...haha! Well, it looks like the best tracks from the score are on the CD (Hog Chase Part I & II). It's hard sometimes with an action score, because a lot of the music is buried in the sound effects. The main titles are scored very cool like, with whirling string writing... the "Hog Chase" cues are very frantic at first, properly mimicking the action, while later in "Hog Chase Part II" (I'm assuming, since I don't have the CD) the score turns very heroic, actually a combination it sounded like, of both frenetic and heroics. What's so good about all of this is that Powell's heroic theme doesn't sound childish like it belongs in an animated film (Antz or Shrek), but mature and original; there were no hints of Hans Zimmer throughout, which is excellent since I felt Face/Off was a bit silly with it's faux Z music. I really think that this score is an excellent outing for Powell, piushing away from anything Zimmerish—but, of course, there will be those who will think that it's nonsense, and dislike John Woo, as well (which is very silly, IMO, considering all the rubbish action films that came out in the past year—see Bad Boys II and Tears of the Sun).

Hadrian, I'm pretty sure you and I generally have the same liking of John Powell, so this score will not dissapoint (it may even surprise you, like it did me).

[Message edited by sean on 12-26-2003]

During the film, the music ranged from right on target to oddly inappropriate. There were times when Powell was using the woodwinds to dance around and do all this jumpy stuff during some of the chase scenes and the result was that I didn't feel that the main character was in any danger at all...it sounded almost playful and I feel took away some of the film's "edge." Other times, the music seemed very good.

quote:

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Originally posted by sean:
I bet!

...haha! Well, it looks like the best tracks from the score are on the CD (Hog Chase Part I & II). It's hard sometimes with an action score, because a lot of the music is buried in the sound effects. The main titles are scored very cool like, with whirling string writing... the "Hog Chase" cues are very frantic at first, properly mimicking the action, while later in "Hog Chase Part II" (I'm assuming, since I don't have the CD) the score turns very heroic, actually a combination it sounded like, of both frenetic and heroics. What's so good about all of this is that Powell's heroic theme doesn't sound childish like it belongs in an animated film (Antz or Shrek), but mature and original; there were no hints of Hans Zimmer throughout, which is excellent since I felt Face/Off was a bit silly with it's faux Z music. I really think that this score is an excellent outing for Powell, piushing away from anything Zimmerish—but, of course, there will be those who will think that it's nonsense, and dislike John Woo, as well (which is very silly, IMO, considering all the rubbish action films that came out in the past year—see Bad Boys II and Tears of the Sun).

Hadrian, I'm pretty sure you and I generally have the same liking of John Powell, so this score will not dissapoint (it may even surprise you, like it did me).

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Ben Affliction has never made a good film, IMO, but that has now changed—he's very tolerable in this picture. The thing I find with John Woo's Hollywood films (and it's strange, because no one seems to pay attention that Woo made tons of excellent films in Hong Kong before ever making anything American) is that the main cast are usually miscast but work none the less; and it's the supporting cast that is strongest. For Paycheck, Colm Feore (Hadrian laugh when he's eating pie in the film) and Aaron Eckhart are excellent as villains, and Uma Thurman is very sexy, I think, and never annoys. Storywise, it's as good as Face/Off, if not better. In fact, there's a lot of story and less action than usual for John Woo. The action is astounding, especially the continuity, which no other director except Woo seems to care about. The bike chase is really something, considering the fact that there is no blatant CGI (just think: all that neat stuff in Matrix Reloaded with the highway chase is all computer generated and silly when comparing it to what Woo has done). Guns aren't cool and there's not much of 'em in here, but not lots of "kung-fu" like Roger Ebert seems to think (silly man!). Look, I can't say enough good about this picture, so I'll stop here, but Hadrian, go see it!