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•	2006 Album

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The entire score for Birth moves with the same cautious delusion that something can elegantly emerge from a creepy situation that is in fact a senseless fraud. The end result is a somewhat sick light romance score that basically works even if it doesn't want you to embrace it. Desplat employs a moderate but always restrained orchestra for the task, augmenting it with his signature electronic bass pulse, which has always been severely grating. The strings and piano are the usual focal points, reinforcing the high-class instruments shown performed on screen. On the upside, the composer graces Birth with a surprisingly intelligent and well-integrated set of three themes, with all of them sometimes overlapping. The score's main theme is a slight but well-refined waltz with cyclical phrasing under shifting harmonies, a particularly relevant choice here given the topic of reincarnation. It supplies stuttering in fragments at 1:03 into "Prologue" with some heroic brass interludes for the lead's husband. Later, the theme is conveyed by solo piano at 0:13 in "The Engagement" and becomes suspenseful and slow on high strings early in "The Rendez-vous" over the opening cue's rhythm, building to a major performance with a return of the brass heroics. Barely surviving in "Under a Spell" over the other two motifs, this theme is totally deconstructed in the unpleasant, droning ambience of "The Wedding." Both the theme and its underlying rhythm return in "Letter" with the heightened brass interlude. As the idea strives to rekindle a genuine sense of romance, it becomes a stately string waltz at 2:19 into "The Kiss" and expands to a more romantic string presence at 1:46 into "Day Out." A detuned piano solo at the outset of "Another Lifetime" is meant to be a ghostly echo of "The Engagement," and the main theme fights to establish itself after a minute into "Elegy," informing the uneasy crescendo for unknown spoken words at the picture's end. The theme becomes a formal classical waltz for strings of stature in "Birth Waltz," where wave sound effects occupy the end of the track on the album. The other two themes often overlap, the first representing the spell of the boy over the lead woman and the second serving as a tool of suspense.

The spell theme in Birth is a rising duo of mysterious figures, usually on celeste. It debuts its cyclical form on that instrument at 1:58 into "The Rendez-vous" over groaning mystery and extends on harp and celeste early in "Under a Spell," where it survives all other action by the cue's end. The motif loses cohesion at first in "The Kiss" but then consolidates under the awful bass synth effect. The celeste renditions continue over uneasy low strings in "Day Out," the main theme's interlude teasing brightly on top. It slows down considerably in the hazy, long sustain of "Knights at Night," becomes tentative but tender throughout "My Dead Husband," and barely touches in the background of the climax of "Elegy." Meanwhile, the suspense motif is at first a simple electronic pulse alternation of the same two notes on the aforementioned electronic thumping effect that Desplat employed far too often for comfort in his early works. Debuting as the boy is born in "Prologue," this usage lends unease to "The Rendez-vous," "Under a Spell," and "Letter." It's slowed and expanded to a third and then fourth note throughout "The Kiss," and the longer, four-note variant continues into "Mr. Reincarnation." Desplat eventually transitions back to the two-note version in "Day Out." In addition to these three motifs, Desplat also utilizes a death motif consolidated in the highly unique "Timpani" cue, a reprise of the middle of "Prologue" as the husband dies. While the integration of all of these three themes into the narrative is admirable, the end result is sufficiently disturbing to make the album experience an off-kilter one. The album's tracks fade into each other, too, with the tracks' beginnings not always matching the natural starting point for a cue. It's safe to say that Desplat accomplished exactly what he needed to with Birth, but the music is unsettling and creepy as a result. Its quietly nightmarish attitude buries the appeal of the straight dramatic material apart from the film. Desplat enthusiasts may also defend the composer's loyalty to his strangely dull synthetic bass pulses, but while that sound does contribute to the intentionally mysterious atmosphere of this score, it is extremely annoying on the album, where it can drown out other activity above it. This music is a fine exhibit of Desplat's intelligence and careful crafting, but don't expect to enjoy its markedly distressed mood.  ***   @Amazon.com: CD or Download

Bias Check:

For Alexandre Desplat reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.39 (in 31 reviews) and the average viewer rating is 3.22 (in 16,383 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.

Total Time: 42:58