King Kong Lives: (John Scott) Ten years after our
favorite Kong was machine-gunned off the top of the World Trade Center
in the 1976 Dino De Laurentiis production of
King Kong, a sequel
was released under the notion that the beast survived the fall and has
been hidden by the government during the following decade. The 1986
production of
King Kong Lives was another De Laurentiis venture,
opening with the final scene of the 1976 film and featuring much of the
same crew. Director John Guillermin would return for
King Kong
Lives, only to see the film end a long career that included
The
Towering Inferno. The script is really what sunk this sequel, with
its laughable premise and ridiculous fallacies in logic rendering the
film completely pointless. The actors seemed to realize that they were
involved in a boring production, given their completely uninspired
performances of cheesy dialogue. The film does have the notable
attraction of a brief partial nudity shot of actress Linda Hamilton, as
fans everywhere seem to have re-discovered. One part of the original
crew who would not return was composer John Barry, despite the
director's continued insistence that the score feature tragic romance
music rather than straight bombast for some of its action scenes.
Guillermin would turn to veteran composer John Scott, whose career has
varied greatly between television, documentaries, and feature films from
the early 1960's through the 2000's. Even though he is still composing
well into the digital era, he'll probably be forever known for scoring
countless Jacques Cousteau documentaries in the 1980's. His large-scale
action scores, especially in the 1980's, can't be dismissed, however,
and
King Kong Lives was one such triumph that far eclipsed the
film in quality. In fact, Scott's work for
King Kong Lives is so
magnificent in scope that it adds another laughable aspect to a film
that was already trying all too hard to take itself seriously.
Scott's music for
King Kong Lives is larger than
life in every regard, forcing the Graunke Symphony Orchestra to its
limits of bombast. With phenomenally engaging and powerful themes for
both Kong and the hunters after him, Scott cranks up the volume with
performances of action more interesting than the music written by Barry
or James Newton Howard for the other modern Kong films. Interludes of a
love theme for Lady Kong, the Kong baby, as well as the dumb human
relationship in the film, serve as counterpoint to the immense size of
the sound that Scott provides for the rest of the score. Hints of Golden
Age sensibilities exist in the highly lyrical romanticism of the themes,
with Scott's title theme sharing similarities to John Debney's reworking
of the Disney "Phantom Manor/Haunted House" music. The balance between
sections in the orchestra is extraordinary, with flourishing woodwinds
accompanying intelligent layers of brass and strings in every major cue.
The German performers knock themselves out in
King Kong Lives,
often generating more harmonic noise than even the most active John
Williams or David Arnold science-fiction efforts. On album, the score is
an outstanding listening experience, complete with the roars of Kong at
the outset of a few cues. The score (released regularly on LP) had never
established itself on commercial albums, available only in retracted
American and Japanese releases that were nearly impossible to obtain. A
1997 bootleg (unrecognized officially by John Scott) provided the
King Kong Lives score in magnificent sound quality, along with a
few suites from other notable Scott scores. The two minutes from
Phantom of the Sun are intoxicating in their merging of classical
and exotic elements, and the title theme from
The Final Countdown
is as lyrically heroic as you can get. These cues are also in crisp
sound quality, and given the unavailability of
Phantom of the Sun
on album, its inclusion here is most welcome. Overall, bootlegs rarely
hit the mark, but this "Ape Records" album is nothing short of
outstanding.
*****
The insert includes a note by John Scott about the score.
