Reviews

CD review: WHAT MAISIE KNEW soundtrack

By DANIEL SCHWEIGER 08/08/2013
WHAT MAISE KNEW soundtrack | ©2013 Milan Records

As a composer with a sensibility as rhythmic as it is eccentrically loopy, Devotchka’s Nick Urata has captured the ups and downs of adult relationships with such charming scores as CRAZY, STUPID, LOVE, RUBY SPARKS and ARTHUR NEWMAN. What makes WHAT MAISIE KNEW particularly striking is how gentle Urata is in his approach, but no less ironic as he evokes a children’s sensibility to depict a little girl who’s caught in a tug of war between her divorced parents and their new amours. It’s an “Alice in Wonderland” approach where a fantasia of bells, gentle pianos, halting strings and a […]Read On »


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CD review: CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER

By DANIEL SCHWEIGER 08/07/2013
CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER soundtrack | ©2013 Intrada Records

Horner fans will have a field day with this complete presentation for the composer’s second stab at Jack Ryan, Intrada’s two-CD set offering a virtual checklist of everything that’s great about the composer’s unabashed symphonic sensibilities. CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER offers the heroic outrage in full swing, from a valorous main theme to another mournful take on a classical piece (here reprising Aram Khachaturian’s “Gayane Ballet Suite” after ALIENS) and a organic-electronic mastery of world music – here tuned to the South American drug war. CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER was a welcome change of pace after Horner accompanied America’s favorite […]Read On »


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CD review: STUCK IN LOVE soundtrack

By DANIEL SCHWEIGER 08/06/2013
STUCK IN LOVE soundtrack | ©2013 Varese Sarabande Records

Nate Walcott (of the group Bright Eyes) and Mike Mogis go from the elderly, ironically enchanted vibe of the excellent Alzheimer’s film LOVELY, STILL to STUCK IN LOVE, a far younger-skewing picture about a romantic roundelay of a writer’s family, producing LOVE‘s score as well as its indie-centric songs. “At Your Door” (featuring Big Harp) has an fun, determined bounce, while teaming with Friends of Gemini for the similarly upbeat “Somersaults in Spring.” Other tunes range from the meh strumming of Conor Oberst’s “You Are Your Mother’s Child” to the likewise indistinct rock of Polkadot’s “Like Pioneers” to pretty good […]Read On »


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CD review: TAKE THIS WALTZ soundtrack

By DANIEL SCHWEIGER 08/05/2013
TAKE THIS WALTZ soundtrack | ©2013 Movie Score Media

A prolific Canadian composer whose most popular film might still be his scoring debut out of the slasher gate with 1982s VISITING HOURS, Jonathan Goldsmith has since written far more delicate works, especially for director Sarah Polley on AWAY FROM HER and STORIES WE TELL. There’s a real feminine sensitivity to the actress-turned-filmmaker’s work, a tenderness that Goldsmith captures with surreal enchantment for the exceptional romantic drama TAKE THIS WALTZ. As Polley depicts the slow, sensual burn towards a marriage-ending affair, Goldsmith captures her breathless anticipation with music box bells and the light tap of a piano, graced with muted […]Read On »


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CD review: REMEMBER ME soundtrack

By DANIEL SCHWEIGER
REMEMBER ME soundtrack | ©2013 Capcom

Olivier Derivière’s name first dealt with amnesia in his videogame soundtrack for 2008s ALONE IN THE DARK, where a memory-wiped tough guy battled demons in an apocalyptic NYC. Now he’s back in who-am-I style for Nilin, an acrobatic ass-kicker from 2084 Neo-Paris that really levels up for this French musician with his new game score for REMEMBER ME. As Nilin seeks to reclaim her past while re-arranging the memories of others, Derivière comes up with a striking approach that might be best described as a trip-hop spin on Don Davis’ scores for THE MATRIX series. Here it’s given a brighter […]Read On »


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CD review: NO PLACE ON EARTH soundtrack

By DANIEL SCHWEIGER 08/04/2013
NO PLACE ON EARTH soundtrack | ©2013 Varese Sarabande Records

It’s almost disarming how pleasant John Piscitello’s documentary score is when you think that it’s for a Holocaust movie about Ukrainian Jews who find shelter, and safety from the Holocaust in the bowels of a giant, utterly dark cave. While Piscitello evokes the string-shivering danger of the depths these survivors are reduced to, the main feeling that NO PLACE ON EARTH evokes is a hauntingly beautiful nostalgia for a past, an innocence that can’t be reclaimed. Think of this gently melodic score as the visions that these people see in the dark, tonal visualizations light and love of homes and […]Read On »


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CD review: BENEATH and WE STEAL SECRETS

By DANIEL SCHWEIGER
BENEATH soundtrack | ©2013 Milan Records

Spinning out a groovily weird indie score beat with the likes of ANOTHER EARTH, 28 HOTEL ROOMS and NOBODY WALKS, the collective called Fall On Your Sword (otherwise known as Will Bates, doing that Daft Punk mask think on his company’s website) has managed to sound different with each soundtrack, especially when dealing with the dual horrors of killer fish and our government’s clandestine activities. Probably the wackiest, and perhaps creepiest musical-design treatment that a mega-piranha has yet gotten, BENEATH uses teeth-scraping metallic effects and berserk buzzing, so much so that the score’s subject feels like it’s about a swarm […]Read On »


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TV Review: FALLING SKIES – Season 3 – “Journey to Xilbalba”

By EGAN BRUMLEY
Noah Wyle in FALLING SKIES - Season 3 - "Journey to Xibalba" | ©2013 TNT/James Dittiger

Stars:  Noah Wyle, Moon Bloodgood, Drew Roy, Jessy Schram, Maxim Knight, Connor Jessup, Will Patton, Colin Cunningham, Sarah Sanguin Carter, Seychelle Gabriel, Mpho Koaho, Gloria Reuben, Robert Sean Leonard Writer: Bradley Thompson and David Weddle Director: Jonathan Frakes Network: TNT, airs Sunday Nights Original Telecast: July 28, 2013 After faltering last week, FALLING SKIES rebounds mightily this week with “Journey to Xilbalba,” the strongest episode to date of this series’ wildly uneven third season.  While not entirely free of some of the show’s most exasperating elements, the pressure cooker of a plot makes it so that nearly every character is […]Read On »


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TV Review: FALLING SKIES – Season 3 – “Strange Brew”

By EGAN BRUMLEY
Gloria Reuben in FALLING SKIES - Season 3 - "Strange Brew" | ©2013 TNT/James Dittiger

Stars:  Noah Wyle, Moon Bloodgood, Drew Roy, Jessy Schram, Maxim Knight, Connor Jessup, Will Patton, Colin Cunningham, Sarah Sanguin Carter, Seychelle Gabriel, Mpho Koaho, Gloria Reuben, Robert Sean Leonard Writer: John Wirth Director: David Soloman Network: TNT, airs Sunday Nights Original Telecast: July 21, 2013 “Strange Brew” begins very differently than we might have expected it to, given that the FALLING SKIES episode that preceded it climaxed with Tom Mason (Noah Wyle) being captured by the Espheni, the alien menace that has invaded earth.  Instead of keeping us in the present, with the aliens and the war for humanity’s future […]Read On »


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Movie Review: THE SMURFS 2

By PAMELA HARLAND
THE SMURFS 2 movie poster | ©2013 Sony Pictures

Rating: PG Stars: Neil Patrick Harris, Katy Perry, Hank Azaria, Jayma Mays Writers: J. David Stern, David N. Weiss, Jay Scherick, David Ronn, Karey Kirkpatrick Director: Raja Gosnell Distributor: Sony Release Date: July 31, 2013 Rarely do I get to sit with my 10-year-old daughter and enjoy a movie equally as much as she does. But, alas, I did just that watching THE SMURFS 2. A fun and tender story about choosing how you want to live your life and that family isn’t necessarily something you are born into. SMURFS 2 opens with the diabolical Gargamel (Hank Azaria) plotting to […]Read On »


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