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JAMES HORNER
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- CommentAuthorPawelStroinski
- CommentTimeDec 1st 2009
franz_conrad wrote
Christodoulides wrote
franz_conrad wrote
I'm not after an 80s masterpiece myself. As long as he makes it a better film, that's all I really care about. He didn't really do that for two of his other acclaimed recent scores - ALL THE KING'S MEN (a film killer, but then the film wasn't good anyway), and NEW WORLD (which wouldn't have been a bad score, just hard to imagine it working nearly as well as the classical tracks that made the film what it was).
What the film was is actually considered a good thing?
I think THE NEW WORLD is a damn fine score and if the director actually used it in correct balance in the film, instead of butching it up and replacing it with last-minute classical pieces, it would have worked wonders, then MAYBE the film could have been elevated a bit more to try and reach TTRL.
When I hear things like that, I wonder if people really understand why Zimmer's score works in that film. For those viewers who like TRL, a big part of its particular appeal is that it feels so spiritual for a war film. The film itself is almost a spiritual experience, and a big part of the reason for that is the pan-theistic medley of ideas contained in Zimmer's score and the remnants of the temp track (Faure, Ives, Part, Jovanovich). It wasn't just a war film, and it wasn't just about the action, nor was it about triumphing over some (equally spiritually confused) enemy, because there was something more. The music (and narration) was providing that perspective.
So too in THE NEW WORLD, Malick is trying to make that story more than just a love story. He wants the spiritual there. But Horner's score rarely gets beyond a melodic expression of the ideas of colonial presence and love. He is scoring the surface story (and said as much in his interview with Schweiger, that this is the only level at which he felt the film should work), rather than going to the next level, as Zimmer's score for TRL does. (And Morricone's score for DAYS OF HEAVEN, and the use of Orff in BADLANDS, for that matter.) The odd moment when Horner's score does say a bit more than 'this is a love story', e.g. the vocal during the battle scene, was in the film, and it has transformative effect, abstracting from the war onscreen and suggesting broader perspective of human history. The one thing you can say about both the Mozart and the Wagner pieces is that neither of them are connecting to the love story. They're both pitching ideas against the film that are deeper, more significant, more mysterious. Ideas that aren't there.
I'm not saying that this produces a more accessible film. I think the film would have to have been edited along the lines of what Horner was scoring to pull in big crowds. And more people here would like it, I imagine. But it is a stunning, mysterious work of art, and Horner's music just wasn't consistent with that vision, whether you like the vision or not.
My article is in heavy translation works after solving a terminological problem. Can you tell me which Part and Jovanovich pieces are used?http://www.filmmusic.pl - Polish Film Music Review Website -
- CommentAuthorfranz_conrad
- CommentTimeDec 1st 2009
Arsenije Jovanovich, 'Prophecies on the Serbian Village Kremna'? (title is similar to that - this is a musique concrete concept piece)
Arvo Part, 'Annum Per Annum' (I'm not sure which movement of the composition is used, but it's that organ piece that plays as the crocodile sinks below the water in the opening. Zimmer did his own version of the piece, but Part is credited in the film, presumably because Zimmer's version is very close to the original).
There are others in the film too, from memory. The hymn 'The Christian Race' closes out the first track on the album in a string arrangement by Zimmer. There's more, but none come to mind.A butterfly thinks therefore I am -
- CommentAuthorPawelStroinski
- CommentTimeDec 1st 2009
Christian Race is officially credited. Is Annum per Annum similar to the chord that starts the album?http://www.filmmusic.pl - Polish Film Music Review Website -
- CommentAuthorfranz_conrad
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
PawelStroinski wrote
Christian Race is officially credited. Is Annum per Annum similar to the chord that starts the album?
It pretty much is the chord that starts the album. The first minute of the album is Annum per Annum on some samples instead of organ.A butterfly thinks therefore I am -
- CommentAuthorPawelStroinski
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
Right
http://www.filmmusic.pl - Polish Film Music Review Website -
- CommentAuthorSouthall
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
franz_conrad wrote
When I hear things like that, I wonder if people really understand why Zimmer's score works in that film. For those viewers who like TRL, a big part of its particular appeal is that it feels so spiritual for a war film..
For me, it's the explosions. So coooool! -
- CommentAuthorMartijn
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
I just think Gibson is such a dreamboat.'no passion nor excitement here, despite all the notes and musicians' ~ Falkirkbairn -
- CommentAuthorSouthall
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
Martijn wrote
I just think Gibson is such a dreamboat.
Yes, and Mawhinney! -
- CommentAuthorPawelStroinski
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
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- CommentAuthorDemetris
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
Michael, i can feel that HOrner's music was on the surface, it's pretty evident. It's a very "light" score as an approach...but how did Mozart and Wagner brought up specific sub-feelings (or deeper feelings) in a movie that didn't quite fit nor they were written for is what i don't understand...what was the film about except the love story anyway? It struggled to prove, to show it and the musical selection sure didn't help at all. I actually agree with Horner when suggesting that the only level that movie would work was on the surface...a love story, like TTRL was a war movie and worked wonders...'cause as it was, THE NEW WORLD, a confused parade of 2ndary meanings that very few understood, didn't work.Love Maintitles. It's full of Wanders. -
- CommentAuthorPawelStroinski
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
The Thin Red Line is a philosophical treatise above all, the war part of the movie is merely a pretext (and actually makes the movie even more moving, asking about the essence of evil in the middle of a war, expressing fear puts it in the most stark realistic contrast possible).http://www.filmmusic.pl - Polish Film Music Review Website -
- CommentAuthorfranz_conrad
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009 edited
Sorry to those people who want AVATAR news. Just skip over this.
Christodoulides wrote
Michael, i can feel that HOrner's music was on the surface, it's pretty evident. It's a very "light" score as an approach...but how did Mozart and Wagner brought up specific sub-feelings (or deeper feelings) in a movie that didn't quite fit nor they were written for is what i don't understand...what was the film about except the love story anyway? It struggled to prove, to show it and the musical selection sure didn't help at all. I actually agree with Horner when suggesting that the only level that movie would work was on the surface...a love story, like TTRL was a war movie and worked wonders...'cause as it was, THE NEW WORLD, a confused parade of 2ndary meanings that very few understood, didn't work.
The answer to this one runs several pages, believe me!
Suffice to say, if it had been the sort of film that only needed the romantic score, I doubt I would have gotten much out of it at all except pretty photography and an appealing lead lady. The problem with only doing the surface in this story is that it would be DANCES WITH WOLVES meets Disney's POCAHONTAS. It wouldn't have been very interesting at all, and if you want to see what pretty pictures and lovely music make together with melodramatic history, go see AMELIA, which is flat as a tack, dramatically. Instead I get a film about the new worlds, personal, social and political, but predominantly personal (with Rebecca as a symbolic traveller across cultures), that arise from contact. The meeting with the White Culture is the beginning of that experience, her death taking her (almost like the astronaut in 2001) to yet another new world, where she's part of the nature that dominated her spirituality. Wagner's Vorspiel can feel like the beginning of the world (indeed, this is what this piece of music was in the opera cycle!), the force of waters shaping lands. Mozart's adagio is fingers feeling out the beginning of a romantic idiom that others later achieved. Both, in their unlikely counterpoint to Rebecca's story, bring in a sense of scale (Wagner) and haunted feeling (Mozart) that bound the images together, and wasn't in Horner's music (which is generally more sunny and warm in its feelings, rhapsodic, etc). The music made it so.
Again, I don't expect anyone to like it. But I do contend that Horner never really *got* the film he was working on. And whether you like the film or not, you'd have to agree. Composer and just about everyone else are coming from a very different place.
PawelStroinski wrote
The Thin Red Line is a philosophical treatise above all, the war part of the movie is merely a pretext (and actually makes the movie even more moving, asking about the essence of evil in the middle of a war, expressing fear puts it in the most stark realistic contrast possible).
So why can't the love story also be a pretext for a philosophical treatise? In this case, it asks about the essence of belonging in a land whose character, occupants, ideals and culture are changing?A butterfly thinks therefore I am -
- CommentAuthorPawelStroinski
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
I was talking to Demetris. I haven't seen The New World yet (and it's gonna take me a bit to borrow it from a good friend of mine). Malick is a philosophy professor. When I read the Horner interviews about The New World, I was struck by his lack of understanding of the concept of musical metaphor! You are talking about a metaphorical thing in his (very bad, sorry Demetris, it loses structure, the worst cue on the score, I am a fan of Horner's music though, just so you know) Winter/Battle cue, Notice that it refers to Wagner's Lohengrin! The same cue Zimmer rearranged for the final high string part of Journey to the Line that was rejected in favor of Ives.
I realized that Horner doesn't get the metaphorical notion when Horner described his discussions with Malick about certain cues "I think we should give (this) emotion here" and Malick going on like "I don't think this scene is about emotion". With Malick? I can believe it.http://www.filmmusic.pl - Polish Film Music Review Website -
- CommentAuthorfranz_conrad
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
I miss the "I'm with stupid" emoticon.
A butterfly thinks therefore I am -
- CommentAuthorSteven
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
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- CommentAuthorfranz_conrad
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
A butterfly thinks therefore I am -
- CommentAuthorSouthall
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
I agree with Franz, it goes without saying. The largest defence of what Horner did is that it's very possible he just didn't get to see anything vaguely resembling a film to score and I'm sure most of us non-intellectual heavyweights would have struggled to understand it all if all we had was hour after hour of unedited material. -
- CommentAuthorDemetris
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
I am not saying Horner got what the film was about, hence this is why he wanted to score it romantically, on the surface. But who did anyway? The movie's a confused and long mess and the source music the director chose makes it even worse to someone - like me for instance, and i guess the general public too, who didn't get it in the first place.Love Maintitles. It's full of Wanders. -
- CommentAuthorThor
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
franz_conrad wrote
So too in THE NEW WORLD, Malick is trying to make that story more than just a love story. He wants the spiritual there. But Horner's score rarely gets beyond a melodic expression of the ideas of colonial presence and love. He is scoring the surface story (and said as much in his interview with Schweiger, that this is the only level at which he felt the film should work), rather than going to the next level, as Zimmer's score for TRL does. (And Morricone's score for DAYS OF HEAVEN, and the use of Orff in BADLANDS, for that matter.) The odd moment when Horner's score does say a bit more than 'this is a love story', e.g. the vocal during the battle scene, was in the film, and it has transformative effect, abstracting from the war onscreen and suggesting broader perspective of human history.
I was also struck by that Horner quote in the Schweiger interview. I was a bit disappointed, to be honest. Here's this guy with a Ph.D., and you would think he knew the value of artistic expression that goes beyond the mainstream, but he's SO incredibly Hollywood-minded, seeing only the values in classical storytelling. I still love Horner and his music, but my respect dropped a little bit at that moment.
I am extremely serious. -
- CommentAuthorkeky
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
I loved The New World both as a movie and as a soundtrack. I think Horner's music wouldn't have spoilt the film at all.
It's a very meditative movie and in my opinion the score album tends to be meditative too, with some of Horner's best melodies in the recent years. -
- CommentAuthorSouthall
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
Thor wrote
I was also struck by that Horner quote in the Schweiger interview. I was a bit disappointed, to be honest. Here's this guy with a Ph.D., and you would think he knew the value of artistic expression that goes beyond the mainstream, but he's SO incredibly Hollywood-minded, seeing only the values in classical storytelling. I still love Horner and his music, but my respect dropped a little bit at that moment.
I had the same reaction. -
- CommentAuthorfranz_conrad
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
Southall wrote
I agree with Franz, it goes without saying. The largest defence of what Horner did is that it's very possible he just didn't get to see anything vaguely resembling a film to score and I'm sure most of us non-intellectual heavyweights would have struggled to understand it all if all we had was hour after hour of unedited material.
I do agree with you James that being a craftsmen with a method in Malick's editing room probably wouldn't be a situation that suggested clear answers!A butterfly thinks therefore I am -
- CommentAuthorPawelStroinski
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
I think this is why Zimmer's score works so well in the movie. Zimmer opened his EUropean soul for this movie (which is a paraphrasis of what I write at one place in my article!). He understands the metaphorical context and if given the right project, he will give you something like this. It's been always with him, but, honestly, can you do a metaphorical, spiritual score for King Arthur, Broken Arrow, Black Hawk Down or, for that matter, Pirates of the Caribbean? Even his score to Last Samurai is a down-to-Earth contextualized bastard of The Thin Red Line, how much I love that one!http://www.filmmusic.pl - Polish Film Music Review Website -
- CommentAuthorTimmer
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
Thor wrote
franz_conrad wrote
So too in THE NEW WORLD, Malick is trying to make that story more than just a love story. He wants the spiritual there. But Horner's score rarely gets beyond a melodic expression of the ideas of colonial presence and love. He is scoring the surface story (and said as much in his interview with Schweiger, that this is the only level at which he felt the film should work), rather than going to the next level, as Zimmer's score for TRL does. (And Morricone's score for DAYS OF HEAVEN, and the use of Orff in BADLANDS, for that matter.) The odd moment when Horner's score does say a bit more than 'this is a love story', e.g. the vocal during the battle scene, was in the film, and it has transformative effect, abstracting from the war onscreen and suggesting broader perspective of human history.
I was also struck by that Horner quote in the Schweiger interview. I was a bit disappointed, to be honest. Here's this guy with a Ph.D., and you would think he knew the value of artistic expression that goes beyond the mainstream, but he's SO incredibly Hollywood-minded, seeing only the values in classical storytelling. I still love Horner and his music, but my respect dropped a little bit at that moment.
Can someone point me to this interview.On Friday I ate a lot of dust and appeared orange near the end of the day ~ Bregt -
- CommentAuthorThor
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
Timmer wrote
Thor wrote
franz_conrad wrote
So too in THE NEW WORLD, Malick is trying to make that story more than just a love story. He wants the spiritual there. But Horner's score rarely gets beyond a melodic expression of the ideas of colonial presence and love. He is scoring the surface story (and said as much in his interview with Schweiger, that this is the only level at which he felt the film should work), rather than going to the next level, as Zimmer's score for TRL does. (And Morricone's score for DAYS OF HEAVEN, and the use of Orff in BADLANDS, for that matter.) The odd moment when Horner's score does say a bit more than 'this is a love story', e.g. the vocal during the battle scene, was in the film, and it has transformative effect, abstracting from the war onscreen and suggesting broader perspective of human history.
I was also struck by that Horner quote in the Schweiger interview. I was a bit disappointed, to be honest. Here's this guy with a Ph.D., and you would think he knew the value of artistic expression that goes beyond the mainstream, but he's SO incredibly Hollywood-minded, seeing only the values in classical storytelling. I still love Horner and his music, but my respect dropped a little bit at that moment.
Can someone point me to this interview.
I can't seem to find it. It used to be at http://www.filmmusicmag.com/?cat=18, but the only Horner interview there now is the recent one about AVATAR. That's not the one.I am extremely serious. -
- CommentAuthorkeky
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009 edited
Timmer wrote
Can someone point me to this interview.
Here it is.
The man is very opinionated and I wouldn't call him modest either. Still, what really counts is his talent and his music, I guess. -
- CommentAuthorThor
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009 edited
keky wrote
Timmer wrote
Can someone point me to this interview.
Here it is.
The man is very opinionated and I wouldn't call him modest either. Still, what really counts is his talent and his music, I guess.
Well, I disagree with his assessments and opinions on the NEW WORLD ordeal, but I love it that he tells it like it is and doesn't succumb to the oh-so-boring Hollywood "smooch talk" a la "Oh my God, I LOVED working for that guy. He's like the greatest genius since Einstein." or vacant expressions like "the crucial thing was to nail the EMOTION of the scene" etc.
He's a breath of fresh air in that regard.
Thanks for the link. I guess reading it in written format is better than nothing. But he really comes through in the audio interview.I am extremely serious. -
- CommentAuthorTimmer
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
keky wrote
Timmer wrote
Can someone point me to this interview.
Here it is.
The man is very opinionated and I wouldn't call him modest either. Still, what really counts is his talent and his music, I guess.
Thanks
Now that I've just read it I realised I'd seen the interview before. Agree or disagree, Horner doesn't pull any punches.On Friday I ate a lot of dust and appeared orange near the end of the day ~ Bregt -
- CommentAuthorkeky
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
Now, in this interview Horner says something about Michael Bay
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- CommentAuthorSouthall
- CommentTimeDec 2nd 2009
I love it! "Not naming names, but Michael Bay..."
I also love that he thinks he understands the wider needs of the film more than James Cameron does!
