 |
| Newman |
Spectre: (Thomas Newman) Enthusiasts of the James
Bond franchise have often wondered why the concept's villainous SPECTRE
organization from the 1960's ("Special Executive for
Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion") and its
memorable lead, Ernst Stavro Blofeld, had gone missing for so long. As
is usually the case, legal wrangling was the answer, a lawsuit pitting
Bond creator Ian Fleming and filmmaker Kevin McClory against each other
in the early 1960's yielding split copyright ownership, the odd
situation regarding
Thunderball and its remake, and the
disappearance of SPECTRE from Bond films after
Diamonds Are
Forever. With the main lawsuit players dead and the estates and
studio settling the issue, SPECTRE, now losing the acronym and simply
going by "Spectre," made its comeback in the 2015 film of that name.
Director Sam Mendes' second and reportedly final entry in the series,
Spectre takes the opportunity to both look backwards and
potentially conclude the Daniel Craig era of Bond's adventures. With
Spectre and Blofeld in the mix, the filmmakers took extensive liberty
to make connections to Fleming's novels throughout the backstory of
Spectre as well as tie in the Quantum storyline of the previous
Craig entries. The film was criticized for relying too heavily on old
franchise formulas related to locations and supporting characters,
though the movie's execution was widely praised. The movie was the most
expensive Bond production ever (and one the most expensive movies
overall), and studio misgivings about the project, revealed in a hack of
Sony e-mails during production, were realized when
Spectre failed
to match its predecessor,
Skyfall, in worldwide grosses.
Regardless,
Spectre was something of a treat for fans of the
concept looking for some of the glitz, humor, and technology of prior
Bond generations, not only continuing the exploration of Bond's past and
its relationship to Blofeld, but in the token return of franchise
favorites in limited roles, such as the car from
Goldfinger and
even actress Judi Dench. Though it was no shock that composer Thomas
Newman returned to score another Mendes film, the relative lack of
franchise influence on his music was a significant surprise given the
film's frequent glances over its shoulder.
While Newman's score for
Skyfall was widely
praised, including a Grammy win and an Academy Award nomination, it's
not difficult to chalk up that success as riding on the coattails of
Adele's magnificent title song for that film. Like the song, Newman's
score was cognizant of the past, echoes of John Barry and David Arnold's
successful entries in the franchise addressing the dramatic depth of
Bond's familial journey with the composer's usual dramatic gravity. In
the case of
Spectre, Newman doesn't have that phenomenal title
song to bolster the soundtrack in general, though with the Craig era
formally killing the idea of coordinating the song and score creation
process in these films, perhaps that relationship doesn't matter as much
anymore. That's an awful shame, for Bond soundtracks have always been at
their best when the composer of the score also contributes to the song.
Now, not only is there a completely disjointed coexistence between the
two, but issues related to studio, artist, and/or record label greed
have led to the lack of the song's inclusion on the official soundtrack
for these movies. It's a disgraceful turn of events that needs to be
rectified for the benefit of listeners and movie-goers. Perhaps with
Spectre this issue is not as pertinent, because the song is
mediocre and the score is only marginally rooted in the Bond universe at
best. The song was the result of only half an hour of writing time by
British artist Sam Smith and his regular collaborator, Jimmy Napes,
before they recorded a quick demo in an hour that eventually became the
final performance. The lack of polish shows badly, for the song attempts
to pilfer chord progressions from several Bond themes (
The World is
Not Enough at the forefront, most interestingly) much like Adele
relied heavily upon the original Monty Norman elements. But it fails to
generate any real sense of romance, lament, or determination. Its
instrumental recording, while palatable in an orchestral sense, is
generically John Barry and has little unique style with which to define
itself. The performance by Smith his absolutely hideous as well, his
voice far too nasal and rooted in the treble region to function in an
environment that has thrived on either sultry females or more forceful
male voices. Public reaction to "Writing's on the Wall" was mixed, with
solid sales figures not necessarily reflecting public sentiment that the
song wasn't near
Skyfall quality. At least it surpassed the
rejected song for
Spectre by English band Radiohead, faint praise
from this reviewer.
As for Newman's score for
Spectre, it's clear that
the composer was headed in one direction while the production was rooted
in another. Despite all the film's tributes to Bond's past, Newman
largely abandoned his attempts to address the Barry and Arnold standards
of the franchise's sound that existed in
Skyfall and instead used
Spectre to push the concept further into his own stylistic domain
of preference. Listeners will have to separate the style of the
Spectre score from its substance, because while the style is
really lacking, the substance within this Newman realm is really quite
good. Lengthy arguments can be made about the tragedy of the loss of
high style and panache in Newman's music for Bond here. Gone are the
times when flourishes of jazz accompanied the character's swagger and
smug smirks. Gone are the readily accessible thematic mechanisms that
repeated endless in the Barry era to make their scores so memorable.
Gone is the free-wheeling sense of fun that you got from those scores,
often defined by infusions of rock elements. It's truly sad to hear a
score for
Spectre that espouses very little of the vintage Bond
"sound," especially in the context of this film's story, and, for some
listeners,
Spectre's soundtrack, along with the tepid song, will
be a significant failure. Even in comparison to Newman's own sometimes
flamboyant style in
Skyfall, this sequel may disappoint. The
highlights of these Newman scores are the locational transition shots in
the movie, and whereas these cues in
Skyfall often received
overwhelmingly harmonic, cymbal-tapping coolness, such applications in
Spectre are comparatively muted and abbreviated. Instead, Newman
seems to have approached this score as he would have a pure suspense
thriller, with more passages that will remind you of
Whispers in the
Dark than anything resembling traditional Bond material. There is
extreme subtly in the score for
Spectre, some of which quite
intelligent and admirable, but one has to question whether this
franchise, and especially this film within that series, is the right
place to be exploring clouded nuance. It's a boon in some ways for
Newman's own collectors, but it's something of a disservice to the
general population. Even for film music collectors, the number of cues
of ensemble romance or attractive, sustained action worthy of inclusion
on a Bond compilation will be minimal, with few truly standout moments
of excellence amongst a significant amount of introversion and
atmosphere.
The instrumentation employed by Newman for
Spectre is closer to that of his own career this time, dulcimer
and worldly woodwinds merging with droning electronic textures to anchor
the work firmly in the composer's trademark suspense sound. That said,
he occasionally uses a flute, the brass, and bass strings to evoke
certain reflections of Bond scores of the past (especially the flute),
though this usage seems token at times, especially by the time wild
trumpets make the their two or three most notable, short contributions.
Expect the lengthy sequences of ambient electronic texture to dominate
at times, especially in the latter half of the score as these passages
come to define the villains of the entry. On other hand, do not expect
the album presentation to exhibit many bursts of coolness, the trailers
for
Spectre utilizing Barry's
On Her Majesty's Secret
Service nothing more than an unfulfilled tease. You have a couple of
moments when Norman's theme is the basis of movement on the 80-minute
album (which omits only about 20 minutes of additional music in the
film), leaving the style of the score reliant upon Newman's own themes.
They are more plentiful than you might think, the composer providing a
couple of action motifs and a villain's theme that translates into the
score's main love theme, too. In
Skyfall, Newman devised a rising
brass motif of action reminiscent of Trevor Jones' reality-altering
theme in
Dark City, and that is heard here once again (perhaps
most obviously at 0:20 into "Westminster Bridge"). A much longer motif
of action is developed rather elusively by Newman (it is built upon
7-note ascending phrases usually heard in pairs) and is best heard in
"Backfire," arguably the score's top cue. The villain's theme (extending
out from Blofeld to represent the sum of Quantum and Spectre) is
introduced in "The Eternal City" and appearing in numerous
conversational and suspense cues before really exposing itself in
"Silver Wraith" and "A Reunion." For those seeking the progressions of
the idea clearly, seek out the second half of "Silver Wraith," where
ethnic accents grace its creepiness over pulsating electric bass. It's
not a great theme by any means; in fact, it's downright forgettable
outside of its purpose in generating a specific mood, but by the time it
morphs into the sparse love theme variant for "Madeleine" and "Out of
Bullets," it achieves greater purpose. Newman extends the romance into
"Donna Lucia" and the latter half of "Spectre," the tone much like the
composer's past morbid drama identities. It's pretty material but
definitely darkened compared to other love themes for Bond's
girls.
One element additionally missing from
Spectre's
score is a clear narrative, a surprising reality given the motific
coordination Newman afforded the film. The album release is particularly
challenging to enjoy in the absence of pre-credit highlights, a song, or
a truly satisfying payoff at the end. This circumstance leaves the album
as one to be pilfered for its individual highlights, a tactic that
worked quite well for
Skyfall. The quantity and snazziness of the
highlights here are diminished, however. The opening "Los Muertos Vivos
Estan" cue presents Norman's rhythm in an ethnic setting, blurting brass
notes on key a highlight of any performance of that theme. The choral
element in the score is a little awkward in how suddenly it explodes
into the scene, but it produces two of the scores best highlights: the
location shot at about a minute into "The Eternal City" (the underlying
descending phrase reminds heavily of
Skyfall's equivalent) and
the chase portion at two minutes into "Backfire" (which builds
anticipation to a harmonic resonance when the choir comes in that is
actually startling in its beauty). By comparison, the fight sequences in
"Snow Plane" and "Tempus Fugit" aren't as impressive apart from the
film. The source-like "Day of the Dead" is of little consequence. The
Jaws-like villain isn't given more than a thumping piano motif in
"Hinx," and the metallic grating of this cue is a bit hard to take. The
pair of "Detonation" and "Westminster Bridge" resurrect some of the
excitement from "Backfire," but not enough to ultimately salvage the
album's listening experience. Don't be surprised if the impression with
which you leave the
Spectre album is defined by the long
sequences of ambient, electronically-aided, vaguely worldly environment.
Cues like "The Pale King," "Kite in a Hurricane," "Secret Room" (aside
from its nice location shot sequence at the end), "Safe House,"
"Careless," and the first half of "Spectre" are all dedicated to
development of Newman's quietly bumbling suspense motif, and together
they cause the album to suffer serious pacing issues. Overall,
Spectre is graced with a sub-par song and an adequate but
somewhat misguided score. Newman's contribution here does not match the
quality of his replacement of John Williams for
Bridge of Spies
at any level. In that score, he tackled the topic using his voice in a
way that functioned just as well as a Williams score might have. In
Spectre, Newman proves that he still hasn't figured how to adapt
his voice to a franchise that thrives on a sense of nostalgia that
includes reverence for its past musical style. Hopes are high for a
David Arnold return to the concept for both song and score.
@Amazon.com: CD or
Download
- Song as Written for the Film: **
- Score as Written for the Film: ***
- Music as Heard on Album: **
- Overall: **
| Bias Check: |
For Thomas Newman reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.14
(in 37 reviews)
and the average viewer rating is 3.19
(in 60,852 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.
|
The insert includes no extra information about the score or film.
