GR: Sometimes we do get criticized for not writing on the same level as Steiner or Goldsmith or somebody like that, but what everybody forgets is that those guys usually had six to eight weeks to write a score. That's a big difference from seven or eight days. Also, there's also the fact that even if we do have a locked picture, frequently it's filled with a lot of green-screen and you're not always really sure of what's going on in the film. That's what leads to generic padding and rhythmic patterns to fill up a scene. I recently had a conversation after the BMI awards where an older gentleman commented that I must feel a little sad that I'm not able to write long melodic themes like Rota and Morricone used to do. My response was that you just can't when you have a piece of picture that comes through the door with a hundred cuts in one scene. The picture is practically a strobe light in front of you. You have to go with what you see. That's the job.

Only way we'll know is if there is a shift in the way things are handled, and you know what? That's extremely rare to happen.

To me, being such an enthusiastic score buff, has helped my filmmaking incredibly. I remember my senior year in high school when I completed what is still my best short film - titled 'The Constantine Chase' - I chose to use a cue from Morricone - "A Silhouette of Doom" from Navajo Joe - and many of my classmates looked at me strangely because I had not chose the latest single from Good Charlotte or Drowning Pool; yet my film got praise from the teacher because I used such a cue. When she confronted me later and asked me why I would do something so different, I simply told her of my affection for film scores and she smiled as if I was I was the last of a dying breed.

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Originally posted by Lou Goldberg:

GR: Sometimes we do get criticized for not writing on the same level as Steiner or Goldsmith or somebody like that, but what everybody forgets is that those guys usually had six to eight weeks to write a score. That's a big difference from seven or eight days. Also, there's also the fact that even if we do have a locked picture, frequently it's filled with a lot of green-screen and you're not always really sure of what's going on in the film. That's what leads to generic padding and rhythmic patterns to fill up a scene. I recently had a conversation after the BMI awards where an older gentleman commented that I must feel a little sad that I'm not able to write long melodic themes like Rota and Morricone used to do. My response was that you just can't when you have a piece of picture that comes through the door with a hundred cuts in one scene. The picture is practically a strobe light in front of you. You have to go with what you see. That's the job.

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Oh, cry me a river. How come guys like Williams, Broughton, Holdridge, Shearmur and Giacchino... just to name a few... can write big, expansive, melodic scores in the same time line with the same crazy cuts and unfinished scenes? Don't hear them bitching!

Go join James Horner with his list of bullshit compliants as to why he can't write good scores anymore.

-Erik-

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Originally posted by Erik Woods:
Oh, cry me a river. How come guys like Williams, Broughton, Holdridge, Shearmur and Giacchino... just to name a few... can write big, expansive, melodic scores in the same time line with the same crazy cuts and unfinished scenes? Don't hear them bitching!

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Well, you don't hear Broughton and Holdridge doing much of anything. They write a certain style of music that has gone largely out of fashion and are no longer favored composers because of it. And while some of Shearmur's work is applicable to what you're saying, he's written some pretty divergent scores and quite a lot of it does not. E.g., didn't he say himself that the love theme in Sky Captain never appears fully developed in the film? And that's even a case in which the director specifically wanted a full-blooded old fashioned piece.

And I don't really see the "complaint" in Revell's words as quoted above. He ends by saying "That's the job." His attitude overall seems pretty pragmatic to me.

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Originally posted by Widescreen:
Maybe some filmmaker should give Revell a chance to write something longer in that vein, and test whether or not Revell can actually write material like that.

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This has already happened. Human Nature and Anne Frank: The Whole Story, during a phase of a couple years where Revell himself said he was consciously trying to break free of the stereotypical assignments he was always given. I guess it didn't work. Good scores, though. A shame the latter was never released.

Kirk

The full version of the love theme was recorded and was to play over top the end credits... unfortunately, the director or producer wanted Jane Monheit's version of Over The Rainbow playing instead.

Are you implying that (a) ghostwriter(s) was/were responsible for Anne Frank, or that it was all taken from other sources? I only heard the score once, four years ago when the TV movie first premiered, so I couldn't exactly hum anything I heard back then. I just remember thinking it was extremely good, melodic and very unexpected for a Revell score. But anyway, what do you mean (I'm genuinely curious)?