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Originally posted by Dinko:
Film music is nice on CD, but movies don't need it.

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Originally posted by thw:
Then again, Dinko is a sage. We must worship every word he says.

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I love Horner. He's a master "emotionalist" with a superb dramatic sense. I don't give a monkey's ass if he copies himself (or others) now and then (which I am fully aware that he does). His own style is still one of the most idiosyncratic and recognizable out there, so he still qualifies as an artist in relation to the 'integrity' and 'originality' criterion. Note, however, that there are also OTHER criteria in relation to the appreciation of art ('intensity', for example).

What I find a bit sad with this thread, though, is that both sides engage in a harsh polemic ripe with hyperbole left and right. But I guess that's what happens with old dead horses like this. They get an almost "religious" dimension where fanaticism is just around the corner.

NP: "The Best Of..." (Electric Light Orchestra)

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but if Horner has that kind of influence on me, and statistically more, he has to be given more credit.

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So you're saying because you love James Horner's work and Titanic especially, he has to be given more credit by us?
That just insane!
Then I could say because I dislike him and every one of his scores, he has to be given less credit.
When a single score makes you a fan of film music, it's no proof that its composer is better than all others; it just means that you like him.

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Originally posted by thw:
Then again, Dinko is a sage. We must worship every word he says.

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Originally posted by Thor:
I love Horner. He's a master "emotionalist" with a superb dramatic sense.

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Ah... so he's figured out how to spot a scene gracefully. High praise indeed!

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Personally, I don't think that the post-Sneakers Horner has any interest at all in being a composer. However, I do think that he is interested in using music to creates moods. He's an "emotionalist", not a musician. That's not an insult, it's just calling a spade a spade.

Obviously, film music can rarely approach absolute composition in terms of overall sonic construction, but most film composers do what composers do--they organize sound into a largely unique whole. The ingredients themselves are rarely unique (which is fine, that's why music sounds like music instead of traffic--John Cage and friends excepted), but the synthesis, the larger picture is very original. Herrmann used the minor, major seventh chord (C Eb G B) extensively in both Psycho and Vertigo, but those two scores aren't going to be confused. So while composition may involve overall guiding structures--emotional requirements, some sort of timing or architectural pre- conceptions--it's largely organizing sounds first in order to engender some sort of effect. This isn't what Horner does.

To Horner, I believe, the emotional impact of the sound is everything. Sure, from time to time he's done works in which sound is king. The aforementioned Sneakers, Brainstorm, parts of Star Trek II, and even the derivative Wolfen are all composed as primarily organized sound. And they're very well done at that. But in most of his work, the sound itself is strictly a vessel to communicate his message. It's 1+1=2 versus 2=1+1. If that means that entire sections of other compositions are plunked down in the middle of something, that's fine. Capricorn One, Enya, Far and Away, and Michael Collins are in Titanic, and by these guidelines, it doesn't undermine his intent. You see, as an "emotionalist", Horner never repeats himself. He can repeat licks and steal riffs left and right, but viewed from a distance--the same way we're judging compositional originality--he never duplicates his emotional content. His gift for spotting films comes into play as well. Watch the scene with Jack and Rose kissing on the bow of the ship. Note how the climax of Horner's cue doesn't arrive until Jack wraps his hand around the back of Rose's neck--showing the exact moment that she surrenders her will to him. Horner writes the same combination of minor and major chords he always uses, but he's never used this exact emotional thrust, this exact emotional timing before. Compositionally, it's trite, it's simplistic, it's banal even. "Emotionalistically", it's unique and on the money.

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That's an interesting quote from Doug Adams, Franz, but I don't really agree with much of it. To say Horner has no interest in being a composer is a long way wide of the mark in my opinion - love it or loathe it, he is one of the few film composers whose music actually has structure, and who makes an effort to write lengthy cues allowing actual musical development. Now, I know that the final product sends a lot of people to sleep, but I usually hear him making a hell of a lot more of an effort to be musically interesting than the majority of his peers.

I don't think he is particularly good at gauging how much music to put in a film (he always chooses too much, or the directors he works with do) but in terms of choosing the right music to provoke the right response from the audience, he's peerless. There are two ways of scoring films well, an intellectual way (North, Goldsmith - trying to tell you things that you can't actually see on screen) and an emotional way (emphasising what you CAN see) - in general I think the former approach is more satisfying, but Horner is certainly head and shoulders above anyone else who uses the latter way.

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Originally posted by PeterK:
Come on, Thor. By our very nature of loving a subordinate part of a complete work, we're already fanatics. Or lunatics!

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Lunatics? Hardly. We're interested in an esoteric artform, yes. But it's perfectly possible to remain rational in discussions. Rationality and emotional dedication are not mutually exclusive.

It is, actually. Because unlike Doug Adams, I do not use the term in a derogatory manner. It is quite difficult to create appropriate emotional context without going overboard. Very few composers can do so successfully. Williams is one. Horner is another.

But note that I also labeled him a superb "dramatist". This means that he knows dramaturgy very well; the ebb and flow of the narrative.

There are many ways to judge a piece of art (or in this case, a score). Many criteria to use. And there are many different filmic contexts to consider as well. Horner bashers seem to get so hung up in the "plagarism" issue that it overshadows any proper evaluation of the other criteria. Which is sad.

NP: "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road" (Elton John)

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Originally posted by Lou Goldberg:
Call me extreme, childish, overboard what have you. You're still all blind, hopeless, losers. I hate Horner and he needs to be stamped out. So anyone who's going to apologize for him and say, I love him, or I used to like him, or he isn't that bad, or what have you gets put between my cross-hairs. He sucks and if you can't see that, all I want to do is yell at you.

You're lost souls. The best de-programmers in the world aren't going to save you.

In any case, my arguments weren't personal. People hire Horner today when he's basically become an arranger so why wouldn't the same boobs be around to hire him to start out with. You don't have to be good to have an career in Hollywood, just an in, a likeability, connections, and some supporters. That was an attempt at a logical statement not a slam.

A film music collection without North by Northwest or Ben-Hur? Impossible. No way. I'd have to shoot myself. If you can be against this, I'd hate to see what films & film music you actually do love--I'm sure they're abominable.

The funny thing is, despite how extreme a statement it is, is that it's absolutely true. If you watch The Big Sky and Johnnie Guitar and don't like either of them, you should give up and stop watching movies, because you don't get movies, what they are about in essence isn't touching you.

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Above are stupid sentences you—Lou—typed.

Lou, I truly wish I had the time and inclination to respond to your lengthly posts in earnest. I assume you're either retired or between jobs to write such long-winded and hate-filled mini-"essays" on the Internet, of all places, but that doesn't matter; all that matters is you vent your anxieties here for us all to see.

So, let's cut straight to it: you've written that people who enjoy James Horner scores, "are all blind, hopeless, losers"; how very sanctimonious of you, it's so enlightening to know behind all your half-witted rantings and ravings about old scores that you truly are an a*s*s*h*o*l*e. Your opinions, and mine and everyone else's, aside about Horner's music, that you actually want to yell at people for liking or enjoying his music is disturbing. It's just music, lighten up there, chief.

"You're lost souls. The best de-programmers in the world aren't going to save you."!?! O.K., psycho.

By the way, I don't own either North By Northwest or Ben-Hur, so you better go have your meeting with eternity; I mean, if someone else's music collection really makes you pine for suicide, then by all means go ahead, no one here cares that you could be that derranged.

Again, your Truffaut argument doesn't add up to anything. For one, because you've already posted some blanket derogatory remarks at the posters here; and secondly, you're subscribing to the stupid idea of gold standards in both films and film music: I wrote it before, it's just as lame and ill-conceived as writing that you need to have read or be reading Shakespeare to have an appreciation for literature, which is just total rubbish. The same is true for films and film music: I don't need to enjoy Rosza's music to enjoy all other scores; that is crazy, and doesn't make sense.

1. Golden Age scores are unsurpassable
2. James Horner is always abominable

Now, seriously, it is not my intention to either offend or attack anyone here, and I know the following statement is provocative, but: although he's very radical, Lou has a very good point.

People aren't all the same, and I think it's fair to say that not everyone has a sensibility for movies (or maybe some have more, some have less) and consequently, some find it easier to appreciate some scores, and some don't get into them at all.
Now understand this: this is not a bad thing, it's nothing you have control of. Just like someone who was born to get into football has higher standards than someone who finds the sport just generally appealing.

I've never been a fan of hiding your problems with the simple and inevitable truths behind the double- standard "Well, it's my opinion, so respect that" scheme.

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Originally posted by Thor:
[b]Ah... so he's figured out how to spot a scene gracefully. High praise indeed!

It is, actually. Because unlike Doug Adams, I do not use the term in a derogatory manner. It is quite difficult to create appropriate emotional context without going overboard. Very few composers can do so successfully. Williams is one. Horner is another.

But note that I also labeled him a superb "dramatist". This means that he knows dramaturgy very well; the ebb and flow of the narrative.
[/B]

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I think he does spot very gracefully, in terms of us being subject to the music's effects more than observing it... but I do think he makes very obvious choices. He may not underline the action in obvious ways, but he does underline the emotionally obvious... sometimes to cover for bad acting or otherwise unconvinging drama that seems good with an old English hymn underneath... But if there's anything he's done to advance the way music can interact with the image in the last ten years, it's the first I've heard of it.

I cite Doug's argument not because I agree with the derision in which he seems to hold Horner's music, but because I think it's a good analysis, except for one thing. Even if all a composer is doing repackaging influences conscious and otherwise to meet the emotional needs of a scene, does that not make him a structurer of sound? I don't think it's as black and white as the article suggests.

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Originally posted by Southall:
Sadly, today most composers don't do either way, they just write meaningless musical wallpaper which doesn't actually make any attempt to do anything for the film on either an intellectual or emotional level, which is probably what prompted Dinko to reach the assertion that films don't need music these days. I disagree - things have become so bad that it's easy to forget just what good music can do for a film - but there are still one or two composers out there who can remind me, and Horner is one of them.

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Originally posted by sean:
[B] I wrote it before, it's just as lame and ill-conceived as writing that you need to have read or be reading Shakespeare to have an appreciation for literature, which is just total rubbish.

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Well it depends on what you mean by appreciation... you don't need to have read Shakespeare to enjoy anything else... but Shakespeare will very likely enrich your understanding of it. (Since his work has influenced so many.)

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Originally posted by Southall:
he is one of the few film composers whose music actually has structure, and who makes an effort to write lengthy cues allowing actual musical development.

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Originally posted by franz_conrad:
Just like you couldn't overlook [...]Cervantes

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Originally posted by Dinko:
If everything he wrote is like Don Quixote, the dude oviously didn't know how to cut to the basics, ranting on and on without getting anywhere, lengthening what oculd be said in 1 page to an interminable 10pp. Either that, or something was lost in translation.

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Originally posted by franz_conrad:
Well it depends on what you mean by appreciation... you don't need to have read Shakespeare to enjoy anything else... but Shakespeare will very likely enrich your understanding of it. (Since his work has influenced so many.)

But if by an appreciation you mean to have an understanding of literature and its history, then one or two Shakespeares are at least a basic requirement. Just like you couldn't overlook Coleridge... or Eliot... or Dante... Cervantes, etc.

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Well, of course, it doesn't hurt to read Shakespeare, or listen to Rozsa, or watch whatever art-house stuff Goldberg immerses himself in, but it just doesn't need to be done. I've read a bunch of Shakespeare, but I didn't need to in order to enjoy other literature. Catch my drift?

I really didn't want to get into a flame war with Sean, but since they're fun, lead on...

To take on his nastiest dig first. I'm wordy, prolific if you will, not unemployed. I work at a cushy job that allows me a lot of downtime to play & write on-line & if you look back on my posts over six years, you'll find many of them are long (or long-winded as you said). I only wish I wasn't working these last six years but I'm too valuable to the work force to left in retirement.

As for being a snob & an assshole, I am. I've never said otherwise. Proud of it too. One of my heroes is the Marquis de Sade. I was born to have a whip in my hand keeping you dogs in line (that and lead wild month-long orgies). But alas, the Golden Age of Aristocratic Debauchery is no more. Still, I figure it's better to be an elitist lording over trash than to have a collection without North By Northwest or Ben-Hur in it.

But you are right. You don't need to listen to Rozsa to love other film music, read Shakespeare to appreciate other drama and literature. It's not a pre-requisite to enculturation & enjoyment. And if Rozsa & Shakespeare aren't your cup of tea, that's all fine. In a way by loving films and film music I'm already loving popular culture which would not be considered high, fine art. Someone who loves Bach & Verdi would probably condemn us all over our tastes. So my loving Rozsa and hating Horner is a mere tussle between factions in that regard.

So I might call myself an elitist, but if I really were one, I wouldn't be here at all, I'd be posting over at Monteverde.com instead.

That said, I still wouldn't admit in public that I'm a film music fan that doesn't have North By Northwest or Ben-Hur in my collection. What's the point of being a film music fan if you're not reaching for the top to begin with? I know, you don't think my idea of the top is the top. You think your idea of the top is the top. Fine. But, as an assshole, I don't respect that. I know, "We should all respect each others tastes in a relative way." Blah, blah, blah. Tough. No way. BS. I refuse. You're free to listen to what you want, I'm not such a fascist that I would stop you or your freedom (but only because I don't want mine taken away), but like Seinfeld in the AMEX Superman ad, don't be surprised if I'm agast at the tastelessness of the show you drag me to. I can't respect what I consider trash and the people who promote it. Plain & simple.

I can't go on defending the French New Wave every time I post (and shouldn't have to as it needs no defense at least in the circles I travel in). It would take some time here away from the main topic to explain Notre Musique in detail. Or how to approach all the late Godard films in general. True, Notre Musique was a step down from Eloge de L'Amour. Also, I'm not a big fan of the Palestinian cause as Godard is. But that said, given the brilliant scene by the bridge, the girl's tears in the car, all the talk about writers as poor activists, and the final heaven for the woman killed by police, I can't call it crap. But if you wanted MI3 and walked into Notre Musique you're in the wrong film. You can't look at Godard (or a number of other filmmakers who use radical discourse) from the perspective of classical Hollywood narrative film. And it's not that he's crap hiding behind a veneer of being different as so many people have slammed Godard over for nearly 50 years.

Lastly, I'm not saying I'm not a snob but the last time I looked "raison d'etre" was still in pretty common usage in English writing and has a connotation that translating it into English doesn't as easily provide. So using it doesn't prove I'm a snob per se (oops used "per se" another French phrase common in English usage, sorry).

As for referencing Truffaut in a topic on MI3, I see nothing snobby or negative about this. Cinema is over 100 years old, it's international, it's a coherent universe. And I've seen atleast 5,000 films (roughly 250 films a year for the last 20 years) and have heard just as many scores. Over the last seven days alone I saw Seven Men From Now, Night Creatures, Brides of Dracula, The Assassination Bureau Limited, Anne of the Indies, The World of Suzie Wong, Safe Conduct, Chori Chori, and several episodes of Kino's Journey and Stratos 4. All while working, sleeping, eating, and doing the lawn & laundry. Not to discuss film without taking in its full range, without talking about Porter and Griffith and Bresson and Barnet and Danny Boyle and George Lucas all in the same sentence, that's what strikes me as odd. Not to mention all the theorists and critics like Jean Mitry, Andre Bazin, Manny Farber, Kaja Silberman, Laura Mulvey, Geoffrey O'Brien, Stanley Clavell, and Gilles Deleuze.

So I hate to sound like Bloom & Paglia but please go off & do some serious homework, acquaint yourself with the canon by watching a lot of different films and reading some books on film, before coming back to slam how I talk about the subject again.

In other words, if I'm a snob, I've earned the right to be one by doing the legwork.

gkgyver-I like your fundamental laws of film music. Number 2 is an axiom of the universe. Number 1 has exceptions. More importantly, I get what you're saying about people getting things or not. I don't get a lot of things. Mountain climbing for instance. Sean doesn't get Godard or Golden Age scores. I don't get Horner, while Thor, who I respect, does. I have to disagree with him, but he obviously gets Horner at some level that I cannot fathom. Is the fault mine for being tin-earred or his? Hard to answer. Neither of us have much choice but to pursue our present course.

Thor & Southall-While Thor sees Horner as an emotionalist with a superb dramatic sense, I see the absolute opposite, a guy with no dramatic sense whatsoever. And he has no recognizable style. I dare you to pick Horner out in a blind taste test alongside his peers. Well, you could: it's so bad it has to be Horner. I don't like that he copies himself & others (it's ok in small doses but geesh) but that's secondary to the main damage he causes by not knowing how to score in the first place.

And because I've witnessed Horner just destroy (de-Troy) films, I can't agree he's peerless when it comes to right music-right image.

Also, just because Horner is more structured than his peers is no argument. It's really apples & oranges because it's the final effect that matters not how it's achieved. Dinko says Horner's long lines remind him of Mahler (probaly because Horner is either cribbing Mahler or like me is just long-winded & can't shut up), but since when do cues lasting 1:30 need long-line structure.

I'm reminded of what Bruce Broughton said about Herrmann. Broughton conducted Intrada's re-record of Jason and the Argonauts and he felt that Herrmann just didn't do much writing. Well duh Bruce, to a note-spinner like you who can't write a cue with less than a billion notes, of course Herrmann doesn't write, he plays 3 notes and that's it. But they're the right 3 notes. And the final effect is that I'll take Herrmann's 3 notes over Broughton's billion any day of the week.

So how Horner structures things is pointless, it's no proof of talent whatsoever.

Lastly, as for an intellectual vs emotional approach, I'd say you have it reversed. Giving us music that refers to subtext or what you can't see on screen is emotional while emphasizing what is there on screen is intellectual.

Thor reminds us again that we can and should all discuss these things rationally & reasonably, but honestly, where's the fun in that? Especially compared with the sport of slamming Sean?

thw-Lastly this joker. You SHOULD be sad you have no taste in music. It IS a horrible tragedy that you don't share the same impeccible tastes that I do. You're absolutely right to cry. If I were you, I'd be too ashamed of myself to go out in public. Thankfully, there are leper colonies you can be sent to where you can mingle with your own kind and be taught the error of your ways.

I don't think anyone watching Notre Musique wanted M:I-3, but they certainly wanted a good movie, which is what I wanted and didn't receive. If Godard wants to keep writing political speeches and calling them films, than so be it, he's just not very good at it.

As for what's at the top of film music for me, there isn't really one (top), in the same way I don't really have a favourite film because that changes all the time, and I don't have gold standards I set other scores and movies to. What's the point? I'd be stuck exactly where you are; you can't get over what first grabbed your ears, or your eyes. Also, you seem a great deal older than me, and older than many others here, and you wear your self-proclaimed elitist attitudes like a badge, but the wisdom you think you hold is just defeated by those same attitudes. You're just Dan Goldwasser and zimmerito wrapped up in a cheap suit, writing the same things/and ideas over and over again; change your tune, you remind me of the composer this thread is about.

Meanwhile, I'm glad you know the names I mention, I would hope you did, and in that case, you shouldn't find it so ridiculous that I bring them up in conversation since it's still hard to discuss film without them. It's not a question of being erudite to put forward an image. If I quote or reference someone it's because in my memory they've got the right example or anecdote to support what I'm saying at the time. It's not just me trying to show off.

If in the MI3 post I mention that MI1 was selected by the Cahiers du Cinema as a top 10 film, I'm not trying to show off the fact I read Cahiers du Cinema. I'm trying to say that MI1 was a film that the European critics took to as well as guys buying tickets in Des Moines, that the film had that range of support. The Euros loved Titanic too as did the Japanese.

It may be true that you've seen more films than I have but you don't talk as if you have, especially anything past the last few years. You tell me you don't have North by Northwest or Ben-Hur in your film music collection, two basic staples, and so I have to assume you haven't seen that many films or that many older ones and certainly haven't heard that many scores. Now true, that's an assumption. Maybe you don't have NBNW & B-H simply because you saw the films and didn't like the scores (god forbid). Or maybe you're being humble and don't want to talk about how you have everyone here outclassed with your own taste & experience and that's fine. But I can only comment based on what you write. You may have seen 6-7-8,000 movies but I don't know what they are anymore than you know what films I've seen. But to be younger than me and to have seen more films must mean you are watching atleast a film a day if not two. Given that I would assume you'd seen all the Hitchcock & Wyler films and be familiar with their scores. However, it's an assumption with no basis in proof.

You write that film is fun, a hobby, a retreat, not serious. Ok. I will counter you by saying that my identity isn't wrapped up in being a film fan or a film music lover. I'm not in the industry and I don't teach film. I do spend a great deal of time watching movies to be sure and I do take filmgoing seriously since it is such a large part of what I do. However, film isn't all that I am. I have a life outside of watching movies. I'm not in some contest to see as many films as possible before I croak because I think you become cool that way. If anything, the more films you watch, the more of a geek you are so it's probably best not to advertise it. In the end, I watch movies because I like to watch movies just as you do. And when I am watching movies, I'm also not seriously analyzing the fun & enjoyment out of everything that comes before my eyes & ears. If I wasn't liking film & getting joy out of it, I would stop. To watch a lot of films just to say I've watched a lot of films so that I'm a better person or better than you would be a horrible waste of time & life. You follow your bliss wherever that takes you. Mine takes me to the theater. For others it takes them paragliding. Raymond Smullyan has written at length about this. He has a wonderful story about two pianists, the one who tries hard to become a master and the one who comes by it naturally, but I didn't need to read him to know his message anyway.

And here I am "name-dropping" again. Well, I don't see how I can avoid it. Smullyan does write about the difference between forcing yourself into a mold because its what you think is important to accomplish and doing something because it's simply what you like to do. You're saying I do otherwise while saying you do the first trying to rub an "I'm better than you" into it in the process and I'm telling you you're (once again) full of crap and should know better. And if that means I reference people who say this much better than I in the process, so be it.

Also, despite referencing De Sade, I'm more of an egalitarian. I realize there are primate heirarchies, alpha males, pecking orders, class, castes, and such, but while I recognize them, I fight against them. I also see people as equivalent despite their differences in talents.

So I have to defend myself against your saying you have the "unbearable lightness of being" whist I do not. I don't need to do anything I don't want to do to promote my self-worth or image (I just have occasional fun in doing so).

I guess we'll have to disagree on Notre Musique. But is Godard not good at making speeches or films or both? It's true that Godard's films are political polemic. So are Michael Moore's. But, despite the jokes both often have (and the fact that both could be seen as fiction), Godard's political cinema takes a much different approach. He roots his politics in the expressions of personalities. You can't say Godard films have much story but they do have a lot of people talking about how they feel about what's going on in the world. His films have surreal aspects and didactic ones so they are not easily accessible (though many critics thought Notre Musique was the most accessible Godard in some years, or do I get into trouble for saying I read Film Comment & Cineaste too), and a lot of people do equate that with being bad. Of course, just because something is inexplicable doesn't automatically make it good somehow either. There are good and bad Godard films. Or rather there are Godard films I prefer to others, since he's never made anything I would personally catagorize as totally bad. Why? Because there's always some idea or gesture in his films, even the shortest, perhaps the very reason why he made the film, that I like, get, that comes through. I watched Soigne Ta Droit again recently and I still don't get that one and I've tried. Maybe it's over my head or maybe it mostly sucks, but even if I do finally "figure it out" and get more out of it at that level, it doesn't make a difference because the film is a failure at the one level I can rely on to "interpret" Godard, my emotional response. Though even here not a complete failure.

You may ask why re-watch a film that wasn't a pleasure when I could do something else more worthwhile with my time. A legitimate question since I just said I watch movies for fun as you do. Well, in the hope that there was some fun there to be had that I missed the first time through. To give a film a second chance. Because I have hope that there's more to be gained from watching a weak Godard another time through than to see MI3 for example.

I remember seeing King Lear for the first time and I just got it, I understood it, I felt it, I got how it was put together, and I loved it, really loved it, the film and I meshed at an emotional level. With Soigne Ta Droit that doesn't happen. With Eloge de L'Amour, I was there the whole way in the same way. With Notre Musique less so but still enough so not to catagorize it as bad or weak. But it goes beyond how I feel while watching the film. Godard films aren't good when you're happy and bad when you have an upset stomach. I have an honest response to watching and taking in as much of what Godard is presenting and letting the mind organize and understand it as much as possible.

I used to be against top 10 lists. Loving movies meant loving more than just 10 and who knows that something you saw next week wouldn't make the list. In fact, that just happened to someone I know. I showed him Valerie and Her Week of Wonders and he'd never seen it before and it just floored him (in fact much more so than it ever did me) and later he said he changed his top 10 list to include it because he thought it was that special.

But I finally realized that I could produce such a list, that you could put forward a gold standard and it wasn't wrong to do so, that certain films just weren't being topped by the other films I was seeing and really deserved to be singled out as the best. But I certainly didn't do it thinking I was stuck or that the list couldn't be changed.

At just over 40, I'm probably a bit above average for age on this board. There are a lot of "kids" to be sure but the ages of many posters past & present top mine easily.

I'm not sure elitist attitudes straight-jacket wisdom as you believe. I think it's possible to hold to positions firmly while still being a student of life open to counter-positions. I also think, for better or worse, people solidify positions, they get married to one person, become religious or not, remain conservative or liberal, and gain, not lose by doing so. They have the wisdom of knowing just who they finally are. You may see it as calcification, and maybe it is, but it doesn't seem to defeat those people or their wisdom to finally settle on a staunch, unmoveable plateau, position, and way of being.

I would never wear a cheap suit.

As for writing the same things over & over again, I can't entirely agree or disagree. First, while I'm writing publically, I'm not making a living at it, it's not like I'm an artist asking for your love & cash under pressure to be original and give you what you want everytime I post. You can criticize all you want but I'm not out to please you, just express myself (which does indeed open me to criticism just as it does you).

Secondly, I often just respond to what is being posted with opinions that don't really change. That's the nature of the board. Someone posts they like Horner. It would be nice if we had another fresh topic but we don't. So I come by and post that I hate him. They give some reasons & opinions why he's great. I give mine against. And sorry, but I don't see how I can say I hate Horner in any new kind of way. And I don't want to let the Horner lovers post without calling them on it. If you're going to post on this board that you love Horner, you have to face me telling you you have no taste. And I'll do it over & over as many times as someone posts they love Horner. Why? Because I find him an affront to everything I care about. I said it earlier in this post: James Horner needs to be stamped out. I wasn't kidding.

Thirdly, that said, I have started enough topics or brought up original ideas or added to topics with ideas or opinions enough to know what you say about me being entirely repetitous is just nonsense.

And to equate me with James Horner! How cruel! I wouldn't insult my worse enemy so! I'd call them every name in the book before I'd call them James Horner. You can't get any lower than that!

Finally, you have no history. If you looked back over my six years of posting here or looked at my member profile, you'd have a very good idea of where I stand on most composers, Williams and Goldsmith included. Of course, you've posted here for about as long as I have (I think). This certainly can't be the first time we've mixed words in all that time or the first time you've read any of my posts. Just as I've slammed Horner ad nauseum, I've also stated on a number of occasions how weak I think Williams can be. And I have caught some very serious heat from posters here over time, more for my attitudes than my positions. This low warmth you're putting out is child's play in comparison. But if I was afraid of taking heat, I couldn't speak my mind as I do.

Lastly, while I do prefer Golden Oldies and spend more time watching older films than new ones, I get to the theater and new release DVDs enough to keep up on what's going on in the current scene. I can't write about Horner as a musicologist might so I can't argue against him with any more language than I have at my disposal. As for being unfamiliar with his music, I probably own more Horner scores than you do despite hating him & no longer playing the discs by him I do have. I've heard a lot of Horner both in films and on record. And I'll still pick him up to hear him from time to time just to see what he's up to apart from the films. Or I'll still find myself watching films scored by him (even when his name on the credits is a big deterrent). He scored Beyond Borders and so I didn't want to go for that reason but I knew the film was getting poor reviews and wasn't going to last and I also knew they'd spent $60 mil on it and shot it in exotic locales and I also wanted to see Clive Owen in something so for all of this I went. Horner didn't ruin the film (it was bad to begin with) but he added nothing to it either. As usual, his score just sat there filling space & time with a coat of flat white paint.

So, I didn't just get through half of Krull turn it off and say that's it the guy sucks forever based on this alone. I'll admit to having a prejudice against him but I gave him a lot of chances. Most people if you rub them the wrong way once just avoid you from that moment on. They don't have the time to invest another second in it. That's justified but I gave Horner much more playtime to build and ruin a relationship with me than just that.

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I think he does spot very gracefully, in terms of us being subject to the music's effects more than observing it... but I do think he makes very obvious choices. He may not underline the action in obvious ways, but he does underline the emotionally obvious... sometimes to cover for bad acting or otherwise unconvinging drama that seems good with an old English hymn underneath... But if there's anything he's done to advance the way music can interact with the image in the last ten years, it's the first I've heard of it.

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I would agree that he's not actually paving new ground, and I haven't actually listened actively to any Horner scores since MASK OF ZORRO, but that's not his forte either. He has an uncanny ability to boost in at the exact right moments and silhouette these scenes so strongly that they almost become autonomous sequences in the film - despite being part of the classical Hollywood paradigm: the final escape from ALIENS, the love theme from TITANIC, the nebula battle in STAR TREK II, several scenes in BRAVEHEART. He is also a master at textural suspense through repeating patterns: PATRIOT GAMES, ALIENS, THUNDERHEART, FIELD OF DREAMS.

Lou, you said that I would probably not be able to pick out a Horner score if put alongside other scores by his peers. Not so. Horner has one of the most distinctive voices around. A voice that goes FAR beyond the self-quotes and classical quotes such as the "danger motif" from ALEXANDER NEVSKY. For example: The crashing piano, the shakuhachi, long string lines that harmonize in different directions, the "breathing" crescendo-descrescendo pattern, the way a line ends in a strong major chord. Several other features as well that I don't remember right now. Like you, Lou, I'm not a musicologist, but thankfully that doesn't prevent us from commenting on film music, where non-representational music interacts with an EXTERNAL meaning system. We just have to use other words.

So....time and again have I recognized a Horner score immediately, even if I didn't know he was the composer or if I just tuned into a movie midway. He's that distinctive.

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This topic is 2 pages long

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It's always fascinating to see that the James Horner debate continues to engage people like this!

James Horner is, IMO, a very skilled film composer. He knows exactly what buttons to push. Musically, he is also a very, very good craftsman and he actually do come up with some unusual ideas now and then (such as moving chairs to come up with novel percussive sounds, or using five Steinway pianos in Flightplan).

However, I will always have a problem with him not crediting the classical sources he uses for many of his themes. It would look so good if it was Aliens, composed and conducted by James Horner, theme incorporating Gayne Ballet by Aram Chatjaturian, adapted by James Horner. It's that easy.

IMO, James Horner should take a year off film scoring and devote some time to a concert work. That would be interesting and refreshing!

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Originally posted by sean:
You're just Dan Goldwasser and zimmerito wrapped up in a cheap suit, writing the same things/and ideas over and over again; change your tune, you remind me of the composer this thread is about.

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Woah nellie!
Both?! Simultaneously?

What is harder is having Moviescore (who I know from Filmus) think that just because Horner moves chairs around or doubles up on the pianos that this means something. He says, "He knows exactly what buttons to push." I cracked up. All I can say is Horner sure knows what buttons to push to pisss me off.

And ok, Thor can find an individual voice listening to Horner cues. All right, so Horner isn't generic as 70s TV chase music (even if he sure sounds like that to me). But just because you can spot him doesn't mean he's worth spotting.

Between chair moving, crashing piano (which Ifukube does a lot--and Ifukube is very repetitious and yet I love his overall sound a lot), the shakuhachi (cliche, cliche, cliche), and everything else, I still don't hear anything that's really music. And as for his wheezing crescendo-decrescendo pattern, god help us. I remember watching Legends of the Fall following that score up & down, up & down, getting seasick, and looking at my watch thinking there can't be another 2 hours left in this movie. I don't know if Sean would call that legitimate criticism but I sure did.

And yes, I'd love to see Horner take a year off scoring films to write some concert music because that would be at least one year where he wasn't ruining any more movies.

I've been absorbed by film music for over ten years now. I know I'm probably a peon when it comes to some of you life-long collectors here. I've come to realize that I like almost any film score that I've laid my hands on. Yes, it could be Horner... or, it could be Rozsa. If I have it, I like it. I don't see any point in "hating" a particular composer. When I first got into Maurice Jarre, I picked up Dead Poets Society and Ghost. I thought they were terrible (save for some of Ghost... the synth is unbearable, though). So what do I do? I picked up Lawrence of Arabia and thought it was magnificent.

This brought me a dilemma. Ever since I got into film music, I've avoided scores from before the 80's. Don't ask me why... I guess it just wasn't my era. However, I now know that I've grown to a point where I can appreciate earlier masterpieces. Ben-Hur is in my collection, and soon, North By Northwest will be too. Akira Ifukube will also find his way into my collection (thanks to Lou, for sharing that compilation a couple of months ago). And I would entertain any other recommendations of earlier works from Lou or anyone else.

And let me delve a bit into the infamous Horner. I know this has been talked to death. But hey, this is a film music message board. Let's beat the dead horse. I admit that I like most of Horner's works (although, I have none of his recent works). I'll give you an example of why. When I first gave The Land Before Time a run, I loved it. Why? Because I grew up watching Land Before Time (I'm a young guy) and all these years later, listening to the score, I remembered how I'd watch that movie over and over.

Film music, for me at least, is not about how it sounds. It's about what feelings it invokes. For me, Horner tends to invoke nostalgia (LBT, Krull, Battle Beyond, ST:WOK, Willow) and emotion (Aliens, Braveheart). Then again, I can find that same appreciation for music produced by just about any other composer. I leave no stones unturned.

Now, I must ask, Lou, why specifically is it that you dislike Horner? I won't attack you for your opinion, I'm just curious. No bland statements like "it killed my dog" or whatever.

In closing, I've always been confounded, amused, and surprised by film music fans. Sometimes, I think you're all a bunch of old curmudgeons (don't worry, I'm a young guy and I consider myself a curmudgeon). Is it really so wrong to just simply enjoy film music? I don't even see most of the films that I have scores to. If I can find a good score to immerse myself in, well, then I'm happy. Or, maybe I’m just tasteless. Can’t decide.

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Originally posted by Lou Goldberg:
Between chair moving, crashing piano (which Ifukube does a lot--and Ifukube is very repetitious and yet I love his overall sound a lot), the shakuhachi (cliche, cliche, cliche), and everything else, I still don't hear anything that's really music. And as for his wheezing crescendo-decrescendo pattern, god help us. I remember watching Legends of the Fall following that score up & down, up & down, getting seasick, and looking at my watch thinking there can't be another 2 hours left in this movie. I don't know if Sean would call that legitimate criticism but I sure did.

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He, he...well, you're free to hate his style, Lou. But at least he has one. As far as the shakuhachi is concerned, though, be aware that it was Horner who really introduced this instrument in mainstream Western films. Before that, it only popped up sporadically in non-mainstream films and non-Western concert works.

So while it indeed has become a clichée (just like the wailing woman that Zimmer manifested with GLADIATOR), Horner deserves credit for introducing it and for incorporating it into his sound.

By the way, Horner has at least one concert work on his resume, the late 70's composition "Spectral Shimmers". Apparently, he went through some real problems with that composition, which is why he steered away from the concert hall and turned his attention towards film music. It will probably never be recorded, but I'd love to hear what it sounded like.

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Originally posted by gkgyver:
So these are the fundamental laws of film music:

1. Golden Age scores are unsurpassable
2. James Horner is always abominable

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I think you made a mistake,it's the other way around,isn't it?

1-James Horner scores are unsurpassable
2-Golden Age are always abominable

These are the right laws,for me at least

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Originally posted by gkgyver:
NOW I certainly understand what Lou was trying to say ...

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Do you? Good for ya,you must be a really intelligent guy,because i don't...

If a guy can say that the Golden Scores are the best there is,then i can say otherwise,see it's the way the world turns,you know the Yin and Yang thing,for every action there's a reaction,that sort of stuff...So for every silly argument,there's one oposite and just as silly...Generalizing is never good...

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Originally posted by gkgyver:
And my take on this is: if I get bored out of my mind with these two, why should I care much about the others?

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Because James Horner went through a number of phases. Much like Jerry Goldsmith, once Horner identified with a particular style of composition, he reused it for years.

Many of James Horner's scores from the 1980's have nothing to do with his scores from the 1990's, or his recent work (since Titanic).
Krull, Willow, the various cartoons... are almost all large-scale, orchestral masterpieces with melodies and countermelodies, deep and multilayered orchestrations, a variety of twists and turns, and as James suggested above, the type of coherent and developed symphonic thought rarely found among other composers.

I think it would be hard to recognize the epic adventure scores Horner wrote as Horner scores.

I've never been that fond of Titanic or Braveheart myself.
Now take something like The Perfect Storm. Find me another composer who can produce large-scale action music which does not rely on heavy percussion pounding and blaring trombone/trumpet calls. Much of The Perfect Storm relies on strings, winds and french horns (actually playing a tune rather than interjecting in the melee). The way Horner weaves the tunes, varies tiny little elements, then comes back with a forceful reprise... it has nothing to do with the Romeo & Juliet-wannabe Braveheart or the fake Enya vocalisms of Titanic.

Take the two Star Trek scores. Horner creates a musical action/danger motif. Now the motif is explicitly stated by the strings & brass all over the place, but at one point for example, Horner creates a dissonant orgy of unbearable noise. Look deeper though, and there they are... plucked strings repeating the danger/action motif. Even in this horrible dissonant noise, Horner managed to include melodic material which links to the key action music he introduced before.
Now, you may not notice it consciously unless you listen for it. But it's there.
What I'm trying to get at, is that the Star Trek scores (once you exclude references to Prokofiev [both Alexander Nevsky and a literal quote from Romeo and Juliet, ie: The Death of Tybalt], Rachmaninoff [symphony #1], and others) are perfect examples of a good film score, written by someone it would be hard to identify as the composer of Titanic or Braveheart.

Before I address your question & statements, I want to give you (and others) some background. You see, once upon a time in university circles, education was no joke. To be considered educated in the Liberal Arts you had to speak Latin and Greek, know the classics very well, have a very good dose of Art History and literature. The idea that someone was an elitist was not looked down on as it is today, it was looked up to and pursued as a goal. Elitism was just what it sounds like, an elite fraternity that you had to work hard to become a member of. It wasn't open to just anybody, you had to know the humanities, and if you showed up and didn't, you were resoundly laughed out of the building.

These days all of this is looked down on as snobbery. And in our egalitarian and relative world-view, to say you know more than someone or might even be a higher person than someone because you know more than them is offensive heresy.

But what I have picked up from reading Camille Paglia and Jacques Barzun and others is their feeling that the level of quality in education at all levels has dropped considerably mainly because of this trend in people letting each other off the hook.

I may at times sound like a snob but the truth is as I said it a few posts ago, I can't even get my foot in the door of the club that has the big boys in it, even in film where I'm horribly outclassed by people I run into who are just amazing. But my guess is, if I can't get into the club, no one else here can do it either.

Now you can say, fine, who needs the damn club if the standards are so high. I'm not an Olympian, I don't need to set world records, I'm content to live my life through, have fun, and the snobs be damned. They're too serious. There's nothing that cool about being in the damn club anyway.

So, ok, you can throw down the challenge as not for you and poo-poo the whole idea as you reject it and walk away but that won't make you a master or better educated.

Maybe that's not your goal in life and that's fine. You want to do what you can handle and go no further. And I agree with those who say it's better to know 6 books well than a whole library. There is such a thing as art fatigue, art burnout.

But aside from that, there is reality. You either know something or you don't and education (if it's important to you) means you know something. Think of physics or chemistry or math. You either know how to do the problems or you don't. Art isn't Science but it still has similar standards, you've either read Euripides or you haven't and if you have read him you've either tried to understand him or you haven't. There's simply no getting around this.

But for someone who knows the humanities well or knows the sciences well to look at you and say you come up short is very hard for most people to take and so they've revolted against this and diluted the importance of standards altogether. In order that no one's feelings get hurt, today, all opinions are relative and equal and valid and become matters of subjective taste and freedom to like what you like. Everyone gets to feel protected at whatever level of education they reach and it's the most destructive thing to hit education since we started to teach people.

Barzun's attitude is you learn it all first and then you can decide to deviate. And because no one listens to him anymore we have college students who still have problems reading and forming sentences.

I have a friend who is a Prof and she says she spends most of her time teaching students how to write. Imagine that, the level of text you get at this site is beyond them. We're not talking about value judgements, we're talking about forming a sentence. In order not to hurt people's feeling by calling them names like idiot and dullard, that's exactly what they've become. And instead of teaching them the subject they are there to write papers about, my Prof friend is stuck teaching remedial English. Because her students can't write papers about her subject if they simply can't write papers to begin with.

This is what happens when you don't have high standards, let them drop, or set up a world where knowing more & more doesn't matter.

Now it's one thing to set up some standards in education and to test people against those standards, but it seems to be another to impose standards on art itself, to say this is good art and this is bad art.

I take art very seriously because it's the place I live in, the realm I go to to dream and hope and see a glimpse of utopia. It may be wish fulfillment, but Art means a lot to me and so I react strongly to people who practice it poorly. Imagine a great painting and someone comes along and spray paints graffiti over it. Well I equate bad art with vandalism. The hack vandalizes my heart, time, and soul.

But if the world cannot establish objective standards in art, I certainly can establish subjective ones. And once established, they are the standards that matter. And it's hard to think of them as merely subjective and relative at that point. And I'm not alone: other people have the same dilemma which is why when my standards clash with yours the debate becomes so violent.

I've written about this before, but there was a time when art created riots. You put on George Antheil or Un Chien Andalou and people torn up the seats in the theater and punched each other out for liking or not liking it. Art was no joke. Antheil wrote that he carried a gun under his tuxedo when he went to perform in the concert hall!

You see the people who fight over their viewpoints as curmudgeons. Maybe so. You're not being a friendly neighbor when you're telling the next guy his love of Hans Zimmer is for the birds. You're giving him the bird instead.

"Is it so wrong to just simply enjoy film music?" No. The paradox is everyone here, we all love film music just different film music.

We claim we want a level playing field where civility comes before preference but even if I wasn't here slamming people who disagree with me, others would break up the party anyway. The idea that I should just stand by and respect another person's opinions on art even if they uphold what I think is trash is ridiculous. All the people here slamming me or praising me are just saying that I share or don't share their own way of looking at things. The people chewing me out the most are doing so either because they like James Horner and don't agree with me or because I'm objectifying my tastes and standards and being un-civil ("un-mutual" as The Prisoner called it). Still, when Sean sees Godard and doesn't like it or doesn't feel the need to have Ben-Hur in his collection, our tastes don't meet and so he loses my respect and I lose his and the name-calling begins. For a while that is. Now we don't even bother to read each other's posts. We skip them. He has nothing to say and he thinks I have nothing to say.

Even Dinko who thinks the film score is obsolete still loves film music. Note, he doesn't think the film composer is obsolete. He still wants his favorites to keep writing music. He just thinks that films themselves have evolved beyond their need for music. And I've taken his statement seriously and discussed it with all sorts of people, not to mention mulling it around my own noggin for quite a while. I don't think I agree with him but it's one of the more original ideas to be presented on this board in all the topics combined.

But getting back to establishing your own standards and then fighting for them, I'm reminded here of the self-absorption of Howard Hawks. He actually said, if I think a joke is funny, chances are most people would think it's funny, if I think a girl is pretty, chances are most people would think the girl was pretty. That's pretty much an I'm the center of the universe kind of statement where he figures his subjective tastes are objective standards.

I'm also reminded of the end of Griffith's Musketeers of Pig Alley (atleast I think it's that film). In any case, there's a tough alpha male guy and a softer beta male guy both interested in the girl and at the end of the film she picks the beta male guy and the alpha male guy looks at the couple and makes a gesture that says incredulously: What? She picked this guy over me. As if the very thought that he wasn't perfect for the girl was unbelievable.

Having this kind of attitude has been under attack since Griffith but it still survives intact in many forms. Criticism is one form. Why should it matter at all if some jerk gives a film a thumbs up or not? But people cling to ratings and other people's opinions as if they carry weight. And, this idea, that some people know what is good & bad in art, has existed since antiquity in the forms of taste-testers, wine-tasters, and arbiters elegante.

Again, we find standards, criterion, ratings, comparisons, rankings, judgments. They won't go away even if cruel and harsh. He has a bigger dick than you do and so you lose the girl. That's the hard (or flaccid) reality of it that can't be escaped. You can't say to the girl all dicks are equal and have her buy it.

So, ok, with this framework as a background, maybe you can see a little bit better what I'm saying, working from, and trying to uphold.

You say you don't see any point in hating a particular composer. Well, it's not a relative thing. If I have an idea of what is beautiful based on having artists provide me with that experience and some hack comes along and spits on that I'm going to hate him. And to me, that hack is James Horner, a guy whose work is the equivalent of drawing a moustache on the Mona Lisa.

You ask me why specifically do I dislike Horner. I've written about this at length before so I'm not sure I can repeat it and do it justice. So I'll give you two examples that I've written about before. They may not really explain it entirely though but hopefully they'll answer your question.

One example comes from Courage Under Fire. The film is leading up to this climax where Lou Diamond Philips (I think) and Denzel Washington are in a car and Philips is threatening to shoot himself or him I don't remember now. In any case, it's a dramatic moment and Horner chimes in with this cue that's all drum pounding and increased tempo and it was absolutely the wrong approach, overdone, over the top, pointless, cliched, you can apply every bad name in the book. And it's just one example of hundreds of such moments in movies where Horner just has no idea of what to do with film moments other than ruin them. And people think he has a great dramatic sense. I have to just laugh & laugh & laugh. Horner destroys drama not enhances it.

Another example comes from Deep Impact. At some point somebody is sitting at a desk in the control room and Horner starts his incidental cue, you know solo woodwind over strings to be warm. And I'm watching the film & listening to this music and the cue does nothing, goes nowhere, is the equivalent of someone pressing a note on an organ and holding it there. Instead of adding, it was detracting. Better to have no music there at all than this.

And these two examples and my take on them sum up James Horner: no dramatic sense and music that is pointless and better left out than in. And why should I support this when another guy could be in there writing music that actually matters.

That said, let me address everything else you write about.

Being a peon. Well, join the club. But it's not about being a peon but constantly working out of it. You never do but the journey & the effort is the value in itself. I can point to a lot of films I've watched and a lot of music I've listened to and I feel the same as you do, that I'm just scratching the surface, that I'm just starting out, that I'm a peon. But you've been at it for 10 years and you seem like you'll be at it for years more to come and you know the cliche about the journey of a thousand miles that begins with a single step.

As for avoiding scores from a certain period this is common. In a way it's like a fetish. Your childhood experience or the associations you have when you first encounter a pleasure stick with you. And most people like the current culture they grow up in. It also trains and organizes your thoughts, sense of time, and other sensibilities in such a way that it's simply a difficult hurdle to overcome.

People who grew up with post-Star Wars & MTV style quick editing find media from before 1977 too slow to enjoy. People who like current film scores find Golden Age sounds too unsubtle, too schmatzy, too blatant. And vice versa. Old-timers find new cinema too fast, new film music too plain.

I'm thinking of the opening sequence of The Magnificent Ambersons which deals with how time was experienced in the 19th Century before the automobile arrived. I've tried to imagine what the experience of time was like in a medieval monastery especially in one where no one talked. I'm recalling passages in Jean Renoir's book about his dad where he says that furniture was made better in the 18th Century than in the 19th.

All of this suggests there are different ways of being in the world at different times and eras that create schisms in understanding.

Now, Sean was right in a way. People get stuck in their timeframes. Like the guy he knows who thinks all good rock ended in 1970. And it takes effort or an open palate to relate to works outside your time. Enculturation isn't easy. If it were, we'd all be masters.

So I can't blame you for avoiding scores outside your time. And I applaud you for stretching yourself. You may find in the end that you can't stretch yourself all that far and may come back to your comfort zone of Horner scores and post 80s films.

I would find that lacking in taste but if you are happy with that, well, you're happy with that.

On the other hand, if you go around saying James Horner is a genius, we're going to have a flame war about it.

Thor-So Horner introduced that damned Jap flute to mainstream Western films. He's the one to blame for it. Instead of deserving good credit for discovering & introducing it, you've only given me one more reason to hate the guy. He can have the credit--it's not like that's something to brag about.

Although much of Star Trek III is re-hashed Wrath Of Khan, it does contain a few moments of brilliance, with "Stealing The Enterprise" (the latter half since there seems to be some sort of plagarism going on at the beginning) and "A Fighting Chance To Live" also stands out; there's lesser moments, too, with "Bird Of Prey Decloaks" and the music for the funny scene where Dame Judith Andersen resurrects Spock.

Listening to new James Horner music nowadays may be like watching WWF/WWE: people know it's fake (they have to), but they're still drawn to it in droves for whatever reason; same with Horner, people know there's elements of this or that theme in his latest score, but still dish out cash for it anyway, regardless of the re-hashed material or Horner's lack of the imagination.

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Originally posted by Lou Goldberg:
Thor-So Horner introduced that damned Jap flute to mainstream Western films. He's the one to blame for it. Instead of deserving good credit for discovering & introducing it, you've only given me one more reason to hate the guy. He can have the credit--it's not like that's something to brag about.

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What is your problem with the shakuhachi, exactly?