Unsaid Music

Prometheus Records of Belgium has released Don Davis' sublime and poetic score for Tom McLoughlin's psychological thriller, THE UNSAID (PCD 156). Davis, best known these days for his MATRIX scores, provided a warm orchestral score in contrast to the film's dark suspense and disturbing unsettledness. In the film, Andy Garcia (who also exec produced) plays a psychiatrist with his own dark past who is treating a troubled youth; in the process layers of each of their pasts are stripped away and hidden truths are revealed. Writing in his notes to the CD booklet, director Tom McLoughlin describes the film's crux as "vision is the ability to see what is invisible" and explains how that also applies to the score. Davis, rather than following the temp track and providing the expected chilling music, decided to play against the film's dark psychology and instead "see the invisible" emotional subtexts of the characters. The music captures these underpinnings very well, with poignancy and brevity. Intricate piano notation amid soft winds lays down an evocative tonality of sensitivity and caring, underlining the link between the boy and the doctor. This motif is also useful, as in "Tommy Watch Kyle Think," in building a bit of mysterioso when it is arranged furtively, before opening into a tender woodwind and strings variation that resolves the cue. "Tommy Turbulence" features some spooky violin entwinements over chilling up-and-down piano figures, crafting an effectively disturbing ambience. "Harry's Little Secret" is also a suitably disturbing piece for repetitious vibrato violin, sounding in tremolo above an ominous piano pattern. The violin weavings of "Kyle's Denial" ascend ominously until swell rapturously in a profoundly warm musical moment. "Tommy Trouble" is a furiously jagged cue for violin chords punctuated by throbbing percussion blasts, while "Tommy and Mommy" offers a powerful moment of musical revelation, culminating in a truly passionate and very powerful musical resolution for full orchestra. The score's probing texture matches the psychological sensibility of the film, supporting its drama of a psychiatric investigation unlocking the past while also emphasizing the human interactions that are occurring. On CD the music is wonderful and eloquently pervasive, understated yet richly melodic and elegantly pleasing.

Music from the Movies reports that Giacchino's next big film assignment is Disney's SKY HIGH, a live action super hero adventure. has been very busy lately. He also continues to score televisions' ALIAS series as well as the new show LOST. Game scores for MERCENARIES and CALL OF DUTY: FINEST HOUR have also been completed, as well as the score for low budget feature THE TROUBLE WITH LOU.

Hans Zimmer and Harry Gregson-Williams are swapping gigs with each other. A few weeks ago, it was announced that Gregson-Williams will score Ridley Scott's KINGDOM OF HEAVEN, replacing Hans Zimmer. Now, the Gorfaine-Schwartz Agency has confirmed that Gregson-Williams is off MADAGASCAR, the animated Dreamworks picture to be released in May, being replaced by Hans Zimmer! Other confirmed upcoming assignments for Hans Zimmer: THE RING 2, BATMAN BEGINS (co-composer with James Newton Howard), OVER THE HEDGE. In the pipeline for Harry Gregson-Williams: KINGDOM OF HEAVEN and THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: THE LION, THE WITCH AND THE WARDROBE.-www.musicfromthemovies.com

Brian Tyler is currently recording his score for CONSTANTINE, the Keanu Reeves fantasy picture based on the DC/Vertigo comic book Hellblazer.

For those who didn't take advantage of the early-bird opportunity to acquire Jerry Goldsmith's final score, the unused score for TIMELINE, from Varese Sarabande, the recording will be available on its official release date of January 25^th. Ditto for Goldsmith's earlier classic, THE GREAT TRAIN ROBBERY. The label has also announced a February 1^st release date for a score soundtrack CD of music from the popular soap opera, DAYS OF OUR LIVES. www.varesesarabande.com

James Horner's next score will be for Robert Towne's ASK THE DUST, a film version of John Fante's classic novel, a romantic drama starring Colin Farrell and Salma Hayek.

Lalo Schiftin's Aleph label has announced their 2005 release plans, which include Schifrin's jazz score for the 1964 film JOY HOUSE, his zany comedy score for 1981's CAVEMAN, and the scores for the first two Dirty Harry sequels - 1973's MAGNUM FORCE, and Jerry Fielding's jazz score for 1976's THE ENFORCER, the only film of the series not scored by Schifrin.

Los Angeles Film Critics Association's annual film awards were presented this month. In the music category, Michael Giacchino won the award for his stirring score for the Disney/Pixar comedy THE INCREDIBLES (The film also won the award for Best Animation).

Other Award nominees have been announced: The Golden Satellite Award nominations for "Original Score" are Jan A.P. Kaczmarek for FINDING NEVERLAND, Howard Shore for THE AVIATOR, Michael Giacchino for THE INCREDIBLES, Danny Elfman for SPIDER-MAN 2, John Swihart for NAPOLEON DYNAMITE and the trio of John Powell, David A Stewart and Mick Jagger for ALFIE. In the "Original Song" category, Alan Silvestri and Glen Ballard were nominated for "Believe" from THE POLAR EXPRESS. Other Nominated Songs were "Million Voices" from HOTEL RWANDA, "The Book of Love" from SHALL WE DANCE, "Blind Leading the Blind" from ALFIE, "Shine Your Light" from LADDER 49 and "Learn to be Lonely," the new song from THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA.

The Golden Globe musical nominees for "Best Original Score" also include FINDING NEVERLAND by Jan A.P. Kaczmarek and THE AVIATOR by Howard Shore, plus Rolfe Kent's critically acclaimed jazz score for SIDEWAYS, Hans Zimmer's comedy score for SPANGLISH and, somewhat surprisingly, Clint Eastwood's score for his own film MILLION DOLLAR BABY. "Best Song" nominees are, again, Alan Silvestri and Glen Ballard for "Believe" from THE POLAR EXPRESS, "Accidentally in Love" FROM SHREK 2, "Learn To Be Lonely" from THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA, "Million Voices" from HOTEL RWANDA and "Old Habits Die Hard" from ALFIE.And, finally, the Grammy nominations for recorded music were announced. In the category of Best Score Soundtrack Album For A Motion Picture, Television, Or Other Visual Media, nominees are: Thomas Newman for ANGELS IN AMERICA, Danny Elfman for BIG FISH, Jon Brion for ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND, John Williams for HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN, and Howard Shore for THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING. Best song nominees include "Accidentally in Love" from SHREK 2, "Belle Rendez-Vous" from THE TRIPLETS OF BELLEVILLE, "Into the West" from THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING, "The Scarlet Tide" from COLD MOUNTAIN, and "You Will Be My Ain True Love" from COLD MOUNTAIN. And for Best Compilation Soundtrack Album, COLD MOUNTAIN, DE-LOVELY, GARDEN STATE, SHREK 2, and KILL BILL VOL. 2 have been nominated. Gabriel Yared was also nominated for "Best Instrumental Composition" for the cue "Ada Plays" from COLD MOUNTAIN, while T. Bone Burnett was nominated for "Producer of the Year, Non-Classical" for the COLD MOUNTAIN album.

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THE RETURN OF THE KING Special Extended Edition DVD.

© New Line Home Entertainment

Howard Shore also talks about his musical score on the recent DVD edition of Tim Burton's ED WOOD, which also contains a featurette on the Theremin, that wonderful old-fashioned electronic instrument of the '50s. Shore discusses his use of the instrument at length, as does Theremin performer Mark Segal.

This week's two-disc Special Edition release of TOP GUN includes a 20-minute featurette on the film's music, including an interview with composer Harold Faltermeyer and music producer Giorgio Moroder. The segment includes a fair amount of discussion on both the score and the film's usage of songs as an integral musical element in the film.

VAN HELSING's multi-disc special edition (the one that includes as "bonus movies" the original FRANKENSTEIN, DRACULA, and WOLF-MAN films (all of which are better preserved in their own "Legacy" collections see below) contains several extras that are not included in the single disc standard edition, including a short featurette on composer Alan Silvestri's score. Universal's "Legacy Collections" of their classic horror films of the '30s and '40s, repackaging their original DVD releases into thematic compilations and, in some cases, including movies not previously released (THE HOUSE OF DRACULA, a much better mastered version of THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN, the INVISIBLE MAN and CREATURE sequels), include some notable segments on music in their outstanding documentary extras. On the FRANKENSTEIN collection, the wondrous and groundbreaking Franz Waxman score to BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN is described at length. The 40-minute featurette is hosted by directed Joe Dante and features about 5 minutes of film historians Scott MacQueen and Paul Jensen discussing the "crowning touch in BRIDE's artistry, the inspired musical score by Franz Waxman." MacQueen describes the Wagnerian style of the score, its use of motives for each of the major characters or sequences ("thematic buildings blocks that can introduce or herald each characters entrance or presence when off camera"), including the Monster's growling, 4-note motif, the Bride's exotic, hi-flown 3-note melody (utilized in many different forms, even under Pretorius' dialog when he first suggests creating a female monster to Frankenstein), and Pretorius' own mad, hopping theme.

In the WOLF-MAN collection, the documentary "Monster by Moonlight," hosted by AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON director John Landis, includes Golden Age music reconstructionist John Morgan and composer William Stromberg (who've made several outstanding new recordings of music from THE WOLF-MAN and other classic Universal horror scores for Marco Polo CDs) describing the creation and use of music in the Universal horror films. "The Wolf Man Theme itself, the famous 3-note motive, is outlining the tritone," says Morgan, who has scored several horror films himself recently. "This was, in medieval music, always a forbidden interval, and has a connotation of the devil... composers throughout time have used it to represent something evil."

And, on the CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON collection, the David Skal-hosted making-of documentary includes discussion from

Monstrous Movie Music producer David Schecter about the CREATURE's music, which in the first film consists of library tracks from earlier Universal films as well as notable original scoring from Henry Mancini, Hans J. Salter, and Herman Stein. "Science fiction films have a requirement that romances and crime melodramas don't have, and that is that you have to get suckered into believing that these ridiculous events are actually taking place. There is no link between man & fish, but as you watch CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON, you're convinced that, yes, this happened. You don't think about those things because the stories are well written and because you get emotionally involved in the movies. That emotional involvement comes in large part due to the music." Schecter describes the films use (and overuse and abuse) of the 3-note, shriekingly intrusive horror theme for the Creature ("you can hardly get a single view of [the creature] without the theme sounding," Schecter says. "I think it sounds something like 130 times in the picture!" Most of the Universal scores of these days were composed by groups (such as the Mancini/Salter/Stein collaboration on CREATURE, each composer being assigned several reels of film to compose. Whoever got the Main Title, in this case Stein, usually composed the main theme, which the other composers would incorporate in their segments. Schecter also describes how the composers were also chosen by typecasting - Stein tended to write the Main and End Titles and the elegant swimming sequence with Julie Adams and the Creature; Mancini wrote more of the lighter, romantic melodies, and Salter got most of the Creature attack scenes, each based on their strongest characteristics.