Film Score Daily: Film Score Friday 12/28/18

La-La Land plans to release a three-disc edition of John Williams' beloved, Oscar-nominated score for SUPERMAN in 2019. And according to Amazon, the label will be releasing a soundtrack for THE ORVILLE, Seth McFarlane's light-hearted homage to Star Trek, featuring music from the series by Bruce Broughton, Andrew Cottee, John Debney and Joel McNeely.

COMING SOON

January 4
Bernie the Dolphin - Joshua Mosley - Lakeshore
The Box of Delights - Roger Limb - Silva (import)
The Sisters Brothers - Alexandre Desplat - Lakeshore (U.S. release)
January 11
Escape Room - Brian Tyler, John Carey - Sony (import)
January 18
Valley of the Boom - Kyle Dixon, Michael Stein - Sony (import)
The West Wing [one-disc] - W.G. Snuffy Walden - Varese Sarabande
January 25
Capernaum - Khaled Manzour - Decca (import)
A Dog's Way Home - Mychael Danna - Sony (import)
Serenity - Benjamin Wallfisch - Milan
February 8
We the Animals - Nick Zammuto - Temporary Residence
February 15
Alita: Battle Angel - Tom Holkenborg - Milan
Date Unknown
Calypso/Italia '61 in Circarama - Angelo Francesco Lavagnino - Alhambra
The Cisco Kid in The Gay Amigo - Albert Glasser - Kritzerland
I Familiari Delle Vittime Non Saranno Avvertiti - Francesco De Masi - Beat
Mad Macbeth - Susan Dibona, Salvatore Sangiovanni - Kronos
A Man Called Peter - Alfred Newman - Kritzerland
Non Lasciamoci Piu - Fabio Frizzi - Kronos
Oma Maa - Pessi Levando - Kronos
Superman - John Williams - La-La Land
Valley of Shadows - Zbigniew Preisner - Caldera

Dennis Harvey, Variety

CERTAIN WOMEN - Jeff Grace

"Above all, though, there is silence. Featuring a score from longtime Reichardt composer Jeff Grace, which only kicks in for a few (devastating) moments, 'Certain Women' strips away all distractions so that we can better immerse ourselves into the powerful stillness of Montana’s wide-open spaces. It’s not just the beautiful exterior locations that give the film an elemental power: These people seem carved out of rock, sunk into the land, which makes their fates seem inconsequential, but also oddly meaningful. Not that there are clear resolutions to 'Certain Women''s storylines -- at best, we get a greater sense of the characters’ inner lives and a hope that maybe they’ve found some modest kernel of wisdom to take with them."

Tim Grierson, Paste Magazine

"There’s plenty of philosophical meat to dig into in 'Certain Women,' but it should be said that the film is also near-perfect aesthetically, with a spare, almost non-existent score and a visual palette defined by snow, yellowing grass, and a mountain of cable knit sweaters that make the film warm and inviting despite its winter setting. Imbuing icy mornings with unquestionable warmth and transforming a simple horse ride into a gallingly romantic gesture, Reichardt has spun another breathtaking ode to life, and to the female experience, with easy humor and most of all, tenderness, that makes the phrase 'Certain Women' one of rarified honor.

Aubrey Page, Collider

"If the characters here are often sparing with their words, or even withholding, the visuals speak volumes. Shot by Reichardt’s most steadfast collaborator, d.p. Christopher Blauvelt on 16mm film, the graininess and deep focus of the cinematography suggest a living landscape that’s constantly in shimmer. The sounds we hear might be the babbling of a nearby river, the murmur of Jeff Grace's understated soundtrack or the rustling of some invisible book's pages. Meanwhile, characters are often seen through glass or reflected in mirrors, underscoring the lack of direct connection, the oblique angles from which they observe each other. It’s no accident that the rawest emotional moment in 'Certain Women' is when the ranch hand and Elizabeth look directly into each other’s eyes in a car park, finally truly seeing each other for the first time."

Jeff Grace, The Hollywood Reporter

DJANGO - Warren Ellis

"His elegant ballad 'Nuages,' for instance, was a rousing anthem for the French Resistance. The song appears early in the film, as if Comar were eager to get it out of the way. The Resistance itself is an amorphous presence -- surely an intentional choice, though the reasons are unclear. And what's meant to be a wrenching coda -- the post-armistice premiere of an organ mass called 'Requiem for Gypsy Brothers' -- is marred by the wan pathos of the music itself, composed by Warren Ellis. As the piece plays, Reinhardt stands dumbstruck, overcome. But if we're supposed to believe this piece represents the peak of Reinhardt's emotional expression, the point is discredited by earlier musical evidence. In a film that's so often about taking sides, 'Django' can feel at war with itself."

Nate Chinen, NPR

"The music of Reinhardt is recreated for this movie with a group led by Stochelo Rosenberg on lead guitar and augmented by Warren Ellis, longtime sideman of Nick Cave, on violin. It’s a very aggressive, modern simulation, with drums loud in the mix and Rosenberg revving up the speed of the solos to the extent that you might be led to think Reinhardt invented 'shred' guitar. It wasn’t to my taste -- there’s quite a bit of actual Reinhardt out there to listen to, and these interpretations add nothing I enjoy to the music."

Glenn Kenny, RogerEbert.com

"The limited framework works better than in a typical life-spanning narrative, condensing the drama into a few months while offering star Reda Kateb ('A Prophet') the chance to shine in an impressively restrained performance. But this semi-fictionalized account rings false whenever it eschews reality for a WWII cloak-and-dagger intrigue, trying too hard to dazzle us with plot instead of letting the music speak for itself. Still, it’s a handsomely made affair with one of the best scores imaginable, which should help it land overseas after opening up this year’s Berlinale. Marking the first stab at the helm for French writer-producer Etienne Comar -- who penned the script for Xavier Beauvois’ 2010 Cannes Grand Prix winner 'Of Gods and Men' -- the film can feel a bit stretched at nearly two hours, though fans will appreciate that at least some of the running time is devoted to full performances of Reinhardt’s best-known work. (The tracks played in the movie were recorded by the Dutch jazz band The Rosenberg Trio, with 'Hell or High Water''s score co-composer Warren Ellis adding an original composition based on an orchestral work written by Reinhardt after the war.)"

Jordan Mintzer, The Hollywood Reporter

THE HANDMAIDEN - Cho Young-wuk

"Park still has his punkish spirit, only it’s channeled here with un-punkish discipline and style. 'The Handmaiden' is a little like that demonic uncle’s house, a riot of Western and Japanese architecture that somehow gels. The shoji screens create what look like puppet stages within puppet stages on which the characters play their parts. The sweeping score by Jo Yeong-wook is indispensable to the mood. It turns the movie’s undercurrents into crashing waves of melody."

David Edelstein, Vulture

"A good many moments resonate not because of what one character is saying, but because of the looks on other characters’ faces as they hear their words and either contemplate their true meaning or visualize images to accompany them. One of many show-stopping setpieces is a reading of perverse erotica from the book collector’s library, accompanied by one of the weirdest sex shows in mainstream cinema, but most of the sequence’s eerie power derives from observing the rapt expressions of men who’ve gathered to hear explicit fiction read aloud. Nearly as powerful, though far subtler, are the cross-cut sequences that feel like self-contained short stories of their own. Dialogue or recited scraps of letters or fiction become de facto narration laid over a cascade of images, brilliantly composed for a very wide frame by Chung Chung-hoon, and backed by Cho Young-wuk’s hypnotically repetitive yet rapturously melodramatic score, which rises to operatic heights when the characters are experiencing misery, ecstasy or fear."

Matt Zoller Seitz, RogerEbert.com

"It isn’t a mistake that Jo Yeong-wook’s score evokes 'Downton Abbey' flashbacks, either, and though you will never conflate that show with 'The Handmaiden', the combination of sight and sound creates an atmosphere of ethereal opulence. And yet the film’s texture, tone and tactility aren’t its best recommendations, because its best recommendation is Park’s talent for tempting us with the obvious. You may think you’ve figured out where the film is going, but you won’t figure out how it’s going to get there. It’s not that Park does away with the obvious, it’s that he reclaims the obvious for use elsewhere in his story, choosing to install it in unexpected places rather than remove it from 'The Handmaiden''s structure wholesale."

Andy Crump, Paste Magazine

"Just as the eerie housekeeper Mrs. Sasaki (Kim Hae-sook) describes Hideko’s manse as a unique style meeting of East and West, so goes the exquisite tech work. Production design combines heavy, dark Victorian interiors with the lightness of Japanese sets, the cinematography culminates in a misty sequence on a magical fantasy lake, and Cho Young-wuk’s silken score, alternating with Mozart and Rameau, sets a light tone."

Deborah Young, The Hollywood Reporter

IRREPLACEABLE YOU - Lesley Barber

"In an episode of the television series 'thirtysomething,' during the arc where Nancy (Patricia Wettig) develops cancer, Nancy spends more time with a new friend from her support group than she does with her family. This causes extreme tension with her husband who wants to soak up as much time with her as possible. But the people in Nancy's support group are the only ones who understand -- and are not afraid of -- what she is going through. These kinds of in-depth, difficult explorations are beyond 'Irreplaceable You''s capabilities. There's real poignancy in Myron's character and in Kate McKinnon's character. Abbie's journey -- from denial to acceptance -- is important, but it's wrapped up in a package that wants to be charming, wants to be inspirational from the first frame with its posthumous voiceover and swelling music."

Sheila O'Malley, RogerEbert.com

"Mbatha-Raw and Huisman’s cute yin-yang chemistry can’t offset the proceedings’ raft of implausibilities (like Abbi and Myron spying on Sam with binoculars), and Laing’s fondness for shooting the duo at dusk alongside the Hudson River and on rooftops which, coupled with Leslie Barber’s generic sweet-but-sad score, leads to monotony. The story of a dying woman who learns to cherish what she has while she still can, 'Irreplaceable You' uses an assortment of slight incidents to impart a lesson that, from the outset, is patently obvious to everyone except the too-dim-to-be-believed person for whom it’s intended."

Nick Schager, Variety

KANGAROO: A LOVE-HATE STORY - Dvaid Bridie

"Nicely shot and expertly edited by Wayne Hyett, the doc is set to a splendid score by David Bridie that evokes all the wonder and danger associated with the Australian Outback. All other technical aspects are on the money."

Richard Kuipers, Variety

KEEPING UP WITH THE JONESES - Jake Monaco

"As an Atlanta native myself, I do enjoy any movie that finds an interesting use for the downtown skyline’s famous blue Polaris dome, but everything else in this tired farce looks and feels utterly generic, shot in bright sitcom lighting by Andrew Dunn ('Bridget Jones’s Baby'). The score by Jake Monaco ('Absolutely Fabulous: The Movie') hits the basic spy-comedy notes, but it’s one of film’s few energetic ingredients."

Alonso Duralde, The Wrap

NOSTALGIA - Laurent Eyquem

"Conceptually, it’s an interesting experiment, one that seems to adopt the almost archeological ambivalence of Ortiz’s character: Like him, we get to rifle through the personal lives (and revealing bric-a-brac) of strangers, before unceremoniously moving on to someone new. In execution, however, Nostalgia is less poetic, oscillating as it does between scenes of the actors either studying piles of junk in a contemplative daze, saxophone blaring melancholically in the distance, or delivering speeches that threaten to transform them into mouthpieces for conflicting attitudes about the value of material stuff. That second element is a clear hallmark of the film’s screenwriter, the indie maverick Alex Ross Perry ('Queen Of Earth,' 'Listen Up Philip'), who’s developing a concerning habit of obliterating subtext through load-bearing lines like, 'Can what we hold in our hands be the same as what we hold in our hearts?' In a lot of ways, Nostalgia plays like a companion piece to Perry’s own new movie, Golden Exits, which also involves assessing a life through the inventory of its remnants. There’s an alien theatricality to the dialogue, though here it’s also been paired with a certain hokey wistfulness, as when Ortiz caresses a brick building and romantically murmurs, 'Lives lived,' to only himself."

A.A. Dowd, The Onion AV Club

"We begin with Daniel (the incredibly underrated Ortiz), an insurance agent assessing the contents of the life of Ronnie (Dern), an old widower surrounded by an accumulation of books and ephemera, who, it is implied, is not long for this world. It is the strongest (and shortest) scene in the film. The narrative segues into the life of Helen, whose house has burned down, and all she has left is a baseball signed by Ted Williams. She ends up selling it to a collectible dealer, Will (Hamm). We then follow him and his relationship with his sister Donna (Keener), who suffers a tragic loss in the midst of cleaning out their parents’ home. Despite the pedigree of the actors, this is the weakest segment of a film that strives to be a heartfelt ode to the things we leave behind, and how those things impact our lives. But with Pellington’s wandering camera and an insufferably maudlin piano score that telegraphs every emotion, Nostalgia feels like an incomplete reverie, an exploration of loss that doesn’t have anything new to add. In other words, it’s a pretty boring entry into the 'What is a life lived?' question that goes on for entirely too long. Don’t shorten your own life by wasting it on this film."

Josh Kupecki, The Austin Chronicle

"First-time cinematographer Matt Sakatani Roe elegantly manages the jump from short films and commercials, making a low-budget film look lush. But composer Laurent Eyquem’s overbearingly Chopin-esque music is maddeningly sentimental, literally underscoring the biggest flaws of a movie trafficking in emotions far shallower than the ones it thinks it’s reached."

Ray Greene, The Wrap

"Considering the material’s verbose, somewhat static nature, Matt Sakatani Roe manages considerable visual fluidity in an impressive feature debut as DP, abetted by Arndt-Wulf Peemoller’s deft editing. Other tech/design contributions are handsome, even if 'Nostalgia' is one of those films that irks a bit in seeming to assume that nearly everyone lives in upper-middle-class environs. Laurent Eyquem’s piano-based original score manages to avoid bathos while underlining the gamut of tearful moods."

Dennis Harvey, Variety

THE RITUAL - Ben Lovett

"Long before one character runs slap-bang into a trunk, the environment is well milked for insinuating threat by DP Andrew Shulkind's claustrophobic images, while Ben Lovett's throbbing score artfully compounds the sense of dread. However, this control of style isn't enough to shake off 'The Blair Witch Project''s shadow, especially during an intense tent-based episode, and the resolution serves to demonstrate how successfully the first 'Blair' film channelled the chill of the unseen."

Kevin Harley, The List

"Though well-cast and competently written, 'The Ritual' owes its primary effectiveness not so much to story or character per se as to the unsettling atmosphere Bruckner and company have eked out of the forest itself. DP Andrew Shulkind’s impressive lensing often frames the actors dwarfed and dominated by oddly hostile-looking trees whose tops or bottoms we can’t see. They feel frighteningly infinite, and as entrapping as jail-cell bars. A fine complement to these landscapes and the action they contain is Ben Lovett’s attractively urgent original score."

Dennis Harvey, Variety

THE NEXT TEN DAYS IN L.A.

Screenings of older films, at the following L.A. movie theaters: AMPAS, American Cinematheque: Aero, American Cinematheque: Egyptian, Arclight, Arena Cinelounge, LACMA, Laemmle, New Beverly [now re-opened!], Nuart and UCLA.

December 28
THE BEST LITTLE WHOREHOUSE IN TEXAS (Carol Hall, Patrick Wiliams) [Nuart]
IT'S A GIFT, NEVER GIVE A SUCKER AN EVEN BREAK (Frank Skinner) [Cinematheque: Aero]
THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE (John Williams), BEYOND THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE (Jerry Fielding) [New Beverly]
RESERVOIR DOGS [New Beverly]
2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY [Cinematheque: Egyptian]

December 29
GREMLINS (Jerry Goldsmith) [New Beverly]
IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT, MIDNIGHT (Frederick Hollander) [Cinematheque: Aero]
NEW YEAR'S EVIL (W. Michael Lewis, Laurin Rinder) [New Beverly]
THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE (John Williams), BEYOND THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE (Jerry Fielding) [New Beverly]
2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY [Cinematheque: Egyptian]

December 30
THE GODFATHER (Nino Rota), THE VALACHI PAPERS (Riz Ortolani) [New Beverly]
GREMLINS (Jerry Goldsmith) [New Beverly]
THE MIRACLE OF MORGAN'S CREEK (Leo Shuken, Charles W. Bradshaw), HAIL THE CONQUERING HERO (Werner R. Heymann) [Cinematheque: Aero]
2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY [Cinematheque: Egyptian]

December 31
THE GODFATHER (Nino Rota), THE VALACHI PAPERS (Riz Ortolani) [New Beverly]

January 1
DUCK SOUP [Cinematheque: Aero]
THE GODFATHER (Nino Rota), KUNG FU EXECUTIONER [New Beverly]

January 2
THE GODFATHER (Nino Rota), THE GANG THAT COULDN'T SHOOT STRAIGHT (Dave Grusin) [New Beverly]

January 3
THE BIG SHORT (Nicholas Britell) [Cinematheque: Egyptian]
FARGO (Carter Burwell) [Laemmle NoHo]
THE GODFATHER (Nino Rota), THE GANG THAT COULDN'T SHOOT STRAIGHT (Dave Grusin) [New Beverly]
STEP BROTHERS (Jon Brion) [Cinematheque: Egyptian]

January 4
AKIRA (Shoji Yamashiro) [Nuart]
CHICAGO (John Kander, Danny Elfman), INTO THE WOODS (Stephen Sondheim) [Cinematheque: Egyptian]
THE GODFATHER (Nino Rota), THE DON IS DEAD (Jerry Goldsmith) [New Beverly]

January 5
THE GODFATHER (Nino Rota), THE DON IS DEAD (Jerry Goldsmith) [New Beverly]

THINGS I'VE HEARD, READ, SEEN OR WATCHED LATELY

In a previous entry in this weekly epilogue, I went into far too much detail about my complicated TV viewing habits, which involve a lengthy list of DVDs and Blu-Rays. In brief, I have a few shows that I watch essentially as soon as I get them on disc (right now it's Star Trek: Discovery and Westworld), several other shows I watch regularly (though these days most of them are favorite shows I'm watching for a second time, like Deadwood, Penny Dreadful, Rome and Sherlock), and a distressingly large number of shows that I get around to maybe twice a year.

One show in the latter category is the original '60s version of Lost in Space, and though several of the series are not exactly favorites of mine (Hawaii Five-0 season 1 is best viewed for nostalgia, the Morton Stevens music and the lovely location cinematography), Lost in Space is the closest thing I have to a "hate-watch." And this is the first, black-and-white season, ostensibly the "good" Lost in Space, not the later color seasons that in one infamous episode brought us actor-writer Stanley Adams as the "carrot man."

Not that those earliest Lost in Spaces are totally without merit. The music by John Williams and others is of course a delight, and the production values are pretty good for a mid-60s sci-fi series -- I especially like the full-sized "chariot" prop the family rides around in, which I think had largely disappeared from the series by the time I caught the later, color episodes in my childhood.

But what I think makes Lost in Space especially hard to watch for me can be summed up in two words: "Doctor Smith." I find pretty much everything about this character nearly impossible to bear, from Jonathan Harris' hammy performance (like a road company Captain Hook) to the way the other characters are so stupidly gullible that they keep giving him yet another chance even after he repeatedly proves himself untrustworthy at best and actively murderous at worst.

The flaws of Lost in Space are especially notable as I've been watching season 1 of the original Star Trek for the first time in decades, and am genuinely shocked at how great those early episodes were.

That said, I'm still looking forward to the Netflix version, if only because the idea of my beloved Parker Posey as Doctor Smith is too inspired to resist.