Filmtracks Traffic Rank: #2,135
Written 5/13/21
Invert Colors
Buy it... if you have a proven history of appreciating the mood of
bleak, ambient film music of a largely synthetic nature.
Avoid it... if you expect more than only marginal connections to
Thomas Newman's more attractive subdued works, this thriller a
surprisingly anonymous bore.
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| Newman |
The Little Things: (Thomas Newman) Substantially
inspired by the 1995 cult favorite Seven, 2021's The Little
Things reprises the notion of two detectives in a dirty, grimy urban
environment hunting down a serial killer who knows all too much about
their personal lives and eventually taunts the hothead of the duo into
murdering him in a desert. The character issues of all three leads are
the focus of John Lee Hancock's modern noir thriller, their failures and
obsessions key to maintaining appeal. While the cast and crew contain a
number of all-stars, the film's depressing plot is dissatisfying,
intentionally left ambiguous at the end and allowing the viewer to
speculate about the identity of the true villain. It's an ambitiously
brazen attempt to recapture the intensity of Seven using many of
the same basic plot points, and audiences and critics weren't buying it.
The movie is one of those bleak mysteries that encourages you to hate
humanity more than you already may, with absolutely no redeeming
characteristics other than marginally interesting acting performances.
No matter how many times you yell at the screen to stop the obsessed
detective from killing the suspect out of frustration, it seems that we
are now to expect just that result. With the look and feel of the film
intentionally desolate and helpless, it's no surprise that The Little
Things is serviced by equally unattractive music. Composer Thomas
Newman had collaborated with Hancock on Saving Mr. Banks and
The Highwaymen, and his duties on this assignment were clear.
Newman explored a number of minimalistic, atmospheric works in the early
2000's as he transitioned away from orchestral lyricism, and The
Little Things is a wholesale return to some of the least accessible
entries from those days. Many such scores are unlistenable apart from
the film, and they add little more than a low level of taxing emotional
weight on screen. Newman's impact on this film is surprisingly inert; as
the heart of the screenplay involves a slow pursuit, the composer
instead leaves the listener with the same sense of stationary movement
at all times. Perhaps this technique is Newman's attempt to represent
the purposefully ambiguous resolution to the tale's many mysteries, for
the story really goes nowhere by the end. There is some minimal
narrative flow to the score, however, turning slightly brighter by the
conclusion in the shades of its instrumentation.
The tone of Newman's
The Little Things is
largely electronic, applying droning synthetic layers to a variety of
guitars and percussion, the latter representing some of the score's more
interesting elements. There are string and woodwind contributions at
times, though their applications could very well be synthetic in this
case. Expect the organic textures to supply very little warmth outside
of a few fleeting moments for the detectives. The composer attempts a
jazzy noir appeal in how he stylizes his instrumentation and
progressions in places, elevating the work beyond the worst of the
genre's non-descript norms. There aren't well-defined melodies in a
traditional sense, but there are indeed two motific explorations at
play. The score opens with the prickly rhythmic ramblings for the
suspect in the film, piano, guitar, and shaken percussion effects
offering the character a slightly foreign sound for whatever reason. The
full performances of this idea in "Chevy Nova" are reprised later in "I
Won't Bite," though the descending motific line continues to inform
chase cues. On the other side is a similarly repeated series of notes
for the detectives, but Newman twists the progression to a more
ascendant one, denoting some vague optimism. This idea really only
receives notable treatment in the concluding trio of "End of the World,"
"Red Barrette," and "A Dead Girl Wakes." By the latter two cues, the
detectives' motif accelerates into a loftier evolution of its core piano
figures. While this isn't the type of score to attract a significant
amount of intellectual appreciation, it's nice to hear Newman supply
motifs for both the detectives and suspect that are interrelated four
note cycles, likely as a nod to the psychological interplay in the
story. The final fifteen minutes of the score is its most accessible,
along with the oddly likeable "Reverend Captain" cue that brings
woodwind tones into the work. Outside of these cues, as well as the two
that really showcase the suspect's motif, the score for
The Little
Things has little to offer. At 55 minutes in running time on its
album, expect to lose patience with the score after half an hour. The
overall experience could be worse, as there is no cue from Newman here
that is purely insufferable, but the mass of the underscore is
disappointingly boring, struggling to maintain more than the most basic
of depressing mood. While Newman collectors will recognize specific
aspects of the score from his past,
The Little Things shares
surprisingly little DNA with the composer's lighter, airy atmospherics
that use similar instrumental foundations. Have your happy pills ready.
** @Amazon.com: CD or
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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.
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