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6/2/02 - Joe Versus the Volcano: (Georges
Delerue) --Limited Edition-- "In the final few years before his
untimely death in 1992, Georges Delerue was enormously productive in the
film composing scene, with a dozen scores to his credit in the 1990's
alone. Luckily, because Delerue had a strongly established following of
fans by that point in his career, nearly all of these scores were released
in album form. The most notable absence in Delerue's 1990's scores on
album, however, was Joe Versus the Volcano. A forgotten first
pairing of Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan, the film had the ultimate, corny,
modern fairy tale love story... along the same lines as Big for
Hanks, but not at all rising to the same level of popular or critical
success. Because the film flopped so terribly at its release, Delerue's
score was never treated to an album release. Delerue's contribution to the
film was originally to comprise about fifteen minutes of screen time. By
1990, films had just hit the popular idea of inserting series of pop songs
instead of using an orchestral score, and Joe Versus the Volcano
made extensive use of this idea...." **** Read the entire
review.
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5/31/02 - There's still time to win free CDs in the May-June, 2002, Cue Clue
Contest. Filmtracks and Sony Classical are proud to offer a new system
of awarding prizes to you. Each of the eight winners of the current
contest will receive a CD album of Star
Wars: Episode 2: Attack of the Clones as well as a complementary
surprise album from Sony Classical. These contests will continue
throughout the year, with many new winners being awarded every two
months. All you have to do is listen to the three Cue Clue Clips on the
Filmtracks Cool Stuff
page and do your best to identify the clips. Remember, you only need to
guess one of the three clips correctly to qualify. The current contest
ends on June 30th. Good luck!
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4/8/02 - Dragonfly: (John Debney) "Opening to a tepid
response from critics and fans in late February, 2002, the film
Dragonfly didn't live up to any of its lofty expectations. The
score by John Debney for the supernatural thriller and love story, though,
got a second wind a month later when it was released on album. Debney has
made a career out of scoring two genres of films: children's and
suspense. The odd combination has shown his versitility on a number of
occasions, though it had been a few years since Debney had produced a
superior score for the suspense genre. Like another master of horror
music, Christopher Young, it seems as though there's a general push to
extend beyond that genre into more heavily dramatic film assignments. For
Debney, however, Dragonfly presented a scoring chance to combine
the suspense he scores so well with a spiritually rich love story. The
resulting combination of mystery and elegance is outstanding...." **** Read the entire
review.
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4/7/02 - Tron: (Wendy Carlos) "Not much of a hit in its
initial 1982 release, but a cult favorite for many, this film was the
first of its kind to explore with CGI effects for a movie. For all its
faults (mainly in the story and acting department), Tron is
nevertheless unique for its then-amazing computer generated special
effects. It was also one of the early jump starts to the US video game
market in the early 1980's, which is what also makes it a
landmark. Composer Wendy Carlos was chosen to contribute to the soundtrack
of Tron, no doubt due to her experimental work with the synthesizer
(and, she admits in the notes, she is a big fan of computer graphics). Her
score, stripped from its function in the film, is a rather odd, yet
intriguing work. Carlos employs her GDS and Moog synthesizers, but also a
chorus, two orchestras, and, on the finale track, a pipe organ. All of
these instruments are synchronized together to create an unusual listening
experience...." Read
the entire donated review.
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