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Alexandre Desplat's Valerian and The City of a Thousand Planets


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44 minutes ago, Disco Stu said:

Reporting to the moderators.  Physical threats!

 

Giacchino praise is worse than any physical threat!

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It's a good score but requires a few listens before you get the most out of it. And it does actually sound like something/someone,.

 

Karol

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I don't know, as often as I've heard that one and want it to be a quintessential Desplat score for me, it just feels... thin.  Not quite as harmonically or instrumentally rich as I want.  What I've heard from Valerian seems more promising in that area.

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2 hours ago, Brónach said:

This isn't hooking me.

 

I tried to warn you, but nobody listened!

 

1 hour ago, crocodile said:

Not Desplat's space opera/Star Wars then?

 

Wasn't necessarily hoping for a space opera. Simply his magnum opus!

 

1 hour ago, crocodile said:

It seems Desplat's most distinct and interesting big epic fantasy score remains his very first one... The Golden Compass.

 

Yep. Nice score, that one.

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1 hour ago, TheGreyPilgrim said:

I don't know, as often as I've heard that one and want it to be a quintessential Desplat score for me, it just feels... thin.  Not quite as harmonically or instrumentally rich as I want.  What I've heard from Valerian seems more promising in that area.

But it's more, shall we say, to the point. It's Desplat's streamlined drama sound applied to a big film. This already makes it more distinctive. If I want a loud busy Alexandre I'll go with Godzilla. Valerian is a weak soup.

 

Karol

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Yeah it is boring. Album has no structure and music has no personality. It's finely crafted in individual moments but doesn't convince me as a whole. I like a couple of cues (The City of the 1000 Planets is my favourite) but most of it feels aimless. But it's a huge letdown. All three Giacchino's scores this summer were better, despite being less accomplished technically.

 

Karol - thinking of cancelling the Amazon order

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Disc 1 is a mess.

 

Disc 2 just ends randomly with the music from (I supposed) the climax. There's nothing to give it a nice sense of closure.

 

Poorly assembled album indeed.

 

Real shame.

 

The OST is now on Youtube:

 

 

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Listened to the album that's on Youtube. What a f....ng noisefest! Percussion galore. Bunch of big chord leaps, but weakly defined melody lines. Mickey-mousing. I did not care for this at all, typical Desplat "emptiness". Perhaps one or two tracks I liked, like "Pearls on Mul", but even they were rather lacklustre.

As a big Besson fan, I'm looking forward to the movie, though.

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2 minutes ago, Thor said:

Listened to the album that's on Youtube. What a f....ng noisefest! Percussion galore. Bunch of big chord leaps, but weakly defined melody lines. Mickey-mousing. I did not care for this at all, typical Desplat "emptiness".

 

Agree with most of it, except "typical Desplat emptiness". On the contrary, typical Desplat is generally better than this!

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5 minutes ago, BloodBoal said:

 

Agree with most of it, except "typical Desplat emptiness". On the contrary, typical Desplat is generally better than this!

 

Well, I dislike Desplat almost as much as I dislike Giacchino (and that's quite a bit), so that's where I'm coming from on that. Add to that, this was pretty much Desplat at his worst. No, I'd like to forget about this immediately and rather try to reappraise some of his earlier stuff (for Audiard etc.).

 

I think I'm also extra pissed because we probably missed out on a great Serra score here (big Serra fan).

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3 minutes ago, Alex said:

Desplat's action cues get better with every film he scores

 

Well, not here, unfortunately.

 

2 minutes ago, Thor said:

Well, I dislike Desplat almost as much as I dislike Giacchino (and that's quite a bit), so that's where I'm coming from on that. Add to that, this was pretty much Desplat at his worst. No, I'd like to forget about this immediately and rather try to reappraise some of his earlier stuff (for Audiard etc.).

 

I'm willing to give that score another chance, but I don't think my opinion of it will change an awful lot.

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Just now, BloodBoal said:

 

Well, not here, unfortunately.

 

Perhaps I should have said "*tend* to get better". I did enjoy Bus Attack though.

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Just playing through this now. A few tracks in, doesn't sound like the most cohesive album, but some phenomenal writing here, and stylistically, it all seems pretty apt for this kind of film.

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9 hours ago, BloodBoal said:

You're going to do your Cremers and say you love it!

 

You were right!

 

I mean, not hard to predict because this is a really, really good score.  Best I've heard for a film of this type since... I can't even say!  I don't care much about how the album flows.  This is almost Goldsmithian in its level of craftiness for a shit film.  Like I said when those early tracks were out, this is definitely what symphonic blockbuster scoring should sound like in 2017.  

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Wouldn't go quite so far - it is really a bit scatterbrained and not really inspired (the blockbuster sound templates being much too prominent in the louder moments) but when it is subtler (the pearls stuff) or more Serra-like in moments like 'Medusa', it's much better. Probably takes a few listens to sort out, that Thor despises it makes me hopeful.

 

On the other hand, 'Largo Winch' did a lot of that before and not a whole lot worse.

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Valerian has all the technical prowess and none of the joy. It sounds like a sequel to Rise of the Guardians which was dull save for one theme. Desplat doesn't seem to know how to give his bigger scores focus. It feels like a collection of finely crafted moments with no narrative. His Potter scores are another good examples of that. Godzilla or Monuments Men at least had some direction and focus.

 

Karol

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8 minutes ago, BloodBoal said:

So, as expected, the "We're different!" group (KK, TGP...) says it's an impressive work, with phenomenal writing and an unquestionable level of quality!

 

God, I wish people with an opinion different than my own would stop posting their thoughts over and over again so that I wouldn't have to read them on a discussion forum. Can we please make a thread where all the people with the same opinion can be together without being disturbed by trolls who feel the need to say they disagree? It's annoying, really. I come to a discussion forum to have my opinion on things validated, not challenged.

 

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15 minutes ago, BloodBoal said:

So, as expected, the "We're different!" group (KK, TGP...) says it's an impressive work, with phenomenal writing and an unquestionable level of quality!

 

God, I wish people with an opinion different than my own would stop posting their thoughts over and over again so that I wouldn't have to read them on a discussion forum. Can we please make a thread where all the people with the same opinion can be together without being disturbed by trolls who feel the need to say they disagree? It's annoying, really. I come to a discussion forum to have my opinion on things validated, not challenged.

 

 

LEAVE GIACCHINO ALONE! 😭

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On a technical level, I found the score really engaging. In terms of writing Desplat is arguably superior to most of other (living) film composers. The actual themes themselves didn't do much for me and I agree with the comments above that the score lacks a bit of focus. 

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10 minutes ago, BloodBoal said:

I'm just gonna hope all the best material from the score was left unreleased!

 

You just need someone to make a video explaining to you how Desplat used the same scale for his main theme as Holst did for the Planets. 

 

It'll make sense then and you'll realise that this is in fact the greatest score of all time.

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19 hours ago, BloodBoal said:

Oh, and looks like the tracklist has changed yet again: https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0734XVKLH/soundtrnet-20

 

CDs tracklist is still the old one https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07237JFTJ/ (which is good in my opinion).

And the funny part is that the vinyl tracklist is different (even different from digital tracklist): https://www.amazon.com/dp/B071VX1S75/

 

So we've got three different tracklists for this score, not sure why...

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Ah, well, this is weird.

 

Good to see the CD release keeps the songs and score separated.

 

The digital release is just weirdly put together. As if the person in charge of putting it online clicked on the "Random Playlist" button or something.

 

Looks like the vinyl release has one exclusive track (Dark Forces). Aand I'm gonna venture a guess and say this release presents the score in chronological order.

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I have to say, between this, which just goes on and on without grabbing me (it just seems that mere technical finesse by itself doesn't make me have a good time these days), and the film being probably destroyed simply by casting (not everybody is JJ Abrams at that... it can make or break a movie), I am not happy.

 

But at least we got Apes, and Shape of Water looks very cool.

 

3 hours ago, publicist said:

I like that score, very much so. But then i found 'Godzilla' to be a slog to get through, so...

 

I liked the big monster material, but not the rest, the suspense and such.

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1 hour ago, Brónach said:

it just seems that mere technical finesse by itself doesn't make me have a good time these days

 

My impression with 70% of Williams' recent film work. The Desplat at least has some more goofy stuff than just polished 100-piece orchestra...and woodwinds, too.

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I guess I don't give a toss about "cohesion."  This is cool music.  The main theme isn't especially original but it gets used in fun ways.  Thumbs up!

 

It's got a joy to it that Rogue One certainly does not.  

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1 hour ago, Disco Stu said:

I guess I don't give a toss about "cohesion."  This is cool music.  The main theme isn't especially original but it gets used in fun ways.  Thumbs up!

 

It's got a joy to it that Rogue One certainly does not.  

 

 

Not heard the score yet, so do you mean it is a joy to listen to in terms of interesting stuff, or a joy in terms of fun music? Because clearly Rogue One was a mostly miserable film in terms of mass death, thus the music had to fit that tone too, and I'm guessing valerian is mostly funny like Fifth element, so the music will be likewise.

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58 minutes ago, leeallen01 said:

 

 

do you mean it is a joy to listen to in terms of interesting stuff, or a joy in terms of fun music? 

 

Little from column A, little from column B.

 

 

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Pearls Attack" is another cue I like a lot.

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7 hours ago, publicist said:

 

My impression with 70% of Williams' recent film work. The Desplat at least has some more goofy stuff than just polished 100-piece orchestra...and woodwinds, too.

 

Speaking of goofy stuff I really like Budapest Hotel. It's the one of his I've listened to the most. It sounds funny to me so I keep going back to it.

 

Other times it's like seeing a highly polished, very well crafted movie that you don't manage to care about or are completely uninterested in the subject matters of the movie. So you're like "this one is very good in theory but I don't care". The film score equivalent of seeing The Social Network. Not saying this about Desplat specifically.

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