At the time of
Cinderella Man, Newman had been
experiencing a second renaissance in his career for a couple of years,
with
Finding Nemo,
Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate
Events, and the television series "Angels in America" all leading
the highly talented composer on a path away from his rhythmically
plunking, instrumentally bizarre experimentation of the late 1990's and
early 2000's. As one would expect,
Cinderella Man demands a
weightier dramatic presence much closer to the sound of "Angels in
America" and the composer's popular mid-1990's output than that of
American Beauty and its relatives. Fans of the era in Newman's
career in which he announced his presence to the world with scores like
The Shawshank Redemption and
Little Women will be
impressed and heartened by the sincerity of emotional depth in
Cinderella Man. While the bravado and large-scale symphonic
crescendos of "Angels in America" and his other successes of this period
are not present in the vast majority of
Cinderella Man, the score
is built upon a solid orchestral foundation worthy of the 1930's era.
That said, most of Newman's effort meanders in the distance, allowing
the atmosphere inherent in the picture to be the primary storyteller. In
early portions of the score, Newman offers stark piano performances of
an easily digestible theme of slight Americana spirit that is dampened
by a slight atonality that is likely applied to convey a sense of hope
while also remaining rooted in the serious financial troubles of the
film's primary characters. The pace of these sequences in the score is
extremely slow, almost painstakingly so, and a certain amount of
patience is required of the listener when wading through the album
presentation. The cue "Cold Meat Party" consists of forty seconds
featuring only a droning sound effect, reflecting the mood of the
surrounding cues. These appropriately understated passages in the score
extend from start to finish, with only a handful of notable
exceptions.
The first cue of significant ensemble volume, "Corn
Griffin," provides a driving drum rhythm over a single, lengthy brass
and string note, culminating in a cymbal-tapping crescendo. One of two
major Irish-influenced pieces in the score is "The Hope of the Irish,"
for which fiddles and seven or eight other solo musicians perform from
the standard collection of Newman's instrumental diversity. These ideas
are later expanded upon in "Turtle" at the end of the album, and outside
of these two cues, there is surprisingly little ethnic expression in
Cinderella Man. The plucking and chopping staccato rhythms that
have defined much of Newman's career make a token appearance with the
strings in "Pugilism," set over a deep drum array. Piano solos over a
bed of slightly exotic shades carry over from the somber moments of
sentimentality in
Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate
Events. It takes until "Big Right" near the end of the film before
the heroism of the story is finally reflected at any level by Newman,
with that cue offering the first satisfying, large-scale presentation of
brass in a full-ensemble thematic performance. In the two subsequent
cues, which alternate between the elegance of Newman's soft sense of
resolution and the established, restrained string themes, the tone
features much in common with sections of "Angels in America," especially
in the fluttering of the woodwinds. Overall, the album for
Cinderella
Man features less than 30 minutes of score material, with the cues
(sometimes beginning with the sound effects of crowd noise) often
exiting as quickly as they enter. The period songs are understandably
appropriate but break the flow of Newman's score; they probably should
have been condensed to the end of the product. The final handful of
triumphant cues indicates yet another strong score from Newman, but it
takes a while to get there, and with the shortness of the cues and the
lack of much relation between the score and songs, the album will lose
the interest of all but the most dedicated listeners or enthusiasts of
the movie. Never the less, Newman's proven ability to state heroism in
various layers of solemn restraint, especially with the continued
application of his unusual instrumentation, is impressive enough to
barely earn a fourth star.
**** @Amazon.com: CD or
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