Buy it... on the comprehensive, 2019 Intrada album if you own only a handful of James Horner's scores and are in search of the composer at his very best, Apollo 13 exhibiting an exemplary sense of historical patriotism and tension.

Avoid it... if the understated respect that Horner conveys in his rather short score for this film doesn't appeal to your need for more lavishly melodramatic efforts from other works during that fruitful period of his career.

Apollo 13: (James Horner) An impressive critical success across the board, 1995's Apollo 13 arguably remains director Ron Howard's most respected film. The humbly patriotic examination of this important piece of NASA history follows the events of the near disaster of Apollo 13's mission to the moon from the perspective of the Jim Lovell (Tom Hanks), Fred Haise (Bill Paxton), and Jack Swigert (Kevin Bacon), their friends and family, and mission control. Not often does a film with all the traits of a historical documentary stir up such popular interest, but a remarkable collection of cast performances, outstanding special effects, and a variety of awards recognition assisted Apollo 13 in its journey to mainstream acceptance. The film supplanted The Right Stuff as the industry benchmark for engaging depictions of past American space exploration, with subsequent pictures either emulating its mastery or intentionally avoiding direct competition with it. One of the film's more obvious elements was its music, with an intelligent collection of appropriate 1960's pop songs selected for inclusion in the film. Above and beyond that source usage, James Horner's rather short Oscar-nominated score, clocking in at about 75 minutes in total length, served as patriotic inspiration for many of the film's more exciting scenes. The year of 1995 was a most impressive one for Horner; fresh off of the overwhelming popularity of the superior Legends of the Fall, he produced two above-average scores for children's films, Balto and Casper. Next came his two Academy Award nominated gems, Braveheart and Apollo 13, and while the legacy of Braveheart has persisted and eventually overshadowed Apollo 13 to a great extent, debates continue within the soundtrack community about which of the two is actually a better fit for its film. In this regard, Apollo 13 triumphs, partly because it works while restraining its understated patriotism so well, and partly because it reflects the film's vastly more intelligent design. There is really no way to appreciate Horner's music fully without also appreciating the high quality of the film itself. The composer's heroic theme epitomizes the patriotic American spirit, and its sincerity and raw, dedicated, and serious power drives the score with the perfect feel of a respectful historical documentary.

Several motifs are utilized by Horner in Apollo 13, but one primary pair of themes defines most of the score. Aside from the inevitable comparisons to Aaron Copland that some listeners will force upon this theme and its noble solo trumpet sub-motif (in some scores, these complaints are valid, but here they're a stretch), Horner's attitude is distilled with reverence. This melody never dances and twirls, nor does it try to get cute or bloated, as many believe a score like Independence Day to be. As Horner stated in early 1995, "If you start off with a big score, it sets an audience up for just another sci-fi movie... except Apollo 13 is a documentary; you know where it's going to end. What I'm trying to get out of the story is the idealism." And the distinction between fantasy and stark reality is very strong in Apollo 13. There are indeed moments of whimsical wonder for the dreams of great space exploration, but the score never deviates from the dark and occasionally frightening realities that the dangers of space travel present. The main thematic expressions, led by a lonely and simple, seven-note rising and falling fanfare for NASA, are dominated by brass, which is appropriate for the American spirit of adventure. Aside from the launching sequence and heroic climax of the astronauts' return, the noble NASA motif and associated primary theme are performed mostly by solitary trumpet solos by veteran film score performer Tim Morrison. The brass represents the far-reaching aspirations of NASA, and in myriad incarnations, it maintains the vast and solitary plight of a small space capsule in such an enormous void. The horns often echo into the distance (in fact, it's built directly into the main theme's constructs), which also signifies the vastness of space. The momentous, massively orchestral mounting of theme during the launch sequence, despite not being the most dense of melodic expression to be heard in Horner's career, can send shivers up a person's spine when combined with the awesome visuals on the screen. The final climactic return to that grand theme unfolds when the capsule emerges from radio silence and the crew is discovered alive. The short choral statement of the idea during Hanks' epilogic dialogue is extraordinarily redeeming. These extroverted passages represent twenty minutes of action on screen (as well as the end credits), and they have come to define the score.

Beyond the primary pairing of melody in Apollo 13 exist many other ideas hard at work. Every part of the orchestra is utilized to its best talents, using the soloists of the ensemble much like NASA's mission control center collecting ideas during the height of the film's panic. As a brilliant move, Horner employed the voice of Annie Lennox to perform classy wordless vocals twice in the score. Lennox's voice itself has almost a historical significance alone in American culture, and her low tone enhances the dramatic and dark aspect of the score for one crucial cue, "The Dark Side of the Moon." Her voice seemingly represents the moon itself, inviting and beckoning the astronauts towards her yet forbidding and cold at the same time. The solemn cue lures Tom Hanks' Jim Lovell into a dream-like state, where the heroic brass theme starts to build in his fantasy; as reality sets in, only Lennox's bittersweet voice remains. She returns for a rousing and very enjoyable performance of the title theme at the opening of the end credits, which is enhanced by a powerful synthetic rhythm. Combined with a choir and electronic base, the format of this presentation will remind many listeners of Glory. The synthetic elements and choir are both used with great effect in the score. The pulsating electronics build the momentum as the launch sequence nears liftoff and represent the technically sophisticated nature of what we are watching. In a way, it also infuses a subliminal sense of coolness into the equation, a touch restrained as to not interfere with the austere personality of the picture while also nodding to all the song placements. It also establishes the strong beat and determination that the marching snare drums cannot achieve alone. The snare, as in many other Horner scores, is used to a great degree in Apollo 13; it is perhaps more appropriate in this film than a few of the others considering the militaristic and governmental influences in the story. On the other hand, Horner's typical use of a children's choir is always entertaining. This was a period in time when Horner was using the choir in almost all of his scores, and it creates a perfect fantasyland for the Apollo 13 astronauts. Its light, whimsical touch floats like the weightlessness itself, beginning as the crew members take off their helmets in space for the first time and concluding during the slow-motion finale of the film, as to foreshadow future expeditions into space by the Apollo missions.

To accommodate the character establishment of Apollo 13, the score does take a while to get jumpstarted, with the songs chosen for the film dominating early scenes. Once the launch sequence pushes the score into gear, the songs are largely confined to short bursts on the astronauts' tape players. (By the start of the landing sequence, the songs are completely absent). Two parts of the score that are rarely discussed are Horner's ideas for tension and panic. The tension is palpable when watching the film, and Horner contributes to it by understating his suspense cues. The "Docking" cue uses a synthetic choral effect along with a slowly marching timpani, string, and wood block rhythm to build to an elegant but subtle climax. The uneasy trumpet solos in this cue are a perfect representation of the balance of confidence and nervousness in the capsule during the scene. The rhythm adds great suspense and even dread to the tricky task of aligning and attaching the two space vehicles; the rumbling holds its breath in a single, pulsating note until the docking is completed, at which time the timpani suddenly quits. In the latter half of the score, Horner pulls out a variety of lightly tapping percussion to accompany mission control and the astronauts during their thought processes. In the cues "Into the L.E.M.," "Carbon Dioxide," and especially "Four More Amps," Horner's slight, but effective use of wood block, snare, and the tingling of cymbals represents the transferring of an electrical current. This interesting technique is expanded upon for the score's one panic cue, "Master Alarm," in which Horner makes the most the crashing, descending piano motif that he introduced a few years earlier in scores like The Pelican Brief and would extend into Titanic. The continued tapping of wood block, snare, and cymbal signifies the energy trickling out of the damaged spacecraft, while the frantic bursts from the piano accompany the wildly pitching instability of that capsule. The cue appropriately ends as suddenly as it began, as Lovell's discovery of the horrifying truth of the situation sinks in. An extension of this sound is more unorganized in the later "Manual Burn" cue, easily the weakest two minutes of the score. None of these sequences, whether for the eerie suspense or the outright panic, is supplied with substantially recurring thematic constructs, though the snare and wood block rhythms remain fairly consistent, as does Horner's typical, guarded optimism with rising bass region figures.