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| Goldsmith |
The Boys from Brazil: (Jerry Goldsmith) An
incredibly compelling and tense drama taking advantage of public fears
about surviving Nazi operatives in South America, Frank Schaffner's
The Boys from Brazil postulated that a maniacal Nazi scientist
was able to produce genetically perfect clones of Adolf Hitler from host
mothers in the jungles of Brazil and then seed them around the world so
that someday one of the boys could fulfill Hitler's unrealized visions.
A famed Jewish Nazi-hunter, played by Sir Laurence Olivier in a role
that brought him Oscar recognition, seeks to track down and expose the
scientist, who himself battles other surviving Nazi agents, including
his own security force. The bloody, final confrontation between the two
men is decided by, ironically, a young Hitler clone in the United
States. Perhaps the most shocking aspect of
The Boys from Brazil
came with the casting of Gregory Peck (with much make-up) in the role of
the Nazi, though equally surprising was the unconventional approach
taken to the music for the film by Schaffner and composer Jerry
Goldsmith, who would also receive an Oscar nomination for his efforts on
The Boys from Brazil. Despite some praise for these various
off-kilter aspects of the production, relatively poor grosses awaited
the film at its debut in 1978 and it has since slipped into obscurity.
The score by Goldsmith was somewhat controversial in its choice of
musical genre to guide the pursuit throughout the film. Schaffner was
quite versed in the musical language, and he immediately insisted to a
reluctant Goldsmith that
The Boys from Brazil be scored with a
battle between the styles of music that appropriately reflected the
cultural divide in the story. More specifically, the director requested
that the meter of waltzes be employed throughout the picture, and
subsequently the Jewish presence is handled with an imitation of Johann
Strauss' Viennese waltz constructs while the Nazi presence replies with
a variation inspired by the anti-Semetic Richard Wagner, whose music was
often associated with Hitler's Germany. The obvious differences in
weight and melodrama inherent in the styles of Struass and Wagner is
precisely the balancing act that Schaffner requested of Goldsmith, and
the composer enthusiastically emulated those sounds in battle, once
declaring that the score owes more to the classic composers than his own
sensibilities. The score for
The Boys from Brazil remains
distinctive due to that underlying strategy, thus retaining fewer of
Goldsmith's usual mannerisms than some of his fans may prefer.
At the same time, perhaps too much is read into the
overt Viennese waltz that serves as the primary theme for
The Boys
from Brazil, for the application of the Wagner-inspired Nazi
material is saturated with Goldsmith's techniques of suspense in this
era. The seven-note Nazi theme doesn't really receive a robust
performance for the full ensemble until "The Hospital" and the massive
"Jungle Holocaust," instead simmering like a constant source of menace
in the remainder of the score. In fact, Goldsmith's deployment of the
theme is very similar to the sinister NASA motif in
Capricorn
One; both are rhythmically based and both only require two or three
notes performed in the bass region to signal the audience as to the tone
of a scene. Also similar to that concurrent effort by the composer is an
emphasis on low brass and percussion. The prevailing tone of
The Boys
from Brazil is one of menacing depth, percolating in the lowest
regions for all of the film's conversational material. The outward
action sequences are also standard to the composer's output at the time,
leaving the performances of the waltz as distinctive within the work.
The overly romantic and optimistic flow of these Strauss-like cues is
indeed a culture clash with the rest of the score. The use of this style
causes
The Boys from Brazil to stand out in Goldsmith's career
the same way the infusion of jazz would signal attention to
The
Russia House over a decade later. Some of the waltz material, like
the limited amount of Latin guitar and rhythm music, would be eliminated
from the final version of the film, though. There are no performance
issues with the National Philharmonic Orchestra, and sound quality is
about on par with
Capricorn One as well. The score's original
39-minute LP release was reflected in two identical CD albums (one
limited entry from Masters Film Music in 1989 and the other from the
LP's company, A&M Records in 2000). This arrangement was somewhat odd
for Goldsmith, carefully editing the score into just three cues on top
of the Elaine Page pop song for the film. In 2008, Intrada Records
provided both this presentation (re-edited from re-mastered source
tapes) and the complete score of 56 minutes as was written for the film.
Much of this material, as well as some of the source recordings included
on that album, were dropped from the final edit of the picture. The
Intrada album was limited in pressing, but at 5,000 copies was a bit
easier to find after its initial debut. On the whole,
The Boys from
Brazil is a technically masterful score that may not hold up as well
on album for some Goldsmith collectors, but its effectiveness remains
unquestioned.
**** @Amazon.com: CD or
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| Bias Check: |
For Jerry Goldsmith reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.26
(in 124 reviews)
and the average viewer rating is 3.29
(in 153,454 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.
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The inserts of the 1989 and 2008 albums include extensive information about
the score and film.
