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     • Years Online: 25
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Covering the best and worst of original film and television music from America's Big Sky Country since 1996, Filmtracks is your spirited home for comprehensive, humorous, and controversial soundtrack reviews. Join our community to support this niche music genre!
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9/1/22 Another 48 Hrs.   (James Horner)
All New Review
Buy it... if you have an established affinity for James Horner's steel drum-led thriller action scores of the 1980's, this entry offering the sound in perhaps its most mature recording quality.
Avoid it... if you found little attractive about the composer's music for 48 Hrs., Commando, and Red Heat, these scores all highly redundant.
8/28/22 48 Hrs.   (James Horner)
Updated Review, With Additional Album
Buy it... only if you consider yourself an absolute completist of a James Horner library, because 48 Hrs. is a predictable entry in the composer's badly dated, steel drum-laden contemporary action style of the 1980's.
Avoid it... if you are among the few who still really dig Horner's blend of electronics, steel drums, saxophone, and limited orchestra in sonic wallpaper mode for chases of that era, namely Commando and Red Heat.
8/23/22 Alive   (James Newton Howard)
All New Review
Buy it... if you appreciate James Newton Howard's melodies at their most redemptive and graceful heights, Alive containing a handful of outstanding symphonic moments of salvation.
Avoid it... if you expect the bulk of the score to consistently develop the themes from those highlights, most of the work somber and understated in its plentiful woodwind solos and light ethnic tones.
8/18/22 Rogue One: A Star Wars Story   (Michael Giacchino)
Updated Review, With Additional Album
Buy it... if you expect a competent and passionately loyal emulation of John Williams' instrumental and melodic techniques by Michael Giacchino, who achieves perhaps the best possible outcome for this impossible assignment.
Avoid it... if you expect Giacchino's derivative melodies to compete favorably with the maestro's, or if you demand a truly representative presentation of the film's music on the sadly underwhelming 2016 commercial album that missed important cues.
8/13/22 Addams Family Values   (Marc Shaiman)
All New Review
Buy it... if you loved Marc Shaiman's approach to The Addams Family, the sequel score offering a handful of related highlights with most of the same set of waltz-derived themes.
Avoid it... if you expect the narrative of this score to survive based upon Shaiman's new material, the pre-existing themes carrying most of the weight to less cohesive ends.
8/9/22 Scream 4   (Marco Beltrami)
Updated Review, With Additional Album
Buy it... if you simply can't resist hearing Marco Beltrami procedurally delve into his 1990's bread and butter once more, even if that taste had become somewhat stale since his superior Scream 3 score.
Avoid it... if you expect to find an interesting or engaging extension of the thematic narrative for the franchise, for the composer revisits ghosts from the past without developing them in meaningful new directions.
8/4/22 The Addams Family   (Marc Shaiman)
All New Review
Buy it... if you appreciate Marc Shaiman's distinct sense of humor and ability to combine the legacy of this concept's music with a smart parody score led by a memorably romantic waltz.
Avoid it... if your tolerance of zany, thematically haphazard cartoon music cannot sustain your interest in even the more whimsically dramatic highlights of Shaiman's work.
7/31/22 Scream 3   (Marco Beltrami)
Updated Review, With Additional Album
Buy it... if you seek the best-developed score Marco Beltrami recorded for the Scream concept, an impressive expansion of the franchise's themes into a more orchestrally robust realm.
Avoid it... if you've never found the famous, vocalized theme for the lead character to be alluring, for the best moments of Scream 3 involve the surprisingly dramatic, albeit brief evolution of that idea.
7/26/22 The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor   (Randy Edelman/John Debney)
All New Review
Buy it... for Randy Edelman's occasionally cheesy but surprisingly overachieving score, an expansive and ethnically smart conclusion to the composer's mainstream career.
Avoid it... on the bootlegs of John Debney's replacement material if you expect it to accomplish more than simply generate more complicated noise than Edelman could muster.
7/22/22 Scream 2   (Marco Beltrami/Danny Elfman)
Updated Review, With Additional Album
Buy it... on the ridiculed 1998 album if you seek just a small but surprisingly adequate taste of the most memorable Marco Beltrami cues from the first two scores in the Scream franchise.
Avoid it... on that 1998 product if you desire a more faithful representation of Beltrami's improved symphonic and synthetic blend for Scream 2 and the associated Danny Elfman music for that film, in which case the later albums are the better choice.
7/17/22 Platoon   (Georges Delerue)
All New Review
Buy it... on the 2018 album for the definitive presentation of the partially rejected Georges Delerue score and the composer's conducting of Samuel Barber's "Adagio for Strings," both of which serving this classic film well.
Avoid it... if you expect Delerue's original primary theme for the film, which was intentionally styled to mimic the Barber piece, to offer the same effortless romanticism of the composer's more famous orchestral dramas.
7/13/22 Scream   (Marco Beltrami)
Updated Review, With Additional Album
Buy it... on the ridiculed 1998 album if you seek just a small but surprisingly adequate taste of the most memorable Marco Beltrami cues from the first two scores in the Scream franchise.
Avoid it... on the longer products if you expect the stock suspense and horror material from Scream to compete favorably with its contemporaries or, for that matter, its own sequels.
2019 FILMTRACKS NOMINEE: Godzilla: King of the Monsters
Godzilla: King of the Monsters
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31 NEW MESSAGES
The Ents are marching! Will you join them?   Expand
Christian Clemmensen - July 30, 2022, at 12:06 p.m.
22 messages  (1090 views) - Newest: August 20, 2022, at 1:16 p.m. by Christian Clemmensen
New My Analysis of the Soundtrack of The Rings of Power - 1x02
Knight of Ren - September 3, 2022, at 1:07 p.m.
1 message (1 new)  (64 views)
New John Williams and the fifth adventure of Indiana Jones.   Expand
Master Composer - September 3, 2022, at 5:46 a.m.
4 messages (4 new)  (319 views) - Newest: September 3, 2022, at 1:46 p.m. by Clint Morgan
New My Analysis of the Soundtrack of The Rings of Power - 1x01 [EDITED]   Expand
Knight of Ren - September 2, 2022, at 4:17 p.m.
2 messages (2 new)  (213 views) - Newest: September 3, 2022, at 5:59 a.m. by mastadge
New Luck, Bad Guys, & Amazon's Horseshit of Power   Expand
jjstarA113 - September 2, 2022, at 9:01 a.m.
8 messages (8 new)  (351 views) - Newest: September 3, 2022, at 12:05 p.m. by AhN
New Now Playing: Friday, September 2   Expand
Roman - September 2, 2022, at 6:51 a.m.
6 messages (6 new)  (77 views) - Newest: September 2, 2022, at 11:01 p.m. by ArborArcanist
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Review and site status: first half of 2022
Christian Clemmensen - July 15, 2022, at 9:00 a.m.
1 update  (2126 views)
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