 |
|
|
|
|
 |
Composed, Co-Orchestrated, and Produced by:
|
John Ottman
|
Conducted by:
|
Bruce Harvey
|
Co-Orchestrated by:
|
Lior Rosner
|
|
|
|
|
Release Date:
|
October 5th, 2004
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Availability:
Regular U.S. release.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
Filmtracks Recommends:
Buy it... if you enjoy John Ottman's ability to provide overachieving
scores that rely heavily on creativity in rhythm and instrumentation.
Avoid it... if no measure of creativity in soundscapes can compensate
for the more intimate, small-scale scope of these B-film scores by Ottman.
Filmtracks Editorial Review:
 |
| | Ottman | |
|
Cellular: (John Ottman) If you're the type of person
who hates cell phones, then perhaps this film's not for you. The
screenwriter of Phone Booth, Larry Cohen, must have decided that he
had conquered the market on phone booth terror, so he turned to every
possible method of terrifying a person with the familiar concept of a
failing cell phone. In essence, a tenuous and random cell phone connection
between a woman being held hostage in her own home and an average Joe on the
streets sends the young man on a race against time and his cell phone
battery to help this woman and her family. Despite the numerous plot holes
that always arise when you stretch a topic like this one to such great
limits, the film does survive on its performances and twists in plot. Though
suffering only mild slaps from critics, the film still didn't hold well
enough with audiences to keep it in the theatres very long. Director David
R. Ellis had been a fan of composer John Ottman's work for The Usual
Suspects and X-Men 2, and thus successfully pursued Ottman for
the scoring duties on Cellular. The plot of intrigue and terror seems
right up the alley for John Ottman, who seems ever-willing to traverse the
range of blockbusters to duds and have fun with anything he has time to get
his hands on. Once again, it's a project for which he can often switch
between major and minor keys in obvious portrayals of good and evil. Even
moreso than in his early years, though, Ottman has become obsessed with the
idea of recording sound effects associated with the films he composers for
and incorporating some variation of their sound into a rhythm or distinct
instrumentation twist that elevates his music beyond the usual trash that
exists for B-rated suspense and drama flicks. With Cellular, he
continues this trend, almost to levels unnecessary intelligence for this
kind of film, but even if you can't enjoy such scores on their thematic and
rhythmic integrity, they serve as an interesting study in smaller-budget
ingenuity in instrumentation. Whether you can enjoy Cellular or not
will depend on your interest in these unusual tactics.
Ottman does seem to take shameless pride in his attention
to unique sounds, and he should. If a purely average (if not substandard)
score such as Point of Origin (released on album last year) can be made into a
delightfully wicked listening experience simply because of the incorporation
of typewriter sounds, then why can't Cellular be equally as enticing
with its distorted cell phone tones and police sirens? The score opens over
the studio logo with the phone tones, distorted and overlayed with woodwinds
so that they're not as obvious as they probably needed to be (they could
easily be missed by a casual listener). The police sirens do catch your
attention to a greater extent when their brass renditions are present,
although they too seemed underplayed. At some point, with a score like
Cellular that is average in every other regard, you almost wish that
Ottman would hit us with even more blatant elements of musical intrigue.
He's proven that it's difficult to even outsmart himself, no matter the
project... so let's have more of it! As for Cellular, Ottman uses one
somewhat mundane theme for both the hero and the hostage, with appropriate
mutations for their separate performances for the two very different
characters. The hero's thematic representations border on coolness, from the
hip stealing of a Porsche to the "Going Shopping" and "Making a Connection"
cues --both of which enjoying some life from electric guitars and rocking
rhythms. The hostage's version of the theme exists in both "Abduction" and
"The Bait" (the latter of which has slurred brass a la Jerry Goldsmith's
The Shadow), and has the sentimentality you hear from Ottman's
morbidly sad electronic choir style of writing. Neither is preferable on
album, really, and Ottman is careful to make sure that these differing
styles never overlap to any degree. In presence, the primary theme is often
performed in full only by woodwinds, strings, and piano in subtle fashion,
allowing a powerful and commanding brass motif (highlighted by a strong
grouping of French horns) during moments of suspense as the most memorable
aspect of Cellular. Overall, Ottman's creative nature continues to
float what would otherwise be a rather uninteresting project. ***
 |
|
Viewer Ratings and Comments:
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
• 1. Opening/Abduction (3:10)
• 2. Going Shopping (3:32)
• 3. Making a Connection (2:20)
• 4. Freeing Ricky (4:05)
• 5. Moony's Curious (1:21)
• 6. School's Out (4:22)
• 7. The Bait (3:06)
• 8. Epiphany/Bank (4:02)
| |
• 9. LAX (4:21)
• 10. We're Going to Die (2:11)
• 11. The Pier (4:09)
• 12. Lost Connection/Dirty Cops (4:42)
• 13. Porsche/Simple Bio (3:36)
• 14. Police Station (4:01)
• 15. Fake Out (2:12)
• 16. Shoot Out (5:42)
|
The insert includes extensive information about the score and film. The score was recorded at Benroya Performance Hall in Seattle, Washington (06/28/2004 - 06/31/2004). This album contains none of the songs from the film.
|
