Filmtracks Recommends:
Buy it... if you wish to hear what arguably stands as the most cohesive of John Frizzell's usually mundane, stock horror scores. Avoid it... if only five to ten minutes of entertaining, rip-snorting music of mechanical precision doesn't justify the lengthy album presentation. Filmtracks Editorial Review:
Thirteen Ghosts: (John Frizzell) This remake of William Castle's 1960 classic of the same name follows the basic structure of the prior storyline and utilizes modern set technologies to update its visual appeal. Met with harsh criticism from audiences and critics alike, director Steve Beck's 2001 version of Thirteen Ghosts is a film that is surprisingly short on believable characters and truly frightening sequences, and it's even more surprisingly short on overall running time. The production attempted to compensate for these flaws by presenting the haunted house with brilliant, elaborate sets of glass and steel that truly steal the entire show. The family that enters the house, claiming it as inheritance from a dead eccentric uncle, accidentally starts up a bizarre machine within its basement, causing its massive gears and glass walls to shift unpredictably and, in an unrelated twist, unleashing twelve ghosts who want to kill one of them and thus, as thirteen in sum, unleash the forces of Hell on our microwave and fast-food loving population. Estate taxes have never been so much bloody fun. The film's subject matter was remarkably similar to the kind of stereotypical genre work to which composer John Fizzell had usually been assigned early in his career. Until his 180 degree turn in 2003, when his breakout score for Gods and Generals shocked score listeners around the globe, Frizzell was the master of scoring films in which poorly developed characters are running away from scary threats, whether natural or otherwise. After Alien Resurrection and Dante's Peak, Frizzell followed Thirteen Ghosts with a nearly identical genre project for Ghost Ship in 2002. With so many overwhelming similarities between the overarching elements of the plots of Thirteen Ghosts and Ghost Ship, it's hard not to compare the two endeavors for Frizzell. The composer was attempting to establish a new sound that would tread somewhere in between the styles of Marco Beltrami and John Debney, whose contemporary horror sounds had become the standard Hollywood issue. Frizzell had typically stayed away from electronic elements, favoring unique instrumentation of a traditional orchestra instead, and that formula largely continues here. With Thirteen Ghosts featuring a distinct set of characters (thirteen enemies, so to speak, if you include the twelve attacking ghosts and the mechanism itself), Frizzell was challenged to provide each with a distinct style of horror. The protagonists are only tools with which to spray blood, so they don't qualify in the motif department. The machine that captures the spirits and opens the gates of Hell is presented with a tingling array of percussive sounds, mostly relating to metallic clangs and unusual sound effects of a similar nature. It's not surprising that the tone of Michael Kamen's Event Horizon comes to mind. Most of the ghosts are given no specific motif, though such identities could have been lost in the edits of the film or album. Two exceptional standouts, however, should be mentioned. First, "The Jackall" is performed with a memorably ripping electric guitar-laced theme that is the only truly terrifying aspect of the score. Likewise, the ballsy, pounding rhythm for "The Juggernaut" is a driving brass piece combined with relentless cymbal crashes (which is a nice effect considering how much glass is seen in the movie and the fact that cymbals often sound like shattering glass when unleashed like this) and is easily the highlight of the score. This theme opens the score album, and the same driving percussion and brass theme would be heard again during the return of crazy Uncle Cyrus at the end of the story. The other ghosts are presented with mostly generic, stock horror music that crashes when appropriate and rumbles without unique instrumental clarity when people are stalked. As the climax of the film approaches, fulfilling the quest for the thirteenth ghost before having its plug pulled, the score builds a full head of steam, offering several variations on "The Juggernaut" theme before finally ending with a pleasant resolution of mundane, positive strings. Overall, the score is as predictable as the film, though Frizzell executes it well enough to serve its purpose, stirring up a horror score that goes beyond the call of duty in parts while remaining barely functional in other parts. The out of print album will demand your attention for about ten of its long sixty minutes. For curious mainstream minds, the song "Excess" by Tricky and Alanis Morissette does not appear on the album. A very similar formula would be employed by the composer for Ghost Ship, and the two scores act as sister projects with very similar sensibilities. Together, they're a noisy romp. *** Track Listings:
Total Time: 60:16
All artwork and sound clips from Thirteen Ghosts are Copyright © 2001, Varèse Sarabande. 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 9/17/03, updated 2/11/09. Review Version 4.1 - PHP (Filmtracks Publications). Copyright © 2003-2013, Christian Clemmensen. All rights reserved. |
