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Review of Meet the Robinsons (Danny Elfman)
FILMTRACKS RECOMMENDS:
Buy it... if you explicitly enjoy the explosively haphazard
movement and zany styles of Danny Elfman's most quirky comedy and kiddie
music from years past.
Avoid it... if you expect an overall package that plays like much more than a collection of Elfman's readily predictable techniques.
FILMTRACKS EDITORIAL REVIEW:
Meet the Robinsons: (Danny Elfman) In the messy
relationship between Walt Disney Pictures and Pixar over the past ten
years, A Day with Wilbur Robinson came at perhaps the most
inopportune time. Already in production when the official merger of the
two animation powerhouses occurred, the Stephen J. Anderson film was
deemed to have major problems by Pixar when they got their hands on it.
It has essentially be reported that the original adaptation of William
Joyce's 1993 book by Disney had few flaws, but that meddling and other
delays had caused the film's plot to dissolve into a mess, and Pixar
prodded Anderson to clean up both the film's second-act scenes (in the
future) and its villain. Along the way, the film was delayed by several
months and its title changed to Meet the Robinsons. The plot
remains faithful to the inspirational book, with an adopted boy genius
inventing a machine that can scan memories and tell him who his real
family is; when he's transported into the future by members of the
Robinson family, he discovers --to nobody's surprise-- that all the
misfits around him are the answer to his questions. The myriad of
strange futuristic characters, none of whom actually seeming related,
presented the problem for Pixar, for their nonsensical relationships and
ultra-strange renderings seemed better suited for one of Tim Burton's
normal psychodelic projects than a mainstream kid's flick. It's no
wonder, therefore, that Danny Elfman stepped into the project, despite
trying to avoid straight animation throughout his career, and
immediately found inspiration.
In the process of writing the score and one song for the picture, Elfman comments, "I've done 60 films, but I can only think of maybe 6 that went this smoothly." Unbothered by the rest of the film's problems, Elfman seems to have latched on to both the emotions of the story and its array of quirky characters and run with "stuff like Carl Stalling" while also writing "big themes" in a "funny retro attitude." Perhaps most telling of Elfman's score would be his statement that "the family's so over the top and what sparked me is that their movements are so quick and sudden." For Elfman collectors, the age of Pee Wee immediately comes to mind. Elfman's contribution to Meet the Robinsons featured a short, but robust recording with a 90-member ensemble, as well as a chorus which gets considerable airtime in the score. "The choral music adds more color," Elfman comments. "They can do things that no other instrument can do." And it is indeed the group of singers that creates the tone of the score. His employment of the choir is similar in style to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, shifting them from traditional wordless performances to lyrical, song-like incantations on a whim. When you step back from Meet the Robinsons and look at the all of the score's parts in sum, it's still hard to think of it as anything other than a collection of extremely faithful and predictable Elfmanisms, leaving the cohesiveness of the whole somewhat in doubt. A very dry recording mix cheapens the size of the ensemble, accentuating the choppiness of the strings' perpetually staggered performances. It's an "Elfman stream of consciousness" score, moving from the rhythms of Flubber to the instrumentation of Mars Attacks!, the stark gothic demeanor of The Nightmare Before Christmas, the brassy bombast of Beetlejuice, the sensitive modern emotions of The Family Man, the sly thematic style of Men in Black, and the outwardly explosive schizophrenia of Pee Wee's Big Adventure all within a minute or two. A definite return to his roots in the 1980's is on display, not necessarily in the rock elements, but in the pure zaniness of the conceptual constructs. Frankly, if James Horner attracts detractors due to his self-ripoff artistry, then Elfman deserves the same detractors here for being so readily predictable. That doesn't mean, as usual, that the music isn't effective. Elfman provides a theme for young Lewis in the lead, as well as appropriately cartoonish ideas for the family and the evil bowler hat. Aside from Lewis' primary theme, however, which brackets the film well (especially coming around in "A Family United"), none of Elfman's themes are presented in an easily transparent fashion. You quickly get the impression that texture and atmosphere were primary. The future is treated with Elfman's trademark electric organ, retro female choral cuteness, and the theremin (which, when combined with the organ, seems like overkill). Combining these elements together in "Pop Quiz" creates an effect so annoyingly packaged in bright, hip retro attitude that you almost wish some To Die For guitars would let rip into it. There's an aspect of Meet the Robinsons that keeps you glued to it, and yet you set yourself up for that sudden moment where the bubble in your brain pops and you just have to get away from it. If you find little value or humor in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Flubber, and Mars Attacks!, then Meet the Robinsons will similarly irritate you. It's really a procedural extension of Elfman's Pee Wee music, but without the suite-like format of consistency from scene to scene. Only a handful of cues in Meet the Robinsons last long enough to establish a mood, and that delightful sense of wonder that Elfman often infuses into his work is largely replaced here by a sense of crazed, attention-deficit-induced mania. There are individual moments that stand out as a better representation of Elfman's previous efforts, including the lengthier choral performances in the lower ranges (as heard in "Goob's Story" and "The Evil Plan," the latter of which will likely be the favorite cue for those whose brains can't handle Elfman's frantic pace). The only song written by Elfman for Meet the Robinsons was "The Future has Arrived," a twisted, teenie-bopper rock extension of the retro sound heard in the "To the Future!" score track. The remainder of the original songs were composed by Rufus Wainwright, Jamie Callum, and Rob Thomas, as inspired by the film's story, and while none of their light rock contributions is either spectacular or detrimental, their differing styles (along with Elfman's own song) cause the block of songs some consistency problems. The same wild variation plagues the final two songs, which together don't make any sense whatsoever (outside of commercialistic goals). Overall, the 30 minutes of Elfman score are so wild in pacing and stylistic reinvention that the half hour will seem like a whole one on album. It's a "best of" compilation of Elfman's previous ideas haphazardly thrown together in a package that ranges from highly entertaining to completely insufferable in parts. Fun? Yes. Listenable? Good question. If you consider yourself a die-hard Elfman nut, then this is your test.
TRACK LISTINGS:
Total Time: 52:45
NOTES & QUOTES:
The insert includes no extra information about the score or film.
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