Filmtracks Traffic Rank: #689
Written 6/15/98, Revised 9/2/06
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Buy it... if you are comfortable hearing trademark James Horner
styles performed with dramatic restraint for a simple, but lovely
score.
Avoid it... if Horner fails to impress you with his relative lack
of diversity within the light drama genre.
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| Horner |
The Man Without a Face: (James Horner) Mel Gibson
has never been a man without a face, especially after his goofy,
infamous mugshot was plastered everywhere in 2006, but he played exactly
that in his directorial debut in 1993. Based on a novel by Isabelle
Holland, The Man Without a Face featured Gibson in the title
role, a recluse in a small coastal town who works alone as a freelance
illustrator. His face is deformed by a car accident many years earlier,
and with the circumstances of his wife's death unclear, nasty rumors
spread about the nature of his character. A 12-year-old boy who lives in
a dysfunctional household nearby befriends the man, raising controversy
and threat, though eventually leading to salvation. For James Horner,
the project would unite the composer with Gibson; the two would produce
the immensely popular Braveheart a few years later. Horner's
output in 1993 was wildly unpredictable, with several of his scores
leaning towards minimalistic structures and instrumentation. That
influence can be heard in the restraint that Horner exercises in The
Man Without a Face. Despite being a considerably melodic, harmonic
effort performed by the awesome force of the London Symphony Orchestra,
the score is remarkably subdued. The size of the ensemble is one of the
primary reasons why The Man Without a Face is considered with
high praise by many Horner collectors. The composer, since expanding the
number of projects he would tackle each year, would rarely utilize the
services of the LSO, a group that caused many of the composer's previous
large-scale compositions to soar. With Horner conducting ensembles
ranging from 4 to 50 members at the time, the depth of his drama here is
its major selling point. Structurally speaking, though, it has really no
unique identifier to separate it from other scores that Horner has
produced before and since.
The title theme and its auxiliary parts are elegantly
simple, often devoid of counterpoint, with basic string, piano, and
woodwind performances that mirror the style of John Barry's scores at
the time while remaining saturated with Horner's own sensibilities.
Every part of the thematic constructs in
The Man Without a Face
can be linked in some way to another Horner score. The overall ability
to merge the melancholy with the hopeful, mostly in the nuances of the
performance (and particularly in the piano), will remind you of
Casper. The actual flow of the themes takes many hints from
secondary themes in
The Land Before Time. Both of these aspects
can be heard right off the bat in "A Father's Legacy," a cue that serves
as the highlight of the album. In the "Flying" cue, Horner employs a
four-note motif heard to a greater extent in
Sneakers and is,
more or less, a major key variation on the famed "motif of evil" heard
in
Willow and other 80's Horner works. That "Flying" cue is
another highlight of the score, using light percussive rhythms to propel
the cue with the score's only sense of true exuberance. The remainder of
the score is predictably pleasant, led often by solo woodwind or piano.
One exception is "Nightmares and Revelations," which introduces some low
bass region dissonance in strings. There are a few creative twists along
the way, such as Horner's use of intensely quivering strings reaching a
crescendo before melting into a smooth flow of the title theme... a
musical representation of the concept of gained trust at the heart of
the film. But otherwise, the score contains nothing to really get
excited about. You need to be able to turn off your critical ears in
order to enjoy
The Man Without a Face, because it truly is stock
Horner drama. The album throws on the "Ch'Ella Mi Creda" opera piece
from the film, and it's a striking contrast in style to Horner's far
more restrained work. Overall, the score gains your respect for its
ability to lull you into its intimate sphere, especially given the usual
fine, deep performance by the LSO, but if Horner fails to impress you
with diversity, then
The Man Without a Face could very well bore
you to death.
**** @Amazon.com: CD or
Download
Bias Check:
For James Horner reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.15
(in 108 reviews) and the average viewer rating is 3.23
(in 203,515 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.
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