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Just to balance this out:
OCTOPUSSY is never boring to me. It has a hauntingly beautiful theme and does not go overboard with its action music.
Barry just knew that elegance elevates.
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Posted: |
Oct 10, 2018 - 5:34 AM
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By: |
Tall Guy
(Member)
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Little if any of what follows is new - I've said it before, and I know that others have too. What is unique about John Barry's scoring for Bond films is in giving each its own character while maintaining and developing an overarching style across all the films. John Barry illustrated and in a way defined what gold sounds like, what being underwater sounds like, what ski-ing down mountains sounds like, what diamonds sound like, what being in space sounds like (contrary to popular opinion that it doesn't sound like anything!)
You could drop a needle anywhere on a blank James Bond soundtrack LP and know within a second or two which film it was from. This effect was diluted very slightly from Moonraker onwards (where his more languid 80s/90s orchestrations started to dominate his work) but came back strongly with The Living Daylights for one last triumph.
I have said - and I stand by it - that I'd swap his Living Daylights score for a John Barry The Spy Who Loved Me score. Sacrilege to some, but it's true, and I'd swap both for a Barry score for another 1960s Bond film. His best soundtracks mixed his particular style of action tracks with music perfectly describing the exotic locations, and throwing in some wonderful romantic themes and perhaps the odd bit of source music. You Only Live Twice is a perfect example - The title song, the music for Aki, the Japanese backdrop, the immortal fight on the Kobe harbour rooftops (second for me only to Tuco's Sad Hill flight as a mixture of film and music) and probably my favourite action music of all time, A Drop in the Ocean. Dynamic, clear, thrilling and energetic. Such a difference to the equivalent from thirty years later, which is perfectly good but much less original in style.
I'd be amazed if I ever saw/heard the like again.
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Little if any of what follows is new - I've said it before, and I know that others have too. What is unique about John Barry's scoring for Bond films is in giving each its own character while maintaining and developing an overarching style across all the films. John Barry illustrated and in a way defined what gold sounds like, what being underwater sounds like, what ski-ing down mountains sounds like, what diamonds sound like, what being in space sounds like (contrary to popular opinion that it doesn't sound like anything!)
You could drop a needle anywhere on a blank James Bond soundtrack LP and know within a second or two which film it was from. This effect was diluted very slightly from Moonraker onwards (where his more languid 80s/90s orchestrations started to dominate his work) but came back strongly with The Living Daylights for one last triumph.
Agreed. The Bond magic was that each film had its own unique signature, unmistakable and musically satisfying, and yet there was a cohesion to it all.
It was more varied, more richly endowed, than the Star Wars and Superman approach. Yet every Bond still belonged with the others. Star Trek's series cohesion took a hit when Goldsmith followed the Williams model for ST-5; then it seemed like every Trek movie was just doing its own thing (as they did with the uniforms, Enterprise sets, technology...). The Treks obeyed no rules.
It was just fantastic the way the Bonds sustained the most challenging musical approach, with new main titles every time, and did it so well.
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Octopussy IS boring. Not bad, just dull.
To each his own
Ironically i find it the best of the Moore films!
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Posted: |
Oct 10, 2018 - 3:30 PM
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By: |
MusicMad
(Member)
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...
Ironically i find it the best of the Moore films!
I'm almost with you there. I place Octopussy (1983) and For Your Eyes Only (1981) as my favourite Roger Moore JB007 films ... the former might have been top had it been honoured with a JB score!
There can be few (e.g. Thor) who do not recognise John Barry's contribution to Western cinema in the 1960s with the JB007 films being forefront in the public recognition of the talent involved. Others have said that JB was an integral part of the formula ... whether they are right is irrelevant ... to me. All I know is that his music has provided me with so much pleasure over 50+ years (I had to wait a while to buy my first JB007 album) that I struggle to express my gratitude.
A repeated statement above is that The Living Daylights (1987) was the last great JB007 film ... certainly score. As much as I enjoy David Arnold's score for Tomorrow Never Dies (1997) I'm in full agreement. I've enjoyed other composers' works for this franchise but none have the magic which JB created film after film. The last two, in particular, were so lacking in that magic that those scores must be significant components of my negative feelings towards both films.
As for the change in JB's style of score throughout his 25 year involvement ... yes, his music for the later films is nowhere near as inventive or extreme as that of the earlier films. But everything else changed during those 25 years so why not the music? Barry has said in interviews that whilst he scored the James Bond Theme for the Sean Connery era on electric guitar ... he didn't think this was appropriate for Roger Moore's portrayal. I'm sure the same thought processes applied to the scores. And, of course, JB himself was ageing ... no longer the young man about town in the swingin' 60s ... his scoring was more orchestral, symphonic. The last score was more modern because of the change in actor/style.
How many times has Bill Conti's score for For Your Eyes Only (1981) been criticised for its pop sound (e.g. the action cue Runaway) ... and yet the inherent suggestion from above is that JB should have continued with his 1960's style. No, for me, the change we hear in the 1980s, first appearing in 1979's Moonraker, was the logical way forward for this composer who, by that time, had done all he needed to do to carry the JB007 franchise forward.
As much as I have loved JB's JB007 scores for 30 - 50+ years, I'm glad he didn't seek to score every one of them ... or continue into the 1990s.
And specifically on the question of Octopussy ... it's a glorious, wonderful score which so suits the on screen action that it's hard to fault. If anything, it is the action theme in A View to a Kill (1987) which is questionnable as this seems to ignore Roger Moore's age/physical abilities 
Mitch
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In regards Barry's changing Bond style over the years . . .
I think that Barry's best Bond scores and songs can be found in the first 6 films he scored: From Russia With Love through Diamonds Are Forever. The others scores were good, some very good, but the best were those six consecutive Bond scores. What a great achievement. Now, we talk a lot on these threads about the great contributions our favorite scores make to films. But I also think that most great scores need something in the film itself to draw out that greatness. Sometimes the great scores owe something to the film. My point is that those first few Bond movies were fresh, exciting, exotic, and sexy. Thank you, Young, Hunt, Maibaum, Adams, Connery, and Freddie Young. Even the ridiculous You Only Live Twice gave Barry mountains and sunsets, Japanese weddings, rooftop battles, and outer space. Compare those films with the tired, jokey, unsexy affairs that followed and it's amazing that Barry could write anything decent, much less great. So, if Barry's post-DAF scores were not quite the stuff of the previous ones, I think he did the best with the material he had to work with. I do love The Living Daylights score and the Moonraker space cues, but the prime Bond days were long over.
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553 comments are right on point.
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Octopussy IS boring. Not bad, just dull.
To each his own
Ironically i find it the best of the Moore films!
Heartily agreed! It's a colorful, classy film all the way.
And anyone who finds the music boring needs an AST ASAP [Attention Span Transplant As Soon As Possible!] :-)
I find the existing ost boring.
The music in the film is another story
Brm
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To Tall Fellow:
I would swap a Barry TLD for a JB GOLDENEYE .
Brm
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Posted: |
Oct 11, 2018 - 5:16 AM
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By: |
Tall Guy
(Member)
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To Tall Fellow:
I would swap a Barry TLD for a JB GOLDENEYE .
Brm
I rather like Serra's Goldeneye. It adds a particular atmosphere to a film that benefited from that approach (in my opinion, obviously). I wouldn't have supported a second Serra score. And I'd like Tomorrow Never Dies much more if there hadn't been another slew of Arnold scores after it, as nonsensical as that might sound. And had there been just the one Newman Bond score, I might have bought it
Without John Barry to score Bond films, I really think that one composer per film should be the approach taken. That composer would pour all they have into their one attempt, like they all have, but in the knowledge that it's the only crack at it they'll get. Second (and subsequent) scores from both Arnold and Newman have, for me, been a dilution of their initial one. I'm sorry to say that, because I have huge regard for both David Arnold and Thomas Newman, but nobody is bigger than the series with the immortal exceptions of John Barry and probably Ken Adam.
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Comparing recent James Bond scores to older ones is to comparing Paul McCartney solo music to his Beatles years. It's not bad, but the magic is gone. It's mostly a well known name with the occasional hint to what used to be.
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I thought GOLDENEYE and DAD were successful in capturing some of the romantic Barryesque feel
Brm
GoldenEye yes. And Tomorrow Never Dies a little too. But nothing to the degree of OHMSS or The Living Daylights. TLD is an outright romantic adventure with James involved with one woman only. Aside from the pretitle boat fling.
"We Have All The Time In The World" is, at least in my opinion, one of the most beautiful, romantic songs written by any composer.
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Comparing recent James Bond scores to older ones is to comparing Paul McCartney solo music to his Beatles years. It's not bad, but the magic is gone. It's mostly a well known name with the occasional hint to what used to be.
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Yeah. Every one loves his new album. It is lame.
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