Filmtracks Traffic Rank: #1,393
Written 12/7/01, Revised 2/14/09
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Buy it... only if you appreciate the restrained tone of Cliff
Eidelman's character drama scores of the late 1990's.
Avoid it... if you expect Eidelman to use the opportunity of this
weighty cultural drama to revisit the engaging tone of his late 1980's
works.
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| Eidelman |
An American Rhapsody: (Cliff Eidelman) An arthouse
film from writer and director Eva Gardos that briefly gained
international attention in the summer of 2001, An American
Rhapsody is a character drama about a family torn apart by the harsh
political rule imposed upon Hungarians in the 1950's. A young Scarlett
Johansson plays a teenager who, based on Gardos' own life story,
traverses both America and Hungary in an attempt to determine her own
identity after her troubled, split childhood between the two highly
disparate countries and cultures. Despite a generally positive critical
response, the film never maintained enough lasting acclaim to propel it
into mainstream awards status, and the score for the film by Cliff
Eidelman likewise faded into immediate obscurity. For Eidelman, An
American Rhapsody represented a return to the big screen that many
of his listeners had been awaiting for three years. His previous feature
film score and album release of his work was for One True Thing
in 1998, and since that time, Eidelman had been occupying his time with
obscure television and concert pieces. Unflattering rumors as to why
Eidelman had been left out of the opportunity to score a mainstream film
abounded at the time, and some scoffed at the small scale of An
American Rhapsody. Nevertheless, the composer was back, and his
touch for intimate, emotional writing with a moderate orchestral
ensemble had not been lost in that time. The story of An American
Rhapsody called for yet another introverted type of score from
Eidelman, a common event for a man who, in the 1990's, had become best
known for achieving such scores with smaller budgets and restricted
ensembles. In the case of An American Rhapsody, the orchestral
ensemble is of limited size, though the style of writing doesn't need
the group to be any larger. Eidelman explained at the time that his
intent with the flow of this score was to simply follow the
internalized, emotional rollercoaster of the film. Thus, there is no
dominant theme or motif with which to easily identify this entire work,
and while the music is functional in its general constructs, it is
ultimately frightfully anonymous.
The scenes representing the "Iron Fist," both in fact
and recollection, offer the only wider representation of darkness or
oppression in the score, yielding its few full ensemble expressions of
traumatic harmony. The majority of scenes contain very restrained, quiet
material, however, dominated by simple, though pleasant string themes
drawn out to an expanded rhythm that would be appropriate for period
setting. The slight classicism in Eidelman's style is understandable,
but it doesn't particularly represent 1960's Los Angeles very
effectively. There are very lengthy sequences of barely audible string
meanderings, most likely accompanying dialogue, and large sections of
this score can pass without much notice. The title track, representing
the finale of the score, presents the clearest and most satisfying
performance of Eidelman's themes, but it amounts to only a few minutes
in length. The album ends with traditional songs conducted by Eidelman
that are, in fact, more interesting that the original score itself. On
the whole,
An American Rhapsody is a disappointment for Eidelman
collectors who waited three years to hear another score from an artist
once considered to be one of the industry's brightest rising stars. The
saving grace for the score (if it is enough) is a collection of sporadic
piano performances, which Eidelman gracefully handles as per his usual
standard. During the darker scenes of displacement, the piano sets a
pulsating base tone (and the rolls in "There Was an Iron Fist" are a
nice touch of elegance), and its solo performances in the upper ranges
are flawlessly presented. But given what we know about Eidelman and his
experience with scores about persecution and loss,
An American
Rhapsody doesn't take any chances, nor does it offer anything new to
Eidelman's career that had not been heard before. It may function well
enough as basic accompaniment, but even as such, it isn't as provocative
as anyone would expect given the weighty dramatic reach of the film.
Because it instead plays as mundane filler material, which very well may
be what the producers or director of the film asked for, it could leave
even Eidelman's ardent fans a bit cold. A solid work, but an often
uninteresting listening experience on album.
** @Amazon.com: CD or
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Bias Check:
For Cliff Eidelman reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.29
(in 17 reviews) and the average viewer rating is 3.2
(in 8,862 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.
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