Saw this film on the big screen at BFI here in London a couple of years ago and was really impressed with the score.
Sorry to post another Morricone query but can find little information about this score on CD. I assume that it has been released but is now OOP and rare. Is that correct?
Could someone please clarify if it's available, or not, on CD.
It was a very impressive film. A little bit more thoughtful than your average Italian western Morricone's cunning sitar and icy strings were just a perfect soundscape for the snowy landscape! And his incessant twangy guitar theme with slightly-atonal short-slash screeches over the top was the perfect theme for Klaus Kinski's relentless and snidey bounty hunter.
the ending is very memorable and unexpected. As aficionados of these films will know, people involved with the film begged the director to change the ending, but he kept it the way he wanted and ignored their pleas. He was proved right in many ways, it gave the film much more power.
IL GRANDE SILENZIO is one of Sergio Corbucci's best westerns and one of Morricone's best as well...too bad the USA DVD leaves a lot to be desired quality wise. Originally released on a rare Italian Parade label LP, it was subsequently reissued on both vinyl and CD by BEAT Records...the last CD shouldn't be that difficult to find and is well worth the effort. There is also a Japanese CD reissue as well.
IL GRANDE SILENZIO is one of Sergio Corbucci's best westerns and one of Morricone's best as well...too bad the USA DVD leaves a lot to be desired quality wise. Originally released on a rare Italian Parade label LP, it was subsequently reissued on both vinyl and CD by BEAT Records...the last CD shouldn't be that difficult to find and is well worth the effort. There is also a Japanese CD reissue as well.
The Parade LP (FPR 317)
The Beat LP (CR 1)
The Beat CD (CDCR 27)
The Japanese CD (King Records KICP 2597)
They all run about 34 minutes, but the Beat CD also contains 14 minutes of music from Morricone's Un Bellissimo Novembre ("That Splendid November").
Thrilling artwork, Bob and wayoutwest - thanks for posting that.
I have the blue Beat LP. I have always loved that design of Kinski holding up the wanted poster. its simple and done like a pop-art image. although, for some reason, the bold painting of faces one is even better.
I've been asked to introduce this film and score in a few weeks, in a seminar about Italian film music hosted by the Italian Culture Institute in Oslo.
I had only seen the film once -- at a point in my life where I largely dismissed it because of the B western feel -- but seeing it again a couple of days ago, its ambitions seem more clear (even though the framework is still a B western).
The score is fascinating. Love the lush bits (like the ovet-the-top love theme), but never been too keen on the staccato stuff as a listening experience. But in context, it was really brilliant.
Any comments on the film, score or context from you Morricone connaiseurs? Any trivia bits I could share with the crowd (that perhaps isn't already listed in its Wikipedia entry)?
I'd say this is not just a good score, but a great one and stands alongside Morricone's collaborations with Sergio Leone (Once Upon a Time in the West and The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly ) as one of the finest scores for (Italian) Westerns.
Morricone's wistful main theme contrasts with the movie's bleak outlook (this is, after all, a western in which the "bad guy" guns down the "good guys"... and in a real twist to classic western lore, does so legally for the most part) and thereby complements it. Social issues such as the power of money clearly seen as a new type of nobility which lets you get away with everything and a justice system open to exploitation if you are just unscrupulous enough. Also one of the few westerns that takes place in bitter cold snowy winter.
