The Happets in the Kingdom of the Sun
Zeltia Montes
" A whimsical and upbeat score, Montes provides some catchy big sound with a delightful colour palette that include cheek popping and knee slapping. "Written by Justin Boggan - Review of the regular release
A whimsical and upbeat score, Montes provides some catchy big sound with a delightful colour palette that include cheek popping and knee slapping. As the composer mentions in the liner notes, "Composing this score has been one of the most beautiful challenges in my life."
The score offers an array of tracks, some with a beat, some switches in style while somehow remaining in the same vain, even some short efforts in tracks which have throwback female vocals you'd expect from some '70's Morricone art film or Pan Am commercial, all courtesy of the Kiev Symphony Orchestra and chorus.
Highlights include: the main title, "In the Playground", which introduces the playful though more mature theme and sets the tone for the more upbeat tracks of the score;
- "I'm Leaving", with it's full-sounding strings and piano playing the theme;
- "Who's You Stylist?", with that '70's female vocals and kind of jazzy sound, as a whole a joyful listen;
- "The Great Pulpini Has Arrived", which offers some brass, announcing presumably the Great Pulpini as royalty or something special, and some snare drum and cymbals in a catchy romp for the later half of the track. You can hear part of this track on SAE;
- "Roller Coaster", which has a great catchy brass repeating melody with cymbal tapping and a beat;
- "I Have an Idea", with it's sneaky pizzicato strings playing the counterpoint from the first track, with woodwinds playing the theme throughout, suggesting maybe a heist or some other devious cartoon caper.
- "Moo Moo's Rescue", which starts out of a nice '80's way, while maintaining a slow and uplifting feel;
and "The Happets End Credits", which reprises the main theme and ideas.
Though the score offers a variety of styles, it's not as mickey mousey as you'd expect and maintains a mature cohesiveness throughout; if you are expecting sudden shifts like some old Bugs Bunny cartoon, you'd not be correct. The worst offender, that does lose some cohesiveness, being "I Wanna Be Like You!", is even then not too bad.
There's no grand finale and the action piece, "Pineapple Battle", never reaches the full potential you'd expect two or three times, but there's hints enough that Montes can deliver the goods if given a big chance. I'd certainly be interested to hear more from her.
The liner notes offer some comments from the composer, the director, a brief outline of what the film is about, and some pictures from the film and three pictures from the sessions, including one of the composer, Montes (turns out the deceptively manly name is for a friendly looking woman). Limited to 500 copies.
On the whole the score is a fun and uplifting listen with some delightful toe-tapping moments. It's mature, full sounding, and professionally done, yet for reasons unknown (presumably the assumption of wild mickey mousing) the score evidently has sold so poorly, that for a while now it's been on Screen Archives for less than two dollars. Why SAE can't move a few copies of this little gem from Quartet, is baffling (it's sold out, though, at Quartet's website). Perhaps the image of CGI-rendered stuffed animals puts people off; maybe they see the name Zeltia Montes and don't recognize it and skip it based upon that. Check out the samples over at SAE.
If my review can help move even just one copy, I feel I've done my job.
The score offers an array of tracks, some with a beat, some switches in style while somehow remaining in the same vain, even some short efforts in tracks which have throwback female vocals you'd expect from some '70's Morricone art film or Pan Am commercial, all courtesy of the Kiev Symphony Orchestra and chorus.
Highlights include: the main title, "In the Playground", which introduces the playful though more mature theme and sets the tone for the more upbeat tracks of the score;
- "I'm Leaving", with it's full-sounding strings and piano playing the theme;
- "Who's You Stylist?", with that '70's female vocals and kind of jazzy sound, as a whole a joyful listen;
- "The Great Pulpini Has Arrived", which offers some brass, announcing presumably the Great Pulpini as royalty or something special, and some snare drum and cymbals in a catchy romp for the later half of the track. You can hear part of this track on SAE;
- "Roller Coaster", which has a great catchy brass repeating melody with cymbal tapping and a beat;
- "I Have an Idea", with it's sneaky pizzicato strings playing the counterpoint from the first track, with woodwinds playing the theme throughout, suggesting maybe a heist or some other devious cartoon caper.
- "Moo Moo's Rescue", which starts out of a nice '80's way, while maintaining a slow and uplifting feel;
and "The Happets End Credits", which reprises the main theme and ideas.
Though the score offers a variety of styles, it's not as mickey mousey as you'd expect and maintains a mature cohesiveness throughout; if you are expecting sudden shifts like some old Bugs Bunny cartoon, you'd not be correct. The worst offender, that does lose some cohesiveness, being "I Wanna Be Like You!", is even then not too bad.
There's no grand finale and the action piece, "Pineapple Battle", never reaches the full potential you'd expect two or three times, but there's hints enough that Montes can deliver the goods if given a big chance. I'd certainly be interested to hear more from her.
The liner notes offer some comments from the composer, the director, a brief outline of what the film is about, and some pictures from the film and three pictures from the sessions, including one of the composer, Montes (turns out the deceptively manly name is for a friendly looking woman). Limited to 500 copies.
On the whole the score is a fun and uplifting listen with some delightful toe-tapping moments. It's mature, full sounding, and professionally done, yet for reasons unknown (presumably the assumption of wild mickey mousing) the score evidently has sold so poorly, that for a while now it's been on Screen Archives for less than two dollars. Why SAE can't move a few copies of this little gem from Quartet, is baffling (it's sold out, though, at Quartet's website). Perhaps the image of CGI-rendered stuffed animals puts people off; maybe they see the name Zeltia Montes and don't recognize it and skip it based upon that. Check out the samples over at SAE.
If my review can help move even just one copy, I feel I've done my job.