The score is bookended with some very impressive "Whoville" songs. These songs blend seamlessly with the score, and I commend Mr. Horner for giving them his all. They are very Dr. Seuss appropriate (a tribute, if you will). The best of them (in my opinion) is the finale (23. He Carves The Roast Beast). Track 17, "Christmas, Why Can't I Find You," is a Horner/Jennings song sung by the child actress in the film, Taylor Momsen. If you couldn't stand John Williams' "When You're Alone" from Hook, this one will be hard to sit through. She oversings the part (in my opinion).

For those of you confused about this release, all of the music Horner composed for the film is located at the end of the cd (the last 9 tracks). These tracks total up to a little over 40 minutes of music. Not bad...

All in all, I'm happy with my purchase. Out of the 10 "inspired by" songs that appear BEFORE the score actually kicks in, there are 2-3 semi-decent songs (Ben Folds, Smash Mouth, and the traditional "You're a Mean One..." sung by Mr. Carrey himself). As a whole I could have done without them (go figure). As for the score, it stands out as a good, solid effort on Horner's part, and I think the majority of Horner's fans will be very pleased. Those who are sick of Horner's recycling methods should give this one a chance. While Horner's "style" has been his "style" since the very beginning of his career (and yes, it's apparent in this score) - you will not find any Appalachian Springs/Bobby Fischer/Deep Impact/Bicentennial Man/Perfect Storm recaps. If I had to put my finger on one score that is similar (just a tad), it would be "Casper." And that's certainly not a bad one to be recycling.

A perfect christmas score.

GO Horner!

I've been perusing this forum's comments and discussions for a couple months now, and I've found this board to be the most engaging and informative source of movie music info out there. Ok...enough brown-nosing...

I was getting Apollo13 hotflashes there for a minute...I must admit the I'm a mindless Horner drone...I hope I didn't just ruin my reputation on the first post.

Thanks for the input...btw: is the dialogue annoying?

Hope to hear from you more!

"James Horner scores a travesty of a mockery of a sham of a mockery of a travesty of two mockeries of a sham"

OR

"James Horner scores a total sacrilege"

I will gladly respond with messages of hate.

I want my full score release.
If you do a job, you should do it right.

Interscope didn't.
I won't support half measures and incompetence.

Apollo 13 and all CDs like it make me sick.

In addition, my only real problem with Apollo13 was how the dialogue was blended/faded into the score. As long as they are isolated tracks on this release, I'll be appeased.

Please take my word when I say that "The Grinch" has provided us with a new, refreshing score from James Horner. Not recycled. A believe me, I can't believe I'm typing that! JJ and I both agreed that this will provide him with NEW material to rip and use in future scores! Woohoo!

Jeron

This is a great score as I said earlier, now that I've heard about 22 min of it (some little bird sent me a big suite) its the perfect christmas score!

--Kyppy
Writer/Editor

Oh, MY god!!!!!!!

Jeron

As for Goldsmith or Williams scoring the movie...I love them both, Williams would have done a fine job, but has Goldsmith scored anything along these lines? I can't recall...anyway, Elfman and Horner would have been my clear choices from the get go.

I think Goldsmith would have been a horrible choice for the Grinch. The Grinch score needed to have a very cheery and busy Christmas feel as well as experiencing periods of dark moodiness that still didn't take itself too seriously. In my opinion, Goldsmith would not have been able to create any of this. His style is too heavy and one sided.

Williams on the other hand would have easily been able to do a great job with this film, and not just because he's John Williams. Williams' style of almost "Mickey Mousing" stuff but not too much would have fit the Grinch perfectly...kind of like is great Home Alone christmas stuff.

But I enjoyed Horner's score very much. Especially the end with the sleigh full of presents and carving the roast beast. Great stuff.

Elfman would have been okay, but I don't know if he could have created that shimmering "warm fuzzy" kind of Christmas music that the end of the film demanded. His Grinch theme would have been great though...