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FILMTRACKS.COM
PRINTER-FRIENDLY VIEW 
Review of The Adam Project (Rob Simonsen)
FILMTRACKS RECOMMENDS:
Buy it... if easily accessible sufficiency can carry an hour of
generically sincere character and fantasy tones that strive to pull on
your heartstrings like it's the 1980's.
Avoid it... if you expect to hear genuinely exciting and fun enthusiasm or depth of complexity from tonal highlights that struggle to shake electronic manipulation at times.
FILMTRACKS EDITORIAL REVIEW:
The Adam Project: (Rob Simonsen) Skeptics who scoff
at time paradoxes need not concern themselves with The Adam
Project, a fairly typical family reconciliation story told through
the science fiction lens of time travel. A "time jet" pilot in a bleak
2050 travels back to 2018 and 2022 to thwart the events of that future,
saving his wife in the past and coming to terms with his estranged
mother and dead father, the latter the inventor of time travel in the
first place. When the corporate villains from 2050 aren't chasing down
these characters, the pilot, Adam, is bonding with his 12-year-old self
and his father, healing old emotional wounds and eventually setting the
timeline towards a better 2050. There's a touch of Steven Spielberg
aspiration in this Shawn Levy film, the fantasy element existing only as
a mechanism to address a lonely child and bring peace to his family. The
Netflix film, which had struggled for ten years to reach completion,
performed well despite tepid reviews. The director had collaborated with
composers Alan Silvestri, Danny Elfman, and Christophe Beck throughout
his career, but for The Adam Project, he turned to Rob Simonsen
fresh off of his strikingly nostalgic success for Ghostbusters:
Afterlife. The original intent of the composer was not to pull at
the 1980's heartstrings with his music for The Adam Project, the
atmosphere initially meant to be electronic and experimental. But as
Simonsen and Levy progressed through their ideas, they realized that a
throwback orchestral score was largely inevitable for the family element
and the general 1980's tone of the story. Also figuring into the movie
is a variety of songs that required Simonsen to work around and write
lead-ins to. The result, generally, is nowhere near as nostalgic as the
lightning in a bottle that Simonsen provided for Ghostbusters:
Afterlife, nor does it contain the whimsically self-aware fantasy
tones that someone like Silvestri likely would have provided. There is
definitely no John Williams influence to be heard anywhere.
Rather than traverse the straight throwback route, the score is instead a hybrid between that sound and the less organic incarnation that originally occupied Simonsen's mind. In its constructs and tone, the score for The Adam Project closely resembles the streamlined and reliable approach Brian Tyler would have taken to the film. While guided by piano and orchestra for most of its tender moments, the score utilizes a mix that never sounds truly organic, giving it a somewhat dreamy element to address the science of the topic. The Tyler-like mannerisms include the application of a set of rather average but easily digestible themes that skirt anthem territory and are rather slim on counterpoint. The suite-like "The Adam Project" uses the standard, basic, long crescendo form for both of Simonsen's themes in satisfyingly simplistic conveyance. The action music often uses wood-slapping percussive tones, though some of the more aggressive passages in this mode, as in the material early in "Punch That Sh*t," are interrupted by electronic manipulation that damages the experience in that and a few other cues. The exhilaration of time travel becomes lost in the equation but does hesitatingly extend the Tyler similarities in the rhythmic progressions of Now You See Me's more hypnotic appeal; cues like "Hawking, Zip It" and "Plan A" extend this sound into faint hints of Michael Giacchino's Tomorrowland while using light rhythmic patterns with insistence. When conjuring the score's thematic base, Simonsen rejected the idea of providing different identities to the older and younger versions of Adam. Instead, he opted to anchor the score with one theme for Adam's familial relations and another for his adventures at both ages and the fantasy concept as a whole. The two themes are integral throughout The Adam Project, the composer offering them in equal doses and mingling them appropriately. The family theme can be distinguished by its foundation built upon three-note phrases that have difficulty resolving, and this idea is most often carried by solo piano. At 0:15 into the suite arrangement of "The Adam Project," the family theme of hearty character in The Adam Project debuts on piano and develops solemnly into a light power anthem, returning to respectfully end the cue with a little digital manipulation in tow. The theme opens "Make Good Choices" but is reduced to two-note phrases throughout the cue, a technique that Simonsen will access several times to offer fragmentation to match that in the story. The family theme continues in either its full or abbreviated form throughout, a dull, low piano version early in "You Can Be a Real Jerk" continuing similarly in "Who's This?" It dominates "I Found You," opening the cue on strings and becoming optimistic, yearning by the end. The theme is reduced to its two-note variant again on piano at the start of "Echo of This One," quietly respectful on strings later, with nice solo violin touches. It takes on a spirit of urgency in the first minute of "They Found Us" before terrible synth percussion ruins the cue, extends out of the fantasy theme at 0:27 into "Laura," switches to its slight, two-note version early in "Is This Time Travel?," and is diminished to chords only under the conversation in "He Doesn't Need Perfect." Simonsen wraps the idea by mostly following the suite format in "Catch" and closes the score with the ensemble briefly returning to the idea in "I Found You Again." By comparison, the fantasy theme is naturally more entertaining in a nostalgic sense, mainly consisting of two-note phrases that adhere to simple, guilty-pleasure chord progressions. Heard first tentatively at 2:11 into "The Adam Project," this idea develops into a more mature melody using the same chords at 3:10 on cello. It extends out the rhythmic anticipation on piano and strings in the latter half of "Hawking, Zip It," enjoys a prominent performance at 1:15 into "Plan A," and is bold on brass for a quick moment at 0:51 into "Ouchie with the Face." At other times, the fantasy theme is less accessible, its chords only very slightly informing the nervousness of "Tell Him" and struggling to assert nobility early in "Plan" before more terrible synthetics and percussion spike the moment. The theme opens "Laura" with hope but not much oomph, though Simonsen compensates by allowing it to drive the action in the middle of "Punch That Sh*t," becoming heroic by the end. The fantasy theme supplies suspense at 1:36 into "Is This Time Travel?," uses fragments to guide the action in the middle of "Butternut Sippy Cup," overcomes distracting manipulations in the first half action of "Supper Time, Spanky," and becomes intentionally indistinguishable from the villains' version of the theme in middle of "You Never Understood the Science," with good, dramatic appeal to this slow, emphasized passage for that climactic scene. The theme returns to the suite's same anthem crescendo at 2:09 into "Catch," and vague atmospherics related to the idea open "I Found You Again." The aforementioned villains' theme shares the first three notes of the fantasy theme but is conveyed on very low instruments and remains centered on those core notes. Heard first in full at 0:06 into "Find Him," this villains' theme informs the action in the latter half of "Look Up," opens of "They Found Us" with force, stews on low brass at 1:42 into "Plan," teases at the outset of "Butternut Sippy Cup," and persists at 0:10 into "Take Your Son to Work Day" before reaching its dramatic demise late in "You Never Understood the Science." It's an adequate theme, if not underexplored. The only other impactfully recurring idea in The Adam Project is a mystery motif of wonder that extends its rhythmic allure from the latter half of "Forest" to the middle of "Take Your Son to Work Day." Together, these themes do offer a strong narrative core to Simonsen's work, and they ensure that the bulk of The Adam Project retains a pleasant demeanor on the score's hour-long album. That digital-only product contains none of the songs from the film, so don't be surprised if mainstream reactions to the album are indignant. The score on its own sustains that length but never manages to achieve the endearment factor that successful 1980's throwback scores often exhibit. This absence of shine isn't simply because of the composer's obnoxious electronic effects mixed throughout, but rather it owes to a seeming lack of fun in the demeanor of this work. In the process of concentrating on the family and chasing elements of the story, Simonsen somehow lost the sense of enthusiasm and charm that brought zest to his Ghostbusters: Afterlife score. Hence, we end up back at the comparison between The Adam Project and a typical, workmanlike Brian Tyler score. There's enough here to genuinely appreciate on album, and it all certainly suffices basically for the picture, but you'll leave the experience wanting more. ***
TRACK LISTINGS:
Total Time: 59:42
NOTES & QUOTES:
There exists no official packaging for this album.
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