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•	1997 Album

•	2013 Album

Thematically, Cocoon is often mischaracterized as a monothematic score, and while the film doesn't seem to make use of different melodies for individual lines of plot, Horner's theme can be divided into three distinct parts. Each of these is provided in succession at the outset of "Theme From Cocoon" and are rotated between in "The Ascension." The tingling seven-note prelude theme for mystery opens both the suite and the entire score and represents the fantasy element. Later development seemingly follows the lines of both the older folks' enthusiasm and the aliens themselves. The ensemble performance of the dominant title theme for the fantasy element at 1:45 into "The Ascension" is countered by a sensitive and romantic counterpart at 1:15 into "Theme From Cocoon." The former brass-led theme, akin to the later The Rocketeer, is offered in conjunction with the harshly metallic sound that Horner often produced in that era, though the latter theme for flowing strings is a striking foreshadowing of the weighty dramatic style that would culminate in Legends of the Fall. The mystery theme is given an elegant horn solo at 2:40 into "Theme From Cocoon," previewing some of the composer's writing in the children's genre to follow. These ideas mingle so frequently they serve as interludes to each other, so it's understandable that most listeners don't separate them when enjoying Cocoon. A few independent but revisited progressions in the score are the early makings of the saccherine ideas in Casper. A few distinct aspects of creativity in the score are worth mentioning beyond these motifs; the use of woodwind instruments to imitate the call of an urgent telegraph message is brilliantly played at 1:45 into "Theme From Cocoon." No re-recording of the theme has ever effectively recreated the sixteenth notes merging into one continuous whole note. Fans of Horner's early action music will enjoy "The Chase," which heightens the fantasy theme with an assortment of percussive aides and brass tones that will raise significant memories of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan and Krull. Synthetic elements provide interesting accents as well; the use of a synth organ effect for moments of a religious nature are heard in the middle of "Discovered in the Pool House" and in "The Ascension." These synths are used to produce a ghostly moment of suspense late in "The Lovemaking" that resembles usage in Jerry Goldsmith's Poltergeist. Horner's application of metallic percussion as an accent to the various fuller ensemble sequences is an effective method of infusing both a sense of magic and watery fluidity into the equation.

Evidence of Horner's more playful side also exists in "Discovered in the Pool House," with some exuberant rhythms that would guide his later animation scores. The swinging jazz of "The Boys Are Out" is also an early venture by Horner into a genre he would explore several times with success. Along with the jazz, the understated acoustic guitar sounds of "Sad Goodbyes" would combine to form a greater portion of Horner's score for Cocoon: The Return, though all of the primary orchestral themes would be regurgitated as well. Additional jazz and source rock pieces were recorded for the project, none of them spectacular. On album, the Cocoon score has spent 90% of its existence as elusive as the aliens themselves. Forty minutes of the score was made available on an extremely early and primitive Polydor CD that, like many at the time, went very much out of print within just a few years. Its value reached $250 in the mid-1990's before a re-pressing in 1997 was made commercially available (and the bootleg CDr market began taking off). Both albums offered identical contents, which unfortunately broke Horner's score into two LP-styled halves with the presence of an absolutely wretched and badly dated pop song that sounds like a much better match for Ghostbusters than this. Songs like "Gravity" exist to remind us just how corny the 1980's were and, inevitably, how much we'd like to ignore the fact that such music ever existed. The 1997 pressing by P.E.G. (another Polygram branch) itself fell out of print within only a short few years, and copies of that album (along with the original 1985 run) eventually sold for as much as $75. Despite its identical contents, the 1997 album was preferable for its slight improvement in sound quality due to a remastering. For audiophiles, however, the true reward of patience came in 2013 when Intrada's expanded album for Cocoon added nearly twenty minutes of music and, more importantly, extensively remastered the score to return it to its most pristine original state. The newly added cues offer more source-like jazz ("Going to the Pool" and "Seduction" featuring the same theme), exuberant playfulness ("Pool is Closed" and "David Runs to the Boat"), subtle tenderness ("A Relapse" and "Sneaking Away"), some intriguing suspense and horror ("Mysterious Dive" and "Unveiling"), and two unfortunate source rock cues in the bonus section. But the improvement in sound quality is where Intrada deserves the most kudos, making this limited product a necessity for any Horner collector. On the whole, with both Cocoon and Cocoon: The Return suffering from a history of limited availability on album, Horner's music for these films is often overshadowed and forgotten by collectors of the composer's popular scores from 1988 and beyond. The original Cocoon, however, offers at least twenty minutes of engagingly dramatic music and remains one of Horner's important "discovery" scores.  ****   @Amazon.com: CD or Download

Bias Check:

For James Horner reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.16 (in 103 reviews) and the average viewer rating is 3.26 (in 193,526 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.