Filmtracks Recommends:
Buy it... if you seek a combination of the yearning beauty of the string motifs in The Thin Red Line and the melodramatic weight of The House of the Spirits. Avoid it... if you agree with critics who believe that Hans Zimmer's "mushy" tone of over-extended emotional reach tends to wash the tension out of serious dramas. Filmtracks Editorial Review:
Invincible: (Hans Zimmer/Klaus Badelt) The first mainstream film by director Werner Herzog in many years, 2002's Invincible was a polarizing tale of human dignity and religious allegory set in Nazi Germany during its early pre-war years. It tells the story of the world's strongest man, a modern carnival attraction that was popular even back as far as the early 1930's. A talent scout finds this man of strength and brings him to a German show house with live acts (run by Tim Roth, who brutally portrays the theatre owner and a clairvoyant for Hitler), where the boyish strongman lifts boulders and performs other outstanding feats. The conflict of the story arises in the fact that the strongman is a Polish Jew in a country slowly being squeezed by the Nazis. And, as part of the necessary allegory of the story, the strongman, like Samson, reveals his true self during a live performance (tearing off his blonde wig and gladiator's uniform). The surprising tale spirals from there, including a love triangle and a predictably unhappy ending. The film was met with either immense praise or intense dissatisfaction by critics and viewers, with the morbidly depressing allegory balanced on screen by phenomenally beautiful art direction and stunning cinematography within the theatre itself. Always attempting to expand upon the genres of films that he accepted as assignments, composer Hans Zimmer had been fighting a recent typecasting into the role of scoring big action and drama films by 2002. In fact, despite similar blockbuster scores early in his career, Zimmer was well respected for taking projects like Invincible and providing them with highly effective music. In this case, Zimmer teamed up once again with German counterpart Klaus Badelt; the previous year, the two had collaborated on an equally dramatic, but far more introspective and personal score for the character drama The Pledge. While Invincible does not exist on as remote a level of instrumentation and alienation as The Pledge, it does offer the same heavily dramatic base as that score, this time with a symphonic ensemble. Zimmer's sensibilities can be heard throughout Invincible, but it's likely that Badelt's greater role in the production of this score was an ongoing trend that would lead him to take primary credit over Zimmer (as legally necessary) for their forthcoming blockbuster hit, Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl. The score for Invincible is largely a string affair, with layers of deeply resonating violins and cellos performing dramatic alternations between major and minor key chords from start to finish. Subtle brass is sometimes utilized to accentuate more poignant moments, including the opening cue, "The Journey," and the powerfully gripping "Martha Lifts the Elephant." Woodwinds also add a human element during scenes of unrealized love between the strongman and the woman of the theatre's owner. Very sparse percussion is utilized by the pair of composers, with only the solemn pounding of "Siegfried, the Iron King" accompanying a buildup of anticipation to the momentous tasks achieved on stage by the strongman. The oppression in the string motifs is omnipresent in Invincible, with Zimmer and Badelt offering really no positive moment of relief in the effort. A title theme exists in very inglorious form, exposing itself most clearly in the two moments of Nazi control during which Zimmer returns to more familiar choral grounds. To represent these two most powerful scenes in the film with overwhelming emotion (those which are the most symbolic of Samson's plight for justice), Zimmer pulls out the familiar deep male chorus and spins their usual Russian tilt into a Germanic one. In both "Master of the Occult" and "Martha Lifts the Elephant," Zimmer evokes the choral intensity of The Peacemaker in its most serious form, instilling a sense of awe and fear into the theme. Collectors of Zimmer's more masculine works will probably latch onto these moments in particular, but the rest of the score, though certainly understated throughout, deserves the same attention. The neo-classical chord progressions of Zimmer's usual choice are hard at work in Invincible, and the 35 or so minutes of score presented on the album release are a non-stop symphonic display of tragedy. No synthesizers exist in this effort, and it is not clear which of the two composers was responsible for the choral passages that serve as the obvious highlights of the work. Overall, this score summons the beauty of the string motifs in The Thin Red Line and merges it with the impressive, dramatic weight of The House of the Spirits. The album finishes with four classical and jazz cues popular in Nazi Germany at the time (some in their original, scratchy recordings). It was a product reportedly released only in Europe (to accompany the primary release of the film there), but available online everywhere. In sum, enthusiasts of heavy Zimmer string melodrama will be very pleased. **** Track Listings:
Total Time: 47:39
All artwork and sound clips from Invincible are Copyright © 2002, Milan Records. 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 9/21/03, updated 3/2/09. Review Version 4.1 - PHP (Filmtracks Publications). Copyright © 2003-2013, Christian Clemmensen. All rights reserved. |
