Alan J Moore's Film Music Chat

Took me quite a while to get into the film and its soundtrack – but in the end, I enjoyed the music and the story.

Any thoughts about the music?  Does it deserve all the acclaim?

I found it slightly too diverse and wanted something a bit more cohesive.  Having said that, I did enjoy many of the tracks and can see this working well as an album…

MIA – Paper Planes ["Slumdog Millionaire" Movie Music Video]

A Millionaire? But when the show breaks for the night, police arrest him on suspicion of cheating; how could a street kid know so much? Desperate to prove his innocence, Jamal tells the story of his life in the slum where he and his brother grew up, of their adventures together on the road, of vicious encounters with local gangs, and of Latika (Pinto), the girl he loved and lost. Each chapter of his story reveals the key to the answer to one of the game show’s questions.

Bet you thought it was ‘The Jazz Singer’ that had the first movie soundtrack!

Well, Al Jolson did sing a song, but the first full-length soundtrack was ‘The Lights of New York.’

Read more about it on the TG Daily website: World’s first full-length talkie is 81 today

Here’s an interesting ditty from one of my favourite artists…

The Call – Regina Spektor (Prince Caspian film version)

(SPOILER ALERT for those who haven’t seen the film yet.)

The Call by Regina Spektor, which plays during the farewell scene from Prince Caspian. This is the movie version.

When I first heard it in theatres, I didn’t think much of it, mainly because I was too distracted by a pop song playing in the film before it had ended. But when I listened to it on the soundtrack, it was so heart wrenching and bittersweet it almost made me tear up. I think saying goodbye to Narnia forever is the hardest thing Peter and Susan had to do. Even when Lucy turns back to look at Aslan, and he looks back with those knowing eyes, as if to say, “It’s okay I’ll see you again,” just tears at your heart.

NOTE: Please do go watch the film properly and in its entirety in theatres! I highly discourage downloading the bootlegged version if you haven’t already gone to the cinema. There’s nothing like watching it on big screen, and it is definitely worth the eight or nine or ten bucks.

I downloaded this purely for reference, and then figured that since there wasn’t the film version of the end song anywhere, I’d put it up. I am going to watch it again in theatres at least once or more.

PS. Oh and Susan should NEVER have kissed Caspian. The whole romance was wrong. Had to get that out.

PPS. Since we’ve been getting a lot of questions about Lucy and Edmund’s dialogue.
Lucy: I’m sure when I’m older I’ll understand.
Edmund: I’m older, and I don’t think I want to understand.

Star Wars Soundtrack – Darth Vader’s theme (Imperial March)

Darth Vader’s theme song. Music composed by John Williams. The music of Star Wars consists of the scores written for all six Star Wars films by composer John Williams between 1977 and 1983 for the Original Trilogy, and 1999 and 2005 for the Prequel Trilogy. More broadly, it refers to any music that is used to depict the larger Star Wars Universe, which would include music for Star Wars video games, and other media. John Williams’ scores for the double trilogy count among the most widely-known and popular contributions to modern film music.

The scores utilize an eclectic variety of musical styles, many culled from the Late Romantic idiom of Richard Strauss and his contemporaries that itself was incorporated into the Golden Age Hollywood scores of Erich Korngold and Max Steiner. While several obvious nods to Holst, Walton and Stravinsky exist in the score to Episode IV, Williams relied less and less on classical references in the latter five scores, incorporating more strains of modernist orchestral writing with each progressive score. The reasons for Williams’ tapping of a familiar Romantic idiom are known to involve Lucas’ desire to ground the otherwise strange and fantastic setting in well-known, audience-accessible music. Williams tapped into the audience-accessibility in the first lines of the original theme by using a familiar song from a popular Oscar winning movie soundtrack from a few years before. Williams has widely maintained that his original theme is the theme song from Born Free played in reverse. He used this as a “subliminal hook” to capture his audience. Indeed, Lucas maintains much of the trilogy’s success relies not on advanced visual effects, but on the simple, direct emotional appeal of its plot, characters and, importantly, music.

Star Wars is often credited as heralding the beginning of a revival of grand symphonic scores in the late 1970s. While to ascribe this feat single-handedly to Williams is premature, the popularity and impact of the scores was a major contribution. One technique in particular has had a particular influence: Williams’s revival of a technique called “Leitmotiv”, which is most famously associated with the operas of Wagner and, in film scores, with Steiner. A “leitmotif” is a phrase or melodic cell that signifies a character, place, plot element, mood, idea, relationship or other specific part of the film. It is commonly used in modern film scoring, as a device to mentally anchor certain parts of a film to the soundtrack. Of chief importance for a “leitmotif” is that it must be strong enough for a listener to latch onto while being flexible enough to undergo variation and development.