Filmtracks Recommends:
Buy it... on both the 2000 re-recording and the 2004 issue of the original LP recording if you are a true enthusiast of John Barry's easy listening hit, for both albums have unique strengths in their presentations. Avoid it... on the 2004 Film Score Monthly remastering of the LP record if you wish to hear the full hour-long score that was re-recorded on the 2000 album or, per chance, if you have no interest in the chart-topping song. Filmtracks Editorial Review:
Born Free: (John Barry) One of cinema's most successful nature documentaries, Born Free was a sentimental British phenomenon in 1966 that helped spur the cause of the genre on television thereafter. It tells the true story of an orphaned lioness raised by two animal rights activists in Kenya; a year after releasing it to the wild on a remote reserve, the couple returns at the end and the lion, now a mother of three, remembers her human parents fondly. Despite director James Hill's best intentions, the film was not a technical success, relying on photographic trickery to convey certain plot elements involving the animals and sometimes practically ruining the narrative by the odd insertion of stock wildlife footage and inconsistent color in neighboring scenes. The most famous aspect of Born Free has always been its music. Providing all the glory of almost every possible score-related award under the composer's belt for his creation, Born Free confirmed, along with Zulu, that John Barry was headed in a mainstream direction that wasn't restricted to his snazzy tones for the James Bond franchise. Barry's fully orchestral score for the safari tale gained him a collection of Golden Globe and Academy Awards for both his score and the associated song. Written twenty years before the composer would score Out of Africa to much acclaim, Born Free has more in common with Zulu than anything thereafter in his career. Even though the song was the vehicle which propelled the music from Born Free to so many awards, Barry's score, like those for many Walt Disney films through the decades, is still of solid quality in its wholesome demeanor. Having just followed Thunderball with the same set of musical collaborators, the grand success of Born Free's music was more of a mistake than the intent. Arguments over the level of scope for the score, as well as the vocals that eventually accompanied Barry's theme for the song, were still under debate when the song, originally performed by Roger Williams, launched itself to the top spot on the American music charts. So popular was Barry's theme that it was eventually performed by over 600 artists around the globe and even adopted as one African nation's national anthem. By comparison to the sensational worldwide embrace met by the title song, Barry's score for Born Free may seem to be rather mellow and understated. While still retaining a theme of noble stature for the lions and the landscape, Barry chose to avoid the grandiose string style that he would eventually become even more famous for, a move made against the wishes of the director. Barry insisted upon taking a more subdued, playful route, emphasizing the innocence of the story and therefore keeping the ensemble pleasantly bubbling along in tonal variations of the main theme for much of the score's running time. Nothing as complicated or even as interesting as Alex North's style for the continent is to be heard here, the layers in Barry's structures held to a minimum. As usual, the composer's more simplistic habits of composition cause the main theme to be inserted in practically even place possible, with only slight variations between performances. Only in a few places does he unleash a burst of tonal romping with all the players to accentuate the massive scale of the environment, as he had done with Zulu. The use of prominent brass to mimic the sounds of the animals in "Elephant Stampede" is of special note, but don't expect much of this excitement to prevail. In general, Barry's score is humbled and conservative, a point of criticism from those expecting to hear his expansive tendencies at work in this context. But it is effective none the less in conveying the bright and optimistic heart of the narrative. Like many films of the era, the soundtrack for Born Free received a separate recording that was made specifically for the LP album release. Barry was never satisfied with the performance of the music in the film (performances that included a considerable number of errors by the players), and the later album version is clearly of superior quality. The follow-up recording was made in vibrant stereo, as many of Barry's scores were, and with some remastering the LP presentation sounds just as dynamic today as a digital era recording. The fate of the original film recording has long remained a mystery (the tapes were declared lost at some point), but the album version's masters survived, and in 2004, Film Score Monthly released 40 minutes of the score from those recovered tapes as part of the label's Silver Age Classics series. Due to the popularity of the score and its accompanying song, this was a rare entry in FSM's series not to be limited in its production run. Interestingly, Barry recorded nearly an hour of music for the 95-minute film, so there remains material from Born Free that has never made it in original form onto an album. The FSM album does have the Oscar-winning song performed vocally by Matt Monro. This original version, while clearly dated (especially with those dainty flute lines fluttering about in the background), is a satisfying easy listening experience entry in retrospect, one that should please Thunderball enthusiasts. There does remain an alternate source of music for Born Free, however. A re-recorded presentation of the score was released in 2000 and represented a continuation of the collaboration between conductor Frederic Talgorn and the Royal Scottish National Orchestra (following the "Hollywood '99" compilation released a few months prior). The performances in this interpretation are steady and enjoyable, though Talgorn was one step behind conductor Nic Raine and the City of Prague Philharmonic is capturing the broad essence of Barry's works. The latter group re-recorded both Zulu and Raise the Titanic at roughly the same time with great success, and there seems to be a touch of epic stature that Talgorn is missing in his interpretation of Barry's style. Part of that difference may owe to the smaller scale of Born Free in general, and the sound quality issue is not quite as relevant here given the superior remastering of Barry's original album recording. The Varèse Sarabande label, under the guidance of executive producer Robert Townson, was pressing re-recordings of other best-selling Barry works frequently at the time, including Body Heat, Out of Africa, and Somewhere in Time. It's easy to understand why Born Free was chosen as the next installment in this series of Barry interpretations, especially given the commercial success of the song and score back in the 1960's. But more technical merit might have resulted had the label and the RSNO tackled a re-recording of another, far more impressive Academy Award winner for Barry in the 1960's, The Lion in Winter (something which the City of Prague Philharmonic did eventually do). While the Varèse album does not feature the song in its pop form, it does have nearly the entire hour-long score represented. Thus, if you're a true Barry collector, then you'd be best served by purchasing both the Varèse and FSM albums for a complete survey of the effortless and innocuous music from the concept. *** Track Listings (2000 Varèse Album):
Total Time: 53:33
Track Listings (2004 FSM Album):
Total Time: 39:53
All artwork and sound clips from Born Free are Copyright © 2000, 2004, Varèse Sarabande, Film Score Monthly. The reviews and notes contained on the filmtracks.com site may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of Filmtracks Publications. Audio clips can be heard using RealPlayer but cannot be redistributed without the label's expressed written consent. Page created 4/15/00, updated 10/3/11. Review Version 4.1 - PHP (Filmtracks Publications). Copyright © 2000-2013, Christian Clemmensen. All rights reserved. |
2000 Varèse