Buy it... if you seek lesser forms of the action in First Blood, the mannerisms of Poltergeist, and the themes of Under Fire in a slightly ethnic package.

Avoid it... if you're simply curious about the ability of The Challenge to provide the same kind of highlights as the scores listed above.

Goldsmith

The Challenge: (Jerry Goldsmith) Director John Frankenheimer sought to clash the brazen action of American cinema with the ancient traditions of Japan in The Challenge, and audiences wanted nothing to do with it. The obscure 1982 film tells of a contemporary American boxer who is trained in the ways of the ninja, both mentally and physically, to help one Japanese brother in his battle with a more modern gun-wielding counterpart to secure two sacred swords. The film's focus is on the concepts of honor and tradition rather than straight forward action, though Frankenheimer inserts enough of a basic revenge equation and frenetic action scenes to serve American audiences. Composer Jerry Goldsmith had rarely ventured into the realm of Japanese-influenced music, but The Challenge came at time of great transition (and fantastic output, by almost unanimous accounts) in his career. The budding Prometheus label had been reviving Goldsmith scores from this era over the course of 1999 and 2000, including Breakout and Contract on Cherry Street. These scores all feature pieces of Goldsmith's Silver Age writing while also significantly foreshadowing his superior work of the 1980's. The experimental habits of the composer in the 1980's served him well with The Challenge, though despite the ethnic elements of the work, collectors of Goldsmith's scores will find it to be among the more readily consistent of his scores in the era. In the process of tackling this kind of values-based film of Japanese influence, Goldsmith was called upon to do something new for The Challenge: compose a score of Japanese character without charging that ethnic influence from a hostile or intentionally foreign direction. Such had been the case with Goldsmith's only previous score of primarily Japanese instrumentation, Tora!, Tora!, Tora!, for which a more divergent sound was appropriate. The composer employed the shakuhachi flute, zither-like koto, and mixing bowls to create the proper ethnic environment, but the traditional orchestra that almost always accompanies these elements is what carries the majority of the load.

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The koto and shakuhachi contributions to the title theme, introduced immediately in "Main Title," may give the listener a false impression that the score will devote itself to that sound. In fact, The Challenge is really a somewhat predictable combination of First Blood, Poltergeist, Under Fire, and even Legend. Goldsmith's intent was to address the underlying values of the film's story rather than individual characters, but that allowed him to extend his usual thematic intensity of the era to some roaring action sequences on par, in some cases, with First Blood. The employment of brass and percussion over staggered rhythms not only reminds of First Blood, but also Capricorn One. The listless and floating set of shakuhachi flute performances (with a low and shifting wash of strings in several cues) is accompanied by swells and woodwind interludes that are familiar to Poltergeist. The actual theme contains progressions that mirror the militaristic march from Under Fire, but in a completely different context. These softer ideas convey an understandably restrained and controlled attitude, especially in the dry nature of the recording. Only in "Stay with Me" does Goldsmith lay a heavy dose of string and woodwind beauty onto the theme to give it a melodramatic interpretation. More than most of the previous unreleased Goldsmith scores of the era, The Challenge debuted on album with significant hype, and while it's a worthy effort during a spectacular year for the composer, it doesn't really meet your expectations. There is action material worth investigating, as is the one truly romantic variant on the title theme, but there are so many familiar aspects of this score that it causes you to seek out the superior alternatives to each part. The quality of the album by Prometheus is quite good (much better than the various bootlegs of the score that floated around the market for a while), with transfers made from sources that were found in excellent condition. It's the kind of score that will fascinate any long-time Goldsmith collector, but the ethnic instrumentation is conservatively employed and the action material is better realized elsewhere. Seek the score only as part of a complete Goldsmith collection. ***   Amazon.com Price Hunt: CD or Download

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For Jerry Goldsmith reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.26 (in 113 reviews) and the average viewer rating is 3.32 (in 133,462 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.