Fans of Christopher Gordon will rejoice that he has a new score out to a film, BUCKLEY'S CHOICE, the release of which was delayed by the pandemic. In an interview Gordon said that the director requested a 1980s-style score.
The main theme is delightful, and unmistakably the work of Gordon, but a number of the cues are make for a rather somber listening experience. So a bit of a mixed bag.
I'm admittedly unfamiliar with most of Christopher Gordon's work, but this is indeed quite good and very much in the mode of Bruce Broughton and 1980s Amblin Entertainment. I'm impressed that a composer was actually directed to write music like this in 2021. I've cynically developed the opinion that most (or if I'm really not feeling it: all) working directors just don't care about film music the way I (and many here) do, so this is a breath of fresh air. We need more directors who are interested in film music like this. Looks like the director, Tim Brown, has an upcoming film due for release in 2022 - may he keep going!
Many thanks for this new Christopher Gordon score reference, as gorgeous as is usual output.
Pure Bruce Broughton/James Horner/John Debney/Joel McNeely old fashion way we miss so much, since the sound design surrounding Hollywood.
Completely underrated and underemployed composer...like Frederic Talgorn.
May we expect a CD release of this thing? Allo, Doug?
Frederic Talgorn should be scoring more films and should have scored No Time to Die but I guess the guys who decide these things have never heard of him.
A new Christopher Gordon score/album is always great news. One of the greatest film composers working today (and I wish he was being hired more often!)
Dylan... You gotta hear MOBY DICK and ON THE BEACH... But especially the later score. Yavar and I both regard it as a total and consummate masterpiece.
It's got everything - a gorgeously haunting love theme, presented in many variations? Check. A big heroic submarine theme? Check. A pastoral, gentle family theme? Check. Solo cello and violin-led pieces of funerary lament? Check. Big bombastic wartime anthem representing the futility of war? Check. Penderecki-esque dissonance representing war-ravaged wastelands? Check. Solo voices and big choral interludes representing the inexorable fate of mankind? Yup, yup, yup... You get the idea.
It's a masterpiece.
MOBY DICK was my first exposure to his work and I still think it's got one of the best themes ever associated with the ocean. It's capitol-S Stirring stuff, if not as 'warm' as ON THE BEACH's most humanistic moments:
His event music is amazing as well:
MAO'S LAST DANCER and DAYBREAKERS have some incredible highlights, also.
Dylan... You gotta hear MOBY DICK and ON THE BEACH... But especially the later score. Yavar and I both regard it as a total and consummate masterpiece.
Yup...MOBY DICK might be fairly assessed as one of the greatest scores of the 1990s. ON THE BEACH, on the other hand, is IMO one of the greatest scores of *all time*.
Wow, that opening 11-minute suite (cue?!) is a corker! I've plumbed the depths of melodic, adventurous film music so extensively, and I do most of my listening so inattentively, that it's rare for a melody to grab me by the ears the way the opening and closing sections of that track did. On to a more somber but still perfectly lovely track 2! This thread deserves some bumpage!
having a spin of this score now. Gordon never disappoints. I dearly wish he'd be tapped for some blockbuster action fare on this side of the world. What I would give to hear a Gordon MCU score...
But there are enough exciting moments in Buckley's Chance that we don't have to imagine. It's all there. Truly amazing music.
Dylan... You gotta hear MOBY DICK and ON THE BEACH... But especially the later score. Yavar and I both regard it as a total and consummate masterpiece.
Yup...MOBY DICK might be fairly assessed as one of the greatest scores of the 1990s. ON THE BEACH, on the other hand, is IMO one of the greatest scores of *all time*.
Yavar
I'm listening to Moby Dick for the first time in a while and boy, what a score. Gordon writes for woodwinds so beautifully. All of those coloristic orchestration phrases, just amazing. I always wished Gordon could have been tapped for a Star Trek film. He would have done such a great job. But he could score the phone book and it would also be amazing.
