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What Is The Last Score You Listened To? (older scores)


Ollie

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I have to admit I just discovered the film some years ago (5, I think). Completely ignored it back in 1997. I was 12 and there were Star Wars SE, and The Lost World. This film looked bit lame. And cheap. But years after I realised how brilliant it is and how its somewhat bland soap opera look and casting choices fit the subject perfectly. It's perhaps one of the wittiest action film of that decade. Shouldn't have doubted Verhoeven. And yeah, I really liked the score straight away.

 

Karol

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Punishment / Asteroid Grazing, first 2 minutes clearly based on the opening of Silvestri's end title as well as down below, very clearly from 06:35. Silvestri references himself also very deliberately so it may have been some similar cue but i doubt it. 

 

 

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Weird coincidence!

 

Michael Giacchino - Star Trek Beyond (OST)

 

I like the score but not the OST.  It's going great through them crashing on the planet, covering all the important used so far.  Then just a couple tracks later we're already at the start of the climax of the movie, with all the cool stuff from the middle not released at all.  Can't wait for a Deluxe Edition.

 

I think i've calmed down from my thoughts that this was the best of the three ST scores by Giacchino.  I think I like STID more.  But maybe a complete release will change my mind.

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Best of Both Worlds expanded, Ron Jones (Borg Engaged still has that 'chills down the spine' element and the use of the fanfare in "Captain Borg" just as good the first time round)

 

and two Jerry Goldsmith's, The Last Run and The River Wild.

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John Williams - The Force Awakens (OST)

 

Gooood stuff!  I have to say that even though I know the OST is not complete, it doesn't feel like highlights are missing.  When listening, the album is so expertly crafted, it doesn't really matter what isn't there, because what is there is so good.  Of course I still want a complete edition, but this is a quite fine album as is.

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Ice Age: Collision Course

 

It's a standard CG comedy score. Debney gives it some flair and packages it in a digestible format, so it's disposable fun. He even uses Newman and Powell's thematic material (Newman's family theme and Powell's theme from Dawn of the Dinosaurs) throughout, unnecessary but a nice touch nonetheless.

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Battlestar Galactica-Stu Phillips

 

This is the score for the original television show (theatrical pilot?). Pretty good. I haven't listened to McCreary's so I don't have much to say in comparison. I do like the original TV show better though.

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22 minutes ago, Hawmy said:

Battlestar Galactica-Stu Phillips

 

This is the score for the original television show (theatricality pilot?). Pretty good. I haven't listened to McCreary's so I don't have much to say in comparison. I do like the original TV show better though.

 

It's pure Cheddar, but it's s fun ride. I remember seeing the edited (135 mins to 115 mins) version, at my local fleapit, in SENSURROUND, no less. Happy days :)

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Flightplan - James Horner

 

A rare oddity in that it s a late thriller pastiche by Horner (Sneakers, Pelican Brief, Beautiful Mind et al.) that for reasons that shouldn't be rises above its many familiar elements as enchantingly constructed little gem (for this genre). Its musical ingredients range from the very textural to hands-on action bound together by a questing three note motif and an unusually close-knitted web of orchestral and electronic ideas that betray a care for musical storytelling that make it run alongside JNH's Shymalayan scores (Horner just had the misfortune of being associated to a rather daft potboiler). It might not yet approach 'Coma' but what is...

 

'Leaving Berlin' opens the album with a recurrent short idea featuring ominous chimes and low-end piano engaged in an uneasy dance with fragile melodic fragments led by strings and woodwind section for almost half of it's 8-minute running time before the main theme proper enters - it's an opening that paints a psychological portrait of Jodie Foster as distressed woman just widowed sitting in a train station in a place faraway from home. The range of subtle emotions Horner presents here musically is arresting but it's blink-and-you-will-miss-it music, headphones required. 

 

When Foster's daughter goes missing on a flight back home and nobody believes her she ever was there, you pretty much know where you are headed in a commercial thriller - you just hope they don't buy their big bang surprise finale with fatal disregard for human, physical or just plain storytelling logic and of course they do just that - but Horner by instinct keeps his eye towards the emotional undercurrents instead of committing himself to heighten the shocks and jolts. Starting with Foster waking up, slowly realizing her child might be gone the gloomy string adagio (hello Khatchaturian, though they left it out the movie) wakes up right with her and while she twists and turns to find out the truth the ensuing cues masterfully package her different states (hysteria, blank despair, quiet moments of reflection, scheming determination) into a colourful musical odyssey (while there are overlaps with earlier scores, the orchestration is fairly sophisticated with all kinds of playful percussions ranging from assorted chimes to iron chair legs).

 

In a way, the grim prospect helps Horner to overcome his tendency to sentimentalize what's already fairly mushy onscreen: when midway through 'So Vulnerable' a tearful moment occurs or in 'Opening the Casket' the mousy theme is given over to sweeping strings announcing a resolution (that turns out false) these moments feel earned and, more importantly, anchor the suspense. 

 

It might be a facetious comparison but the ability to rise above a bad movie in a 'difficult' genre like this - in the sense that the score musically gains a coherent form that steers clear of the less compelling scenes and in a movie - is hallmark of the best film composers, often attributed to Goldsmith but also colleagues like Arthur Rubinstein (for another highly improbable thriller, 'Nick of Time'), and in that sense Horner has truly risen to the occasion here (just compare that to his disappointing outings like 'Pelican Brief' or 'Patriot Games', where he often resorted to boring and formless droning).

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That is another Horner score that flew (no pun intended) under my radar back in the day and I remember putting it on my "to listen" list ages ago but never got around to it. Might have to check it out now, if it is on Spotify.

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12 hours ago, Richard said:

 

It's pure Cheddar, but it's s fun ride. I remember seeing the edited (135 mins to 115 mins) version, at my local fleapit, in SENSURROUND, no less. Happy days :)

 

It's even cheesier if your Mormon haha.

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The whole show is really about Mormons in space (kind of). Gary Larson was Mormon, and many references to Mormon theology are scattered about the show. I can't really get to deep into it without breaking the forum rules though haha.

 

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16 hours ago, Stefancos said:

 

The film didn't do very well, and the OST is a lot longer then the previous two.

 

Hm. After the previous two, I was just assuming this one would get an expansion as well for sure. I didn't even consider picking up the standard release.

 

I'm also surprised that the film didn't do well, after all the praise I've read about it online. I'm not complaining, mind you. It wasn't a good film.

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3 hours ago, Bespin said:

John Williams - Heartbeeps :huh:

 

I listened this score for the first time (it's on Spotify).  Probably for the last time too!

What, no love for the Crimebuster theme?!!! And all that fine layering of synth work! :o

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yeah it's not his most shining hour that one. ;)

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