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The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor


Pieter Boelen
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I'm just listening to the score. It's not as bad as I thought it would be. The main theme is kind of meh. Nowhere near as good as the first or even the second one, but certainly not a disaster. Some pleasant music for listen or two. Then it'll become a dust collecotor. The sound is kind of funny. Is it just me or it is a synth orchestra?

Karol

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It depends. There are a handful of cues which consist primarily of the LSO being at the forefront. Others which are half and half, and some which are almost entirely synth. I know the few synth dominated cues that do appear on the album and consist almost entirely of a sampled orchestra were actually unused.

After his score had been recorded, editing changes took place on the film, meaning that Edelman's music no longer worked for these scenes and his being unavailable due to an operation he had recently undertook meant bringing in John Debney to rescore 30 minutes of his music for the final film.

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I think Edelman has a knack (or had a knack) for writing good melodies. His insistant use of synth and simple-sounding orchestrations bring down his scores as to making it almost painful to have to get through the dreck of the presentation to get to the good ideas. I don't understand why he uses the synth elements. But still, I think that Dragonheart has tremendous themes, and I'm quite fond of the ones from Beethoven, Dragon, While You Were Sleeping and Gettysberg.

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I only own one score by Edelman and that's Anaconda. His synths tend to ruin the music because there is some good stuff in there.

I don't think he uses them well.

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I just listened to the soundtrack. The themes are pretty good, but surely that can't be a real orchestra? The entire thing sounded like 100% synth. If I had listened to it without knowing what it was, I would have said it was a video game score.

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Anyway, 18 reviews are in at RT...and it stands at 6% for now.

Wow. But then again, it is directed by Rob Cohen....

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I've heard a few cues from this, and some is actually quite good.

Problems: Why half synth a lot of the time? Isn't the theme that opens the first track exactly the same as JNH's Lady in the Water Blue World theme? The 'main' theme is also just a bit too cheesy...

I like the romantic side of things, and how 'fluid' some of the action seems to be.

I'll catch the film when the Blu-ray is ripped.

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He's always had a weakness for the particularly dumb summer fair. This is the man who recommended Van Helsing. And he does seem to have gotten particularly generous after his illness.

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Now you are starting to sound like Joe.

There is nothing wrong with giving dumb-summer movies the thumbs up, actually.

Each film has to be judged according to what it is.

There are good dumb summer movies, and bad ones.

The Mummy is a good one, The Mummy Returns a bad one.

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Now you are starting to sound like Joe.

There is nothing wrong with giving dumb-summer movies the thumbs up, actually.

Each film has to be judged according to what it is.

There are good dumb summer movies, and bad ones.

The Mummy is a good one, The Mummy Returns a bad one.

I'm sorry if mentioning Van Helsing made it sound overly critical. We all enjoy dumb summer movies. I was simply pointing out that this is nothing new with Ebert- one might want to take into consideration that he does not seem to have the highest standard when it comes to summer fare.

And, as I said earlier, I think that, in this summer, dumb summer fair won't cut it. There's already been a decent amount of decent summer movies. I don't believe that Rob Cohen has the capacity for making a movie with a modicum of intelligence or grace in any facet of it.

EDIT: In response to Steef's post: Dragonheart is crap, utterly forced and fake feeling at every turn. XXX was unexciting and extremely forgettable. I have not seen F&TF. However, even if they did entertain, I do not think that precludes him from being a bad director. Even as summer fare, goes, one could do much better.

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Dragonheart was good, so was XXX.

The Fast And The Furious brilliantly captured the audience it was aiming at.

He's not so bad as Jonathan claims.

Dragonheart was poo.

XXX was poo.

The Fast And The Furious was poo.

The Mummy 3 will be poo.

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After just getting back from watching Mummy 3, I have to say it's pretty good fun. Nothing to take too seriously (like the first two, which both I really enjoy). That's basically it, it's just good fun. I did miss Rachael as Evy though. Her quirkyness and nerdyness is just too charming, and although Maria did a find job, it's just not Rachael.

As far as the music, it's definitely no Silvestri or Goldsmith, but it is good in it's own right. The themes are actually pretty good, and I actually like the cd a bit better after viewing the film.

But, Debney's contribution is amazing! We need his music released. The stuff he wrote for some the battle sequences is some epic stuff. Large orchestra and choir with lots of brass. I think he also re-scored the Shanghai Chase, 'cause it definitely didn't sound like the CD version...(need to start taking my iPod into the films...).

Overall, for me, a good, entertaining film and pretty good music (the Debney stuff is excellent).

Jamesyboy

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Seems like a blockbuster can't be made these days without Debney rescoring part of it.

I'm liking the score more and more - the themes are all very catchy. But I can't get past how synth padded it really is (despite Cohen's insistence to the contrary). Just sounds so flat at some points.

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