Buy it... if you are curious about the origins of James Horner's most familiar structures and techniques, many of which evident in Wolfen and culminating in an interesting (if not marginally entertaining) listening experience.

Avoid it... if you expect to hear much of anything original on the long-standing bootleg that contains both Wolfen and Deadly Blessing, the latter overshadowing some decent pastoral writing with harrowing and painfully obvious references to Jerry Goldsmith's The Omen.

Horner

Wolfen: (James Horner) One of three major cinematic depictions of werewolves in Hollywood during 1981 was Wolfen, a film with an aim that did not equate with either studio or audience expectations and therefore suffered an undeservedly quick death. While advertised as a standard werewolf film, a topic that was obviously extremely popular at the time, Wolfen was actually a spin-off of that subgenre, exploring the mystical relationship between wolves and Native Americans in contemporary New York City. When the wolves' habitat in an abandoned section of the city is threatened by new development, they channel the thoughts of the Native Americans in their pursuit and killing of those who are responsible for this threat, namely politicians and other powerful scum. A detective played by Albert Finney is charged with solving the mystery, and while he slowly reveals the unlikely truth, director Michael Wadleigh provides audiences with thrilling shots of New York life through the eyes of the wolves, the image shimmering to represent their sense of smell. This technique garnered the movie considerable praise within the industry's tech-whiz community, but didn't receive the respect it truly deserved from others. Unfortunately, the adaptation of the story from the Whitley Strieber novel was considered too cerebral and was thus cut and rearranged by the editors several times in post-production; no less than four editors were eventually involved, leading to problematic, abrupt cuts and scene shifts that were unnatural. In this process of hacking the film to pieces, composer Craig Safan's score for Wolfen was removed and James Horner accepted the first of several replacement assignments that would yield some of his most interesting work of the early to mid-1980's. Graduating from the fun but pointless schlock of Roger Corman's New World Pictures at this time, Horner was beginning to take a variety of assignments for major studios and lesser known filmmakers of future stardom. He only had less than two weeks to write 40 minutes of replacement music for Wolfen, and he cut the deadline so closely that the editors were forced to use some of the composer's just-previous score for The Hand in several placements, despite the fact that the composer would eventually fulfill his obligations to write his full, balanced effort for Wolfen. Regardless of the outcome, this toil played a major role in leading to his hiring on Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.

The majority of Wolfen is tense and suspenseful, not terribly dissonant but effective at creating a mysterious atmosphere. A well-rounded orchestra is accompanied by an exotic percussion section (and even a blaster beam) that was synchronized with the sound effects track in the film's final mix. Horner's title theme is a clear (and potentially obnoxious) precursor of the motif for the titular villain in The Wrath of Khan the following year, the opening notes identical but explored to a conclusion that suggests early incarnations of the theme from Aliens. This identity is introduced in the "Main Title" on lonely trumpet and woodwinds, and like several other Horner scores, it represents some influence from Jerry Goldsmith's Alien. Often performed by harsh brass in its fuller forms, this theme is translated to sensitive flute in "The Indian Bar," in which case a spin-off melody begins to provide a sense of decency in the otherwise ominous narrative as there is some redemptive element introduced for the wolves. The most notable performances of the idea come in the slapping rhythmic cues "Van Der Veer's Demise" and "Wall Street and the Wolves," both of which very similar to Khan's material in brutal tone and instrumentation. A melodramatic, more harmonious version of the theme from "The Indian Bar" heard at the end of "The Final Confrontation" is a highlight. Like the film, Horner's score is generally more interesting than it is enjoyable, a representation of fledgling ideas yet to mature in other works (led by the sharp, singular, six-note motif that would resurface in Vibes). The combined "Epilogue and End Credits" contains the score's most accessibly tonal passages and, along with the sampling of the rhythmic Khan-like action, could yield about ten minutes of entertaining material in sum. Most of the score was summarized on a longstanding "Pony Tail" bootleg album also containing another Horner horror venture from 1981, Deadly Blessing. The first official release of Wolfen on album came in 2011, when Intrada Records released the composer's full replacement score without attempting to add the portions from The Hand heard in the film or emulate the often senseless edits to this score in context. Sound quality on this product is as good as could be expected, the percussion not a satisfying as it could have been with modern recording capabilities. The presentation does include a notable alternate version of "Rebecca's Apartment" with a strikingly metropolitan trumpet performance that was ultimately removed for the final film version of the cue. While this album of Wolfen is great to see, it will appeal to only hardcore Horner collectors.

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For those seeking information about the aforementioned, widespread bootleg, brief information about Deadly Blessing follows. This movie was a lesser project but one of interest to fans of director Wes Craven's early works, his first attempt to break into studio ranks. Often considered extremely promising but underperforming in its haphazard red herrings and indecisive dual endings, the plot involves a rural American farming community of both Hittites and non-believers who both come under attack from a deadly force (or single maniac) that torments them supernaturally and murders indiscriminately. The main problem with Deadly Blessing is evidenced in the differences between the final two minutes of the international and domestic versions of the film (in the former, a normal killer is the culprit and, in the latter, a demon bursts through the floor to drag a woman to hell... no kidding!). It's a ridiculous horror flick that falsely pits the pious against the sinners and throws the great acting of Ernest Borgnine against the incompetent acting of Sharon Stone. Horner's score is an awkward blend of his most hearty Americana tones of the early 1980's and blatant rip-offs of Jerry Goldsmith's The Omen, resulting in a score that requires a significant amount of track rearrangement to enjoy. The pastoral theme for strings, woodwinds, and harp heard in the early cues is simply beautiful, evolving into a similar love theme and a variation in "Vicky & John" that is a blatant rehearsal of material from The Spitfire Grill and Deep Impact. The suspense of the score comes in the form of deep, menacing choral tones (almost like throat singing) that incorporates religious power in its solemn chime-banging that could have informed The Name of the Rose had the latter film had a more ambitious budget. Extremely high range plucking on violins is a disturbing effect. The most memorable parts of Deadly Blessing, however, are the direct references to Goldsmith's The Omen. When Goldsmith later made a wisecrack about Horner "helping himself to the work of others," it's hard not think about Deadly Blessing, for its several Latin chants (heard most impressively in the latter half of "Unwelcome Visitor/Fiery") use unconventional choral techniques, including the battling of vocal genders and crying, shrieking, and wailing females, that owe everything to The Omen. Horner's predictable handling of these sections makes Deadly Blessing an eye-rolling event, sending most listeners back to the lighter, pastoral theme. On the bootleg, that material amounts to about six minutes in length, ultimately pushing the mass of interest back to the previous Wolfen portion of the product. Once again, Horner collectors will be intrigued, but don't expect too much from it.   Amazon.com Price Hunt: CD or Download

Music as Written for Wolfen: ***
Music as Written for Deadly Blessing: **
Music as Heard on the 1997 Bootleg (Both): ***
Music as Heard on the 2011 Intrada Album (Wolfen): ***
Overall: ***

Bias Check:

For James Horner reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.09 (in 95 reviews) and the average viewer rating is 3.27 (in 176,446 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.