Already at the top of his game and popularity was composer
Jerry Goldsmith by 1974, and while he is known for having several works
rejected through the years,
Chinatown represented, along with
Air Force One, one of the composer's most famous replacement
assignments. Goldsmith commented that Lambro's music was thrown out
"because the composer wasn't right for the movie in the first place."
Perhaps not surprisingly, Lambro spent several decades going to extremes
to defend his music for
Chinatown and trash everyone who was
involved in the production, including Goldsmith. He went so far as to
write extensively about it, though some of his assertions were debunked.
Goldsmith, meanwhile, stepped in with only ten days to write and record
a replacement score, and he provided far less music for the movie than
Lambro had, opting to leave several vital sequences unscored. He
received acclaim for his short but memorable work, including nominations
for all the major industry awards. Interestingly, though, despite the
heartache and mudslinging involved with the music for
Chinatown,
neither score could be considered a classic, and they likely would have
equally served the film if Lambro's action material had been dialed back
in the mix. (He became irate at the editor for doing just that, in fact,
and he later claimed that this fight was the real reason he was fired.)
The truth is that both Lambro and Goldsmith's scores approached the
topic from the same perspective, the composers identifying the need for
similar noir romance and dissonant, percussive suspense. The difference
between the two is that Lambro threw into the mix some ethnic Chinese
material for three cues and was generally harsher in all facets of his
work. His saxophone theme of noir appeal in "Main Titles" exists over a
jumble of incongruent lines of piano and other instrumentals, creating a
nightmarish ambience that sets the mood but does so with intentionally
disturbing and uneasy atmospherics. His suspense material is more fully
orchestral than Goldsmith's, but it is plain obnoxious in its absolute
unpleasantness. His take on the Noah Cross villain is not much different
from Goldsmith's, but Lambro is content to slather dissonant violin
lines on nearly everything without really needing to. His action music,
as in "Orchard Chase," is competently terrifying, and it's in cues like
this where his breadth of percussive coloration really serves the
concept well.
As with Goldsmith's score for
Chinatown, the
highlight in Lambro's work is his more accessible romantic element,
summarized by the disarming piano and string tonality in "One Night With
Evelyn." This music is reprised in true noir agony in "Forget It Jake,"
and the hanging chord to conclude that cue is superb. The Chinese cues,
led by "Welcome to Chinatown" and "End Titles," offer their own theme,
and their applications seem cheap. The use over the end credits is
Lambro's most considerable mistake, as this cue definitely needed to
expand upon the agony of the tortured romance material. It's not
difficult to imagine that the opening and closing titles are where
Lambro's music ultimately sunk him, and Goldsmith didn't make that same
mistake. The key difference between the two scores is Goldsmith's
ability to provide a truly appealing and sultry main romance theme, and
this dominant, bluesy identity is expressed well throughout his
replacement work. As was always a concern at the time, the studio wanted
to sell albums, and Goldsmith's "Love Theme" from the film, used
obviously in not only the "Jake and Evelyn" romance cue but also the
opening and closing of the film, was positioned to sell the album. It
captures the sleazy demeanor of the film far better than Lambro's
equivalent, and this theme alone likely earned Goldsmith his
recognition. The notable solo trumpet performances in this theme,
provided over the composer's usual bed of piano and strings, are highly
acclaimed, their lazy but respectful attitude vital in reinforcing the
personality of the narrative. Goldsmith adapts this theme well in the
suspense portions of his work, reprising it at satisfactory intervals,
though don't expect this majority of the score to strongly appeal. The
composer relies upon a minimal ensemble for
Chinatown, his
trumpet and strings joined by a handful of pianos, harps, and percussion
for a rather sparse atmosphere. The piano is often prepared in a way to
give it an otherworldly, thumping tone. His take on the Noah Cross
villain is more subdued and reliant upon sinister percussive rhythms to
convey the menace of conspiracy. One of the more intriguing aspects of
Goldsmith's recording is how dry the suspense passages sound compared to
the relatively wet trumpet performances. This may be an intentional
reference to the role of water in the story of the film, the dry literal
environment inspiring Goldsmith to use techniques he had utilized for
arid Western settings in the past.
Overall, neither Lambro's score or Goldsmith's
replacement music for
Chinatown will impress you if you are not
enamored with the film itself. Very little of the Lambro score
translates well onto album, and Goldsmith's 31-minute work can be very
effectively condensed down to a ten to fifteen-minute suite. Also to
consider are three source cues of vintage jazz and blues that better
match the replacement score. The Lambro work was released by
Perseverance Records in 2012 under the title "Los Angeles, 1937," and
though it was limited to only 1,000 copies at a low price point, the
product did not sell out and escalate in value in the first ten years of
its release. That presentation also appends four tracks from Lambro's
concert pieces, "Structures for String Orchestra" and "Music for Wind,
Brass & Percussion," that were either tracked into the movie originally
or inspired Polanski to hire him for the project. The concert pieces are
in stereo while the original score is in mono. The editorial arrangement
of the music for the film's trailer is an interesting attraction, though
the rest of the work struggles outside of purely intellectual
appreciation on album. The Goldsmith score has enjoyed far more
availability, not surprisingly, starting with its original LP
presentation. That stereo arrangement was long the domain of the
Varèse Sarabande label, which pressed that short selection to CD
in 1995 and then, after that product became out of print, as a limited
CD Club item in 2012. The latter was a point of substantial
dissatisfaction from film music enthusiasts, as it was a straight
re-issue without additional material or even improved sound quality. The
Varèse albums both provided an overly flat sound that disregarded
nuance in the recording, and between this flaw and the lack of missing
material (and film versions of several cues), the label's promotional
description of the product as "definitive" was widely ridiculed. In
2016, Intrada Records finally offered the proper presentation of
Goldsmith's
Chinatown, starting its single CD with a more
balanced stereo version of the album arrangements and then providing the
film version of the score, including two or three pivotal narrative
moments, in the best mono sound available and with the source material
properly sequenced. While
Chinatown will not appeal to all
Goldsmith collectors, the Intrada product is an absolutely superb
representation of his score and renders all previous releases moot.
Still, don't let the hype oversell either score for this film, for both
entries are somber, introverted, and challenging experiences.
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