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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 Download

Bias Check:

For Thomas Newman reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.14 (in 37 reviews) and the average viewer rating is 3.18 (in 60,837 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.

Total Time: 47:01