Filmtracks Recommends:
Buy it... if Basil Poledouris' anonymous but massive action cues are pleasing to you despite the lack of much coherent organization or dominant theme to define the score's personality. Avoid it... if you prefer Poledouris' more texturally creative orchestral and synthetic adventures featuring engagingly memorable themes. Filmtracks Editorial Review:
The Jungle Book: (Basil Poledouris) There have been several film and video adaptations of Rudyard Kipling's original story of "The Jungle Book," and on film you can go back all the way to the 1940 rendition of the tale (which utilized a diverse Miklos Rozsa score). Most casual viewers, though, are familiar with the 1967 Walt Disney animated version and its Academy-Award recognized song, "The Bare Necessities." The 1994 live-action version, starring Jason Scott Lee, Sam Neill, Cary Elwes, and John Cleese offered a similar Tarzan-themed story with additional challenges for the forest-dwelling young man to conquer. Despite featuring newly revamped action sequences, this revival of The Jungle Book didn't click well with audiences, falling out of mainstream attention with surprising haste. Composing the score for this adventure was Basil Poledouris, who had been an established veteran for ten years as an A-list composer in Hollywood. He was in between his popular and successful Free Willy assignments and was going through a phase much like James Horner in the early 1990's. Both composers experimented considerably with the children's film genre despite their original appearances on the scoring scene in the greater fantasy and adventure genres during the early 1980's. Poledouris' work for the Free Willy franchise represented his best in the genre, with his scores for Lassie and White Fang often correctly remembered as functional though not terribly memorable. For the composer, The Jungle Book was a project for which an orchestral ensemble was essential, and he would leave behind the usual electronic elements that were a trademark of his scores at the time. Perhaps not surprisingly, there are moments of playful underscore in The Jungle Book that will very much remind the listener of Horner's similarly veined efforts of 1993 and 1994. The sound was becoming almost an unmistakable cliche, especially given Horner's tendency to re-use the same motifs over and over again. Ultimately, Poledouris' effort would match that of his other lesser known children's scores, defining The Jungle Book as a decent score but not a particularly memorable one when compared to its peers. Moving in predictable directions, Poledouris' score for The Jungle Book accomplishes its mission in delightfully accompanying the film with the full force of the orchestra sometimes contributing significant melodramatic depth. He does offer a manageable title theme that is explored at several junctures, but it never fully realizes a single, noteworthy performance (like the Free Willy one does on countless occasions). The theme for The Jungle Book pleases as it plays, but it is nearly impossible to recall once the score has finished. A slightly anxious, but persevering tone of orchestral consistency often explodes into exciting action cues that are seemingly out of control in their brass rhythms. They use their massive volume to propel the film without much guidance, but these moments are astonishingly enjoyable to hear on album. The "Shere Kahn Attacks" cue in particular is a highlight, tearing for several minutes with the ballsy attitude that Poledouris exhibited in his most robust action scores. Even without a cohesive element to draw these accelerated and exciting cues together, the London Studio Orchestra impresses with volume, precision in counterpoint, and broad strokes of harmony when necessary. There is only a sparing employment of jungle percussion, which is a major disappointment considering how well Poledouris utilized that section of the orchestra in his other scores for outdoor adventures. Without this element as much of a factor, the absence of the composer's electronics becomes a bigger issue. As is, the score is fluffy in tone and light in thematic breadth, and it is thus a pleasant listening experience. It is begging, though, for some true sense of originality, and the inclusion of more diverse and interesting instrumental variation could have assisted this score in standing out. Somber underscore for character-building scenes does little to assist the score's search for a personality. The album situation is a curious one. Released by Milan in 1994, most American pressings contain ten cues of Poledouris material at 48 minutes in length. Some European pressings by Milan seem to have the "Two Different Worlds" pop song by Kenny Loggins at the front of the album (and then the same Poledouris contents). Both albums are out of print, and even though they present some strong Poledouris action material, the work shares a bit too much in common with Horner's material for the genre at the time and can be missed without too much worry. *** Track Listings:
Total Time: 48:06 - 53:57
* track does not appear on some pressings of the album All artwork and sound clips from The Jungle Book are Copyright © 1994, 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 6/23/03, updated 4/2/09. Review Version 4.1 - PHP (Filmtracks Publications). Copyright © 2003-2013, Christian Clemmensen. All rights reserved. |
