Buy it... only if Alexandre Desplat's quietly rhythmic score was effective in aiding the suspense of the film for you.

Avoid it... if a dazed, muted, and seemingly understated score of ambient rhythms and poorly rendered solos doesn't heighten your senses for intellectual thrillers.

Desplat

Syriana: (Alexandre Desplat) As part of the modern renaissance of political corruption thrillers that is starting to seem awfully reminiscent of a similar emphasis in 1970's cinema, Syriana takes a broad look at the hopelessly corrupted international oil industry. The film, based on the book by Robert Baer, was directed and written by Stephen Gaghan, who won an Oscar for his screenplay for Traffic. It's another "hyperlinked" film that uses the style of establishing characters and storylines spread across the entire planet and slowly connecting all of them together as the film progresses. The smarts of the story has generated a somewhat positive response from critics and moviegoers, though as polarizing a topic as Syriana remains, it's difficult to expect unanimously positive reviews in light of the intelligently glum viewpoint of the picture. Given that Stephen Gaghan's Traffic was similarly rendered and themed, it wouldn't have been a surprise to see sound design composer Cliff Martinez return to score Syriana. But Gaghan turned to French composer Alexandre Desplat because, in his words, "I realized this guy has the crossover dribble; he can play the outside and he can play in the paint." That statement could mean any one of several things, including something quite perverted (not to be mentioned here), but you can get the general sense that Gaghan was interested in the diversity of Desplat's genre-bending talents.

2005 has been a breakthrough year for Desplat, who had scored over 60 films in his native France before announcing himself in Hollywood a few years ago with Girl with a Pearl Earring. With seven 2005 films featuring Desplat music, Syriana joins Hostage as the most widely recognized. But unlike the sensibilities of his previous American works, Syriana ironically takes Desplat along a musical road that sounds much more like Cliff Martinez's ambient sound design than his own orchestral structures. And despite an ensemble appropriate for this kind of sobering thriller, Desplat's music fails to muster any kind of genuine suspense or intrigue. The ensemble consists of a small string and percussion orchestra, with notable soloists on the duduk, ney, piano, and cello. Also present in nearly every cue is an electric bass or other synthetic element. The key word is "somber," which could be very easily combined with "dazed" to describe Desplat's work here. Muted, beaten, and understated, the score for Syriana is surprisingly devoid of any self-defining character because it lacks the sort of edge that a film like Syriana promises. Desplat's title theme is held closely to the vest, performed with heavy restraint by piano and only clearly evident in an extended sequence for the whole ensemble in the concluding "Fathers and Sons" cue. The album offers the more interesting ideas near its opening, with "Driving in Geneva" presenting the most active rhythmic cue on album.

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In "Driving in Geneva," quickly but quietly alternating strings are joined by the electric bass to create a canvas of slight urgency despite the significantly slower, more mellow piano solo on top of that canvas. The rhythms would proceed to define the score best, with their very slight presence nearly always meandering in the background, sometimes alone. The geography is played well by Desplat in Syriana, with the duduk offered in a far more authentic manner than typically heard in American scores nowadays. But like the solo ney and cello performances, a very subtle mix is used to incorporate those performances. In many cases, the most intriguing elements of Syriana are unfortunately undermixed, creating that dazed and heavily sedated effect on the score. Thus, as a background listening experience, Syriana is difficult to appreciate, and as an accompaniment to the film, the score's lack of true suspense would seem curious. Given Desplat's use of a solo child's voice in Hostage, a poignant use at the very least, it's difficult to understand how the solo uses in Syriana are so mistreated. Perhaps the delicate balance between high drama and serious restraint was simply skewed badly towards the latter, because Syriana lacks the gritty edge that similarly conceived scores for those old 1970's political thrillers had. Overall, Desplat's Syriana is a head-scratcher, but it may suffice at the most basic, necessary levels. **   Amazon.com Price Hunt: CD or Download

Bias Check:

For Alexandre Desplat reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.21 (in 19 reviews) and the average viewer rating is 3.1 (in 10,771 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.