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Filmtracks Recommends:
Buy it... if you are tired of all of the same old, sappy James Horner string themes and are open to the idea of solo and choral ethnic vocals over an unusually varied use of synthesizers over the orchestra. Avoid it... if you value harmonic consistency over electronic deviation when you are seeking Horner's emotionally personal scores. Filmtracks Editorial Review:
There are some very intriguing musical ideas presented by Horner in Beyond Borders, and if you extract fifteen minutes from various parts on the album and arrange them in your own suite, then you'd have a fantastic piece of music. But the disjointed nature of the project as a whole leaves listeners with a troublesome package. On the positive side, Horner does manage to avoid all the pitfalls of his recent, repetitive styles; there are ten minute sequences in Beyond Borders when even a Horner collector would have no idea about which composer had written the music. His title theme is performed with a distinguished, native rhythm and delivered with the same ethnic spirit that was heard in Bopha!, but thankfully without wailing vocals in the background this time. The solo female voice carries into a more free-flowing performance from the heart in the second cue, and reappears occasionally throughout the score. A children's chorus with introductory notes similar to those in the theme from Glory is utilized in the opening and closing cues. Subdued piano solos occupy considerable time, such as the entire eleventh cue on the album, and their sensitivity is equaled by the somber orchestral underscore provided in the later Cambodian portions of the score. The tenth cue offers the only propulsive orchestral action, completed by Horner's use of tolling bells and chimes. The title theme is heard quite often, and is more personal than the larger-than-life string themes that Horner has offered for Radio and The Missing at roughly the same time of release. The theme seems to rise from the same heart that floated on the soul of Casper, presenting Horner fans with a more refreshing angle on the composer's usual thematic styles. The beginning of the ninth cue on the album, opening the Chechnya portion of the score, presents a gorgeous rendition of a subtheme with the ethnic flute, Horner's synths, and melancholy percussion. Here arises the issue of the electronics, however, which will make or break this score for you. Without a doubt, Horner utilizes his electronics in ways that we haven't heard since the days of The Name of the Rose, and Beyond Borders is a rare, recent Horner score orchestrated and arranged largely by the composer himself. The synths exist in two fashions: first as a tool to saturate the foggy depths of his music with a softer sense of harmony, and second, to unleash havoc through harsh rhythms and sound effects. In the first application, the meandering, pleasant tones of the synths are a style straight from Mark Snow and Christopher Franke, with portions of the melodic cues sounding remarkably similar to Snow's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and Franke's Babylon 5. The keyboards often lend a hand to the bass strings in broadening the lengthy whole notes underneath these cues. On the other hand, the scratching and clawing sound effects that Horner alternately uses for the horrors of the third world completely bust up whatever mood is established by the romantic cues. The fifth and sixth cues (in Cambodia) deliver some needed emotional punch, but they do so with sound effects that border on the threshold of pain for the ears. These are not the creative Horner sound effects, such as the helicopter powering up in Courage Under Fire, but rather, a series of distorted notes climbing in intensity with the low pounding on the piano (as Don Davis used in his Matrix scores) until such a time that you may realize that you have a headache coming on... and this difficult writing by Horner is compounded in the ninth cue, in which the excellent statement of theme mentioned above is followed by a tolling bell to obnoxious synth effects at significantly higher volumes. Thus, Beyond Borders is a score of ups and downs, beauty and distortion, and if you are fond of taking Horner's scores and burning your own compilations of his best work, then this album will offer you several worthy cues of somber beauty. It marks the first James Horner score released by the Varèse Sarabande label in over a decade, followed soon thereafter by Horner's House of Sand and Fog. A generous and appropriate amount of music (over 55 minutes) is released on the Beyond Borders album (albeit without track names), and while it may not be as easily enjoyable as Horner's other scores of 2003, it exhibits some new ideas and a refreshing look at some old ones. ***
The insert includes a list of performers, but no extra information about the score or film. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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