s intrusive, invasive, simplistic, annoying and it actually forms the main thematic strand to Goldsmith’s barrel-scraping US MARSHALS effort.

I could imagine even the most ardent and loyal Goldsmith fan watching this movie, and when the ‘Ice Chase’ music starts up and everyone else in the room or cinema starts wincing, would sink into his chair, and just in case anyone recognises him as a possible Goldsmith disciple, would deny all knowledge of the pony-tailed one – three times if necessary – for fear of the mockery and piss-taking that would be directed at him.

Goldsmith’s use of electronics during CHAIN REACTION is particularly inept – this is not CMS, this is an assault on modern musical sensibilities – this is anti-CMS (anti-Contemporary Musical Sensibilities). The application of electronic percussion is stilted and clumsy, particularly with the quality of Goldsmith’s thematic material being so weak. The main theme as heard over the opening credits, is by turns a ‘mournful’ and facile exercise in space-filling – it serves no purpose whatsoever – it adds nothing to the movie, and certainly is rendered completely obsolete on the album.

As always, Goldsmith’s score to CHAIN REACTION is not without moments of interest – fleeting though they may be. There is an effective electronically percussive sequence when Reeves’ absconds with a police car having waded through a group of bagmen, and there is also an occasional outburst of an interesting thematic spin-off from Goldsmith’s usually monotonous and bland action material (just as there is in US MARSHALS strangely enough). The action/chase music suddenly becomes more urgent and comprises a series of descending notes rather than the plain uncontoured thematic musical territory that characterizes most of Goldsmith’s 90s thematic material – typically, these moments of musical interest do not appear on the album.

THE GHOST AND THE DARKNESS (US 1996) movie *1/2 score ** album *1/2

THE GHOST AND THE DARKNESS was a desperately disappointing movie that began well enough, but instead of taking-off, gradually fell apart, especially when Michael Douglas turned up to give a terribly unconvincing performance as a big-game hunter. Superb photography and locations did help, and Goldsmith’s score within the movie worked well enough – it was certainly one of his better film-scores from that period.

It seemed as though Goldsmith put a lot of effort into this score, and occasionally the music is rousing, evocative and mysterious – but to me, four fifths of the score suffers from those ‘faults’ that have afflicted most of Goldsmith’s work during the 90s. Firstly, there is the often banal and repetitive action music that is frequently way too loud, clumsy and hollow-sounding. Secondly, much of the score has a staccato-character, by that I mean the music is jerky with too many highs and lows and not enough smooth ambience – though THE GHOST AND THE DARKNESS does contain far more atmospheric scoring (such as the whispering sampled voices and whistles) than most of Goldsmiths 90s scores.

Indeed, despite the array of electronics utilized, the score is often too symphonic and orchestral at the wrong time. The lion-attack scenes were overwhelmed by shattering brass and acoustic drums – it was just too bombastic. On the other hand, though there were some lovely romantic-symphonic moments, not enough was made of the opportunities afforded Goldsmith. Look what Yared did for THE ENGLISH PATIENT - a gorgeous orchestral score with a memorable and dynamite main theme. And that brings me on to the third problem area in Goldsmith’s scoring of THE GHOST AND THE DARKNESS - the thematic material.

With the main theme, Goldsmith tried to mix the three main elements that the movie represents – the African location, the British Empire and the Irish leading character. Unfortunately, the ethnic drums were too ponderous, the Celtic theme lacked that vital ‘Irish-spark’ (as did his RUDY) and the Empire music wasn’t magnificent and awe-inspiring enough. And these disparate elements don’t gel at all in the main theme, mainly because, apart from the weakness of the thematic material, each is presented, not as elements within an integrated whole, but as separate strands of music that do not relate to each other – it’s like oil and water, they just don’t mix – but a more skilled composer could have achieved the successful inter-relating of these disparate musical strands, in my opinion.

Overall, the main theme comes across as awkward, contrived and hollow. Beyond the main theme, the score is at its best when subtle electronics (including whispering sampled voices) and wispy and insubstantial electronic and orchestral phrases evoke the atmosphere of dusk out in the veldt. Some of the ethnic music works fairly well also, and a few phrases of the British Empire thematic strand succeed, particularly at the train station. The score is definitely at its weakest when the lions attack, when all subtlety is thrown to the dogs as ponderous, cumbersome and unwieldy brass overwhelm the electronics and more subtle elements of the orchestra.

STAR TREK: FIRST CONTACT (US 1996) movie **1/2 score * album ½

Goldsmith’s score to STAR TREK: FIRST CONTACT is remarkable for all of the wrong reasons. The movie itself is a reasonably entertaining expansion of the television series – though one continues to be amazed at the missed opportunities that blight all of the Star Trek movies. First Contact is no exception – the Borg don’t come across as menacing at all, and the movie is imbued with all of those characteristics that makes the Star Trek series of movies a largely puerile, laughable, naff and generally ridiculed exercise in moviemaking ineptitude – I find it extraordinary that the series went beyond the third movie – who could have believed then that STAR TREK IX (and further movies?) would one day be made.

Goldsmith’s score promises much. His new ‘First Contact theme’ is very good – but, at the end of the day, though the theme is memorable, it’s in almost exactly the same style as all of Goldsmith’s other 90s themes – it is slow, measured and rather ponderous. Goldsmith’s 90s movie themes are all of the same exceedingly slow and deliberate tempo – so, no matter how strong the thematic material, he cannot seem to climb out of the ponderous and outmoded compositional rut in which he has become seemingly entombed – the vast bulk of his 90s music is bereft of fluidity, wit, colour, smoothness, energy, subtlety and nuance.

Beyond the main theme to FIRST CONTACT, Goldsmith’s score quickly becomes disjointed and fails to add hardly anything to the movie – save for one or two impressive moments (such as the temporal wake sequence). Joel Goldsmith’s additional, mainly Borg-orientated, music doesn’t help – it’s quite different from the elder Goldsmith’s style, and is actually not quite as bad as his father’s banal and clunky contribution to the movie.

What makes Goldsmith’s scoring of STAR TREK: FIRST CONTACT so noteworthy, is the extraordinarily unintelligent and unimaginative use of his marvellous themes from STAR TREK: THE MOTION PICTURE. The classic main theme is hardly heard at all within the movie, except for the exceedingly bombastic and now tiresome extended going-over it receives during the closing credits – and we never seem to get to hear the graceful splendour of the ‘Enterprise’ version of the main thematic material. Even worse is Goldsmith’s limp and inappropriate application of his Klingon theme. Suddenly, it is Worf’s theme, and the music’s original purpose is rendered almost obsolete. In much the same way, the rest of Goldsmith’s score to STVIII seems to amount to chunks of ill-orchestrated and ill-advised music being thrown at the images, leaving an apparently haphazardly constructed mosaic of inappropriate and clodhopping musical ideas that bear very little relation to the agenda of the movie.

THE GOLDSMITH CHRONICLES (1992-1999) – part XVIII subsection B

FIERCE CREATURES (US 1997) movie *1/2 score **1/2 album ***

THE EDGE (US 1997) movie *** score **1/2 album ½

*** Spoilers ahead ***

Goldsmith’s score to THE EDGE is a study in compositional conservatism. The movie itself is very entertaining, though rather preposterous. An intelligent script, good performances, and excellent locations combine to create an often exciting wilderness thriller.

Goldsmith’s main theme is very good, but once again it is a little too similar to all of his other themes composed during the mid-‘90s. Nevertheless, matched with the wilderness scenery, Goldsmith’s score does come alive, and there is plenty of nifty acoustic percussion work during many of the action scenes.

The album itself is virtually worthless other than as an academic record of the movie’s score, but that nice jazz version tacked on at the end is welcome – apparently this was an afterthought from Goldsmith, which is funny, because it’s probably the most effective music heard in the film, and certainly the best music heard on album. Indeed, in the movie itself, the jazz version of the main theme serves as a most satisfactory termination to the movie – one could describe it as Hopkins’ theme – he has returned from the wilderness, indeed, he has beaten the wilderness, and triumphed over Baldwin – the warmth, urbanity and sophistication of the jazz version of the thematic material reflects Hopkins’ nature and safe return to civilization.

LA CONFIDENTIAL (US 1997) movie **** score *1/2 album ½

Goldsmith’s anonymous score to LA CONFIDENTIAL would not even be worth mentioning but for its note-for-note replication of a thematic strand from Leonard Bernstein’s ON THE WATERFRONT. Not only that, much of Goldsmith’s score too readily puts one in mind of his Rambo theme (itself seemingly derived from Barry’s superior ON HER MAJESTY’S SECRET SERVICE theme).

In Goldsmith’s defence, much of LA CONFIDENTIAL’s soundtrack comprises source music that did not leave the composer as much room to play with as he is usually afforded. Having said that though, Goldsmith’s work on LA CONFIDENTIAL is incredibly conservative, small-scale, mono-thematic and low-key. The album, even by Goldsmith’s disappointingly empty 90s film scoring standards, is an almost completely worthless listen – though the efficiency of orchestration and instrumental deployment is of academic interest.

So, Goldsmith’s LA CONFIDENTIAL is really just a bridging score that also manages to re-use Bernstein and incorporate a brief jazzy trumpet-led love-theme that is very reminiscent of CHINATOWN without being anywhere near as good. The album opens with ‘Bloody Christmas’, a reorganised deployment of several cues from within the film including the bluesey love-theme. The jail-house bust-up music that opens the album has a nice Latin slant to it before it disintegrates into Goldsmith’s by now overly familiar use of heavy brass and acoustic percussion culminating in ear shattering orchestral hits – it’s all very old-fashioned, outmoded and plain naff.

THE GOLDSMITH CHRONICLES (1992-1999) – part XXI subsection A

AIR FORCE ONE (US 1997) movie **** score **1/2 album ½

AIR FORCE ONE is a spectacularly entertaining action movie – the effects are superb, the action scenes are well orchestrated, and the cast is excellent. Harrison Ford is perfect in a Bill Clinton-styled heroic role, and the versatile British character actor Gary Oldman revels in the opportunity to play yet another screen villain. The rest of the familiar supporting cast is fine also.

And, Goldsmith’s score is quite adequate. Though the main theme is derivative and ponderous, it reinforces the sturdily patriot tone of the movie to perfection. The theme appears frequently throughout the score, and serves to bolster Ford’s determination to overcome the Russian terrorist threat. The Russian scenes are flavourfully scored also, as is the stately motorcade sequence. The action music is typically 90s Goldsmith in just about every way, but one cannot deny its effectiveness when gelled with the images. It must be pointed out however, that Joel McNeely’s ‘additional music’ that is based on Goldsmith’s thematic material and does not appear on the Varese album, is the most musically interesting aspect to the score – particularly the ‘Mig Attack’ that McNeely scores with blistering fluidity. McNeely’s accomplished additional music serves to expose many of the deficiencies in Goldsmith’s compositional technique – as did Joel Goldsmith’s work on STAR TREK: FIRST CONTACT.

Anyway, away from the movie Goldsmith’s AIR FORCE ONE is simply repugnant as a purely musical experience. Bland thematics you feel you’ve heard a billion times before, skeletal orchestration, long periods of repetitiveness and monotony, the minimum of thematic development, a paucity of instrumental colour, and far too much orchestral bombast do not make for a fulfilling listening experience – quite the reverse in fact.

THE GOLDSMITH CHRONICLES (1992-1999) – part XXI subsection B

DEEP RISING (US 1998) movie ***1/2 score *** album ½

US MARSHALS (US 1998) movie ** score ½ album ½

Any feelings of optimism relating to Goldsmith’s output following his good work on DEEP RISING were rapidly dispelled on hearing Goldsmith’s clodhopping and outmoded score to US MARSHALS. Once again the obnoxious action-motif first heard in CHAIN REACTION’s ‘Ice Chase’ re-emerges, this time to form the main theme to US MARSHALS. Not only that, Goldsmith’s main theme to US MARSHALS recalls his infinitely superior theme to EXTREME PREJUDICE, just as his banal main theme to FIRST KNIGHT was made worse by its obvious similarity to Goldsmith’s magnificent main theme to LIONHEART.

Needless to say, Goldsmith’s US MARSHALS album is utterly worthless as a stand-alone listen – but it does serve to crystalize everything that is wrong with Goldsmith’s simplistic and unsophisticated approach to scoring modern movies – not only is the composition thematically weak, it is also almost entirely lacking in contemporary stylistics and instrumentation – which is ridiculous considering the score is for an urban/action thriller in a contemporary setting.

The score relies too heavily on brass-led orchestral bombast, and the electronics, such as they are, are not properly integrated into the instrumental framework of the composition, thus giving the impression that the electronics are mere afterthoughts, and incongruous ones at that. Indeed, the acoustic bombast from the brass and acoustic percussion completely overwhelms and dwarves the electronics – this is unforgivable in the age of CMS excellence.

When viewing US MARSHALS, the music is extremely intrusive, and actually forced us to switch off eight of the side-surround-speakers in our home cinema when viewing the movie owing to the score’s intrusive and obnoxious nature. Good film music should enhance the dramatic effect of individual scenes and reflect the agenda of the movie. Goldsmith’s film music overwhelms and undermines the dramatic effect of individual scenes and detracts from the agenda of the movie. Goldsmith’s music often sabotages the purpose and aims of the movie because, more often than not, his music is at odds with the agenda of the movie – Goldsmith is scoring to his own limited musical sensibilities and not those of the movie – that’s why most of Goldsmith’s 90s scores sound so strikingly similar to one another.

To be fair, there are a few brief successful moments during Goldsmith’s score to US MARSHALS. The car park shooting scenes are scored with excellent electronic ambience, and the ‘city’ cue is also well put together with an atmospheric mix of smooth and echoing percussion and ethereal woodwind.

But these are small crumbs of inventiveness in a bland and ordinary compositional whole – Goldsmith’s score to US MARSHALS is easily one of the worst scores to a big-budget movie of the 90s. But, then again, the movie itself was nothing to write home about.

MULAN (US 1998) movie *** score **1/2 album *

A small-scale but entertaining addition to Disney’s portfolio of cinematic cartoons, MULAN succeeds most in its intelligent application of politically correct issues and the way in which they are communicated to the contemporary audience.

This time Goldsmith does make some concessions to contemporary musical sensibilities, but overall, Goldsmith’s score comes across as a rather clumsy, colourless and old-fashioned film-scoring effort – especially when one listens to the extremely truncated album representation of the score.

The main problem with Goldsmith’s score to MULAN is the weakness of his thematic material. Now, the songs were not particularly distinguished (Goldsmith had no part in the writing of these songs), but they were just about good enough to keep the movie flowing. Instead of Goldsmith adapting the extensive and distinctive thematic material developed within the songs, he tends to go his own way, but the trouble is, Goldsmith’s thematic material is far inferior to that heard within the songs by some margin.

The sequence called “Mulan’s Decision” provides another perfect example of Goldsmith’s unsuitability for scoring modern cinema. By all accounts he had to be persuaded to score this important segment with contemporary stylistics and electronic percussion. The result is that “Mulan’s Decision” is by far the best part of Goldsmith’s score (if indeed he did write this section) – the music is up-tempo, successfully contemporary, compelling and invigorating and quite unlike the rest of Goldsmith’s generally stilted, retrograde and retiring scoring of MULAN. To further illustrate Goldsmith’s misguided attitude to modern cinema, the album does not include the actual music used in the movie, but Goldsmith’s orchestral and rather uninteresting originally intended version.

SMALL SOLDIERS (US 1998) movie **1/2 score **1/2 album *

Another slightly better than adequate effort from Goldsmith, SMALL SOLIDIERS has a pugnacious and quite catchy and appropriately militaristic main theme. The rest of the score includes some rather-more-interesting-than-usual-for-Goldsmith marmalade music for the gentler scenes, and some aggressive and often interesting action music that unfortunately occasionally falls prey to the editor’s scissors.

There is much non-Goldsmith music in SMALL SOLDIERS, quite apart from his own intentional and relevant incorporation of Richard Strauss, The Battle Hymn of the Republic, and Franz Waxman into the dramatic score. But, as a whole, the musical accompaniment to SMALL SOLDIERS does work to improve the movie, considering the movie’s many and important limitations.

The movie itself is okay but ultimately disappointing. It has to be said that the toy characters are pretty good, but there are those periods of directorial incompetence that we have come to expect from Dante. The Varese album is a travesty, because there is so much worthwhile music not included.

Anyhow, despite the usual paucity of electronics and contemporary stylistics, Goldsmith’s work on SMALL SOLDIERS isn’t a disgrace.

THE GOLDSMITH CHRONICLES (1992-1999) – part XXIV subsection B

STAR TREK: INSURRECTION (US 1998) movie *** score **1/2 album *

STAR TREK: INSURRECTION is a much derided movie – by critics and Star Trek fans alike – but I actually thought it was one of the better Star Trek movies – though that’s not saying much. There was plenty of good-natured humour, and the movie managed to evoke the camp spirit of the 60s series far more successfully than even any of the first six movies could achieve. However, for a 90s movie, the special effects are terrible.

Once again Goldsmith liberally employs his all-too-familiar 90s action motifs, but this time the composer manages to extract some mileage out of the done-to-death action material. A nice variant on the thematic strand that formed the main theme to US MARSHALS works well in some of the action scenes and is heard at its most splendid in a slowed down version as the Domesday Machine orbiting the planet unfurls and becomes activated – though this segment of music is not included on the album.

That apart, the score is really a retread of all of Goldsmith’s other mono-thematic 90s scores, the sickly-sweet ‘paradise’ music is neither moving nor is it memorable – it merely pads out the particular scene. Also, much of the action music is the same old AIR FORCE ONE and CHAIN REACTION ‘Ice Chase’ ear-splitting monotony – but there are moments of interest throughout the score, particularly the heavily electronic lake scene, which again does not appear on the album.

Goldsmith’s use of his famous STTMP themes is even less prevalent than in his STAR TREK: FIRST CONTACT score. Worf’s Klingon theme is back, though this time more subtly incorporated into the framework of the score, and, at least on the album, this segment of the score comes across quite well, what with its more electronically percussive nature.

THE MUMMY (US 1999) movie ***1/2 score ***1/2 album **

Goldsmith made a spectacular return to form with his score for another DEEP RISING-styled action spoof. A great main theme, both thematically rich and appropriately Egyptian sets the score alight. A particularly generous album represents the score very nicely and Goldsmith excels during many of the desert-tinged sequences – ethnic instrumentation and that lovely theme conjure up images of Arabian nights even when heard away from the picture. Some particularly roistering and well-developed action music also graces the movie. The final cue on the album is the ‘frosting on the cake’ – here, Goldsmith develops the love theme magnificently as the listener is carried away by the richly suggestive music. Goldsmith pulled out all the stops here and created a memorable score to an entertaining movie.

THE GOLDSMITH CHRONICLES (1992-1999) – part XXV subsection B

THE HAUNTING (US 1999) movie ** score **** album **1/2

Goldsmith’s main ‘House’ theme to the HAUNTING is an absolute gem – it successfully combines the ethereal warmth of the ‘Cloud’ music from STAR TREK: THE MOTION PICTURE with the searing intensity of the main theme to BASIC INSTINCT – a nicely off-kilter calliope/fairground theme sets the tone of the score and movie perfectly. The rest of the score is almost invariably successful in its aims. Rumbling electronic ambience, romantic splendour, innocent string and woodwind segments, unearthly instrumental combinations (including celeste) all combine to create a richly romantic score that oozes with depth, subtlety, nuance and emotion. At times the strings almost sing. To cap it all there is a thundering Mahlerian cue that climaxes the score – profound brass and strings combine to create a shatteringly sublime and lengthy musical segment. The score to THE HAUNTING is very effective and often very moving – if only the movie had come anywhere near what Goldsmith achieved.

THE GOLDSMITH CHRONICLES (1992-1999) – part XXV subsection C

THE 13TH WARRIOR (US 1999) movie **1/2 score **** album **

Goldsmith’s score to the 13TH WARRIOR is magnificent, heroic, flavourful and often thematically deep. Indeed, there are some sublime moments during the score, particularly in one passage when the choir becomes almost becalmed, the music flows forth in great waves and each time the choir becomes just that little more intense and passionate – the thematic development is very satisfying throughout the score. The main theme is quite superb – it is everything one could hope for from this kind of score – the music is powerful, urgent, noble, and seemingly unstoppable, and the thematic strength is such, that the rest of the score is amply fuelled. There are many delicate and playful moments during Goldsmith’s score to THE 13TH WARRIOR also – the solo instrumentalists have a field day, and Goldsmith catches the mood of the movie and its locations perfectly. Some of the action cues are breathtaking – there is often a Beethovenian discipline to the structure of the cues, and Goldsmith introduces many effective and original thematic diversions – great stuff.

THE GOLDSMITH CHRONICLES (1992-1999) – part XXV subsection D

Based on Goldsmith’s output in 1999, one could have hoped for a banquet of fresh and inventive film scores from the apparently revitalized Goldsmith during 2000 – but, 1999 was to prove a false dawn. For one reason or another, REINDEER GAMES went by the wayside, his unsuitability for WONDER BOYS became apparent, THE YARDS never happened, and Goldsmith left the THE KID having experienced ‘artistic differences’ with the film’s director. Thus, since THE 13TH WARRIOR was released over one year ago, only one Goldsmith-scored movie has been released, the critically ridiculed HOLLOW MAN.

At present, Goldsmith’s future projects include the distinctly unpromising ‘Alex Cross’ thriller ALONG CAME A SPIDER, Fred Schepisi’s promising LAST ORDERS, and then possibly Fred Schepisi’s unpromising I WAS AMELIA EARHART – but all of this is beyond the far horizon – ALONG CAME A SPIDER is due to be released late Spring 2001, LAST ORDERS is currently being filmed, and I WAS AMELIA EARHART is still merely a twinkle in Schepisi’s eye. The lastest additions to Goldsmith’s list of assignments are RAT RACE and DOMESTIC DISTURBANCE, neither of which inspires much optimism.

I will not comment on Goldsmith’s scoring of HOLLOW MAN until I have seen and heard how the music works in the movie (some time early in 2002 perhaps). But, by all accounts, I think Goldsmith can safely assume that he won’t be required at this year’s Oscar ceremony.