I, dear Nutz, have devised a little game for us girth-challenged fellows who regularly attend this site (est. 1998). The game is simple: find two scores from any composer; and face them off against one another. Here are the rules: the scores and their films have to fall under the same year and/or the same genre. And no punches below the belt!

Here's our first battle; a battle so epic it could have only taken place in the yesteryear of 1999. The composer is Jerry Goldsmith.

CORNER 1: The Mummy

CORNER 2: The 13th Warrior

I want a good clean fight; what're the honest opinions? Which score stands the test of time? Which score is more enjoyable? Which score is better composed? Are you still listening to either of these?

I brought these two up because, a new XBox 360 game, Assassin's Creed utilizes custom soundtracks (thank God considering the existing score is dreck!) so I've added those two Goldsmiths along with HGW's Kingdom of Heaven. All three lend themselves well to the time period and setting of the game.

I'm surprised to see so many votes for The Mummy. I always thought people liked The 13th Warrior better "because of it's complexity compared to The Mummy." I don't know where I read that. HAHA

I vote The Mummy. It was the first Goldsmith score I bought and was one of the first scores I bought.

I like several cues in both. I dont know which I like better.

Have a great Thanksgiving to all my friends here at moviemusic.com message board.

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Originally posted by BackToTheFutureFan:
Good topic.

I'm surprised to see so many votes for The Mummy. I always thought people liked The 13th Warrior better "because of it's complexity compared to The Mummy." I don't know where I read that. HAHA

I vote The Mummy. It was the first Goldsmith score I bought and was one of the first scores I bought.

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Thank you.

Yeah, in the past I would've thought that people preferred The 13th Warrior, as well. I'm very pleased with the responses.

And, surprisingly, The Mummy was my first Goldsmith purchase; I even bought for someone else who never listened to it and decided I'd be better off with it. Their loss, I suppose.

13th Warrior, on the other hand, wins it big time here. The themes are better, more memorable, and it's a score that fits nicely into Goldsmith's knights cannon: Lionheart, First Knight, and Timeline. Of note is the relentless and towering action piece "The Fire Dragon," that builds and builds, delivering some of Goldsmith's most exciting action music since First Knight and Star Trek: First Contact--the apex is at 03:00-END; the horns brilliantly echo some of what made his Rambo action music so great at 04:15-04:39. Not to give the actual film 13th Warrior a leg up on The Mummy(Warrior is better, but it's still a film made by barbarians, about barbarians, for barbarians), but for the "Semantics" scene, which is actually quite well done (like that in The Hunt For Red October, for those who know John McTiernan films; though, in the end, Michael Crichton pretty much helmed this film entirely), Goldsmith carriers the entire sequence through music as Banderas's Arab courtier character learns the Viking language during the fireside scene 00:38-END: Goldsmith scores this transformation expertly through subtle performance of the heroic Viking theme and a rising bass line, going into the Banderas theme and then blending it with a grand statement of the Viking theme once more; no composer could have done this better, and Goldsmith read the sequence perfectly and delivered it with such sophistication that this film never deserved from him. "Swing Across" is another good example of Goldsmith blending the opposing themes of the Banderas character and the Vikings heroism, first with a desperate and driven performance of the Viking theme and then into the Arab courtier theme, given a grand statement on par with the Viking's: He beautifully pulls them together at the end, with "A Useful Servant." From "Swing Across" to "Valhalla / Viking Victory" it's a non-stop action ride and Goldsmith delivers the material and themes variation with first-rate skill and grandeur: Fans of his brilliant music to Star Trek: The Motion Picture will get a kick out of his Vejur-like string writing for "Underwater Escape," after Wendol is slain.

IMO, Goldsmith had more fun on this film, not only because of it being slightly better than the The Mummy (13th Warrior is an excellent book! Perhaps Goldsmith found great inspiration there? I wouldn't be surprised, considering the high caliber of his music here), but it also marks another collaboration with Michael Crichton: The two did wonders on their 1979 adventure film, The Great Train Robbery.

Although The Mummy is plenty fun, you can tell that Goldsmith really didn't understand what was going on in the film, who anyone was or what they were doing. The result is a very busy score with lots of bluster, but which for me lacks a certain clarity that 13th Warrior (written before The Mummy, even though the film came out afterwards) has in abundance. Although I do like Goldsmith in busy too-many-notes mode, The Mummy's not as good as King Solomon's Mines for my money.

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Originally posted by nuts_score:
I just happen to listen to The Mummy more . . .

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Originally posted by nuts_score:
But seriously, Kevin J. O'Connor is a fantastic actor! I can't wait to see him in There Will Be Blood. He's always the best thing about any Stephen Sommers movie!

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Originally posted by nuts_score:
The new round should be up before the end of the weekend.

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Originally posted by John C Winfrey:
Sean, that Forced Flight is a great cue on that King Solomons Mines. A fav of mine along with several other cues on that score. I liked all the new cues on the extra releases when I heard them. The four extra cues on that original other LP release were all great. I liked all four of those when I first heard them and they are still among my favorites on that score along with Forced Flight. This is such a good score for such a lame film. J.

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