Buy it... as a heartwarming and affable extension of the movie's hopelessly optimist tone, Marc Shaiman clearly in his comfort zone for this spirited, dramatic comedy romp.

Avoid it... if any kind of unique variation on Shaiman's standard, fluffy techniques for wholesome orchestral writing is what you seek.

Shaiman

In & Out: (Marc Shaiman) The topic of homosexuality had finally penetrated the mainstream of Hollywood in the early 1990's, led by the heartbreaking success of Philadelphia. Credited with finally breaking through the orientation barrier in the wholesome comedy genre was In & Out in 1997, assembling an incredible cast to finally push issues pertaining to homosexuality to genuinely funny ends. Kevin Kline is a high school English teacher who is about to marry a co-worker (Joan Cusack in an Oscar-nominated role) but is "outed" right before the week of the wedding by a former student giving his acceptance speech for his own Oscar win on television. The chaos that ensues tests the teacher's resolve, and with the help of a gay reporter played by Tom Selleck, he finally comes to accept his orientation after saying "I'm gay" instead of "I do" at the altar. The reaction of small town America to all the attention brought to it by this high profile incident is the source of much of the story's humor, and references to real life events (such as Tom Hanks' own acceptance speech in which he thanked prior gay acquaintances) and screen classics (including the Sparticus show of support at the end) keep the environment very light-hearted. Aside from Cusack's painful but hilarious ability to sob uncontrollably, perhaps the most lasting highlight of In & Out is a ten-second kiss performed by Kline and Selleck. On the serious side, the movie remarkably made its statement about the acceptance of homosexuality without actually being overtly sexual in any way, the result of careful crafting by a crew consisting of a fair number of gay men. Among these was composer Marc Shaiman, perhaps the most notably well known homosexual composing for major feature films and whose wicked sense of humor is legendary in the industry. It's painful to perpetuate the erroneous stereotype that gay composers tend to write some of the fluffiest romantic music in existence, but in Shaiman's case, that just happens to be the truth. If you need extremely positive, sappy, major-key and treble-happy orchestral music for a light comedy or drama, Shaiman has proven himself the master of that sound on countless occasions. His knack for parody is also respected, though In & Out was the kind of assignment that required little more than the composer's most common syrupy tone and he delivered that sound to perfection.

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Anyone closely familiar with Shaiman's career will be able to hear the music for In & Out in their mind before actually playing it for the first time. The standard orchestral ensemble is light on its feet and bubbly in its expressions, developing motifs of slight comedy but sticking mostly to a dramatic ambience. The pleasant, tingling sincerity of "Wedding Preparations," prominent harp lines of glowing hope aplenty, devolves into panicked rhythms of prancing strings and woodwinds in "The Morning After" and "The Bachelor Party," the latter cue exploding into a brief and humorous statement of Shaiman's main rhythmic motif from City Slickers near the end. The composer's main theme and rather frantic "action" motif undergo significant stress in these cues, but never does the tone ever darken. For all the chasing that occurs in these cues, there's nary an extended moment of dissonance to break the breezy mood. Even in "I Don't," Shaiman parades with snappiness straight from Rachel Portman's The Road to Wellville, though the pair of "Mom & Dad" and "Cameron & Emily" finally slow the pace down with pretty woodwind interludes over tingling percussion. After a brief reference to the "People" theme in the final cue (which sounds very much like the sappy melodrama that Shaiman might himself conduct at the Academy Awards), a hearty ensemble performance of the main theme closes out the score with predictable warmth. Only about 24 minutes of score material is included on the 40-minute album for In & Out, but that quantity proves itself to be well suited to the demeanor of the music. It's a redundant score in many ways, the only exception being the source-like music for "To Serve and Protect," a cue that proves that even when attempting to write a serious dramatic cue of adagio-like proportions, he ends up emulating the equivalent efforts of Alan Menken in terms of low genuine gravity. The soundtrack is fleshed out by some of the prominently placed songs in the movie, including, most appropriately, the "Macho Man" classic by Village People that the cast dances to in the final scene. The other entries are equally retro in style, but it's somewhat disconcerting to hear Diana Ross' inferior version of "I Will Survive" rather than the Gloria Gaynor original (though the updating of the disco tone is perhaps a good thing). Overall, this soundtrack is a very likable souvenir of the film, but it will offer nothing new of note for a collector already owning a decent selection of Shaiman scores. If only some of the man's spoken humor could have been hidden somewhere in a few of the tracks... ***   Amazon.com Price Hunt: CD or Download

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For Marc Shaiman reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.13 (in 8 reviews) and the average viewer rating is 3.12 (in 18,264 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.