| CLOSE WINDOW |
|
FILMTRACKS.COM
PRINTER-FRIENDLY VIEW 
Review of Drop Zone (Hans Zimmer/Various)
FILMTRACKS RECOMMENDS:
Buy it... if you have always loved Hans Zimmer's hyperactive action
style in its most relentlessly abrasive form, Drop Zone being
among the pioneers in defining such barrages of synthetic force.
Avoid it... if the grating sound of Zimmer's earlier generation of synthetic samples and dry keyboarding in accelerated rhythms, with no substantial breaks for accessible melodic interludes of lesser volume, is little more than an invitation for a headache.
FILMTRACKS EDITORIAL REVIEW:
Drop Zone: (Hans Zimmer/Various) There was a sudden
rash of action movies combining skydiving and crime in the early 1990's,
though 1994's Drop Zone has two characteristics by which it
distinguishes itself. First, it was arguably the biggest mainstream
offering of the topic by a major studio, much of its $45 million budget
earmarked for Steven Seagal before he was replaced in the lead role by
Wesley Snipes. Secondly, all three stars of Drop Zone (Snipes,
Gary Busey, and Yancy Butler) were destined for the embarrassment of
legal troubles, each eventually arrested for a variety of accusations
including tax evasion, spousal abuse, and disorderly intoxication. The
criminals on screen in the film are led by Busey's former DEA agent, who
plots to skydive onto his former agency from far above Washington D.C.
and bring with him a top flight computer hacker he breaks free from a
transfer aboard a commercial airliner. It's up to Snipes' U.S. marshal
and Butler's skydiving trainer to foil the plot and avenge the killing
of the marshal's brother in the earlier jailbreak. With no interracial
romance or spectacular technology on display, Drop Zone was
really nothing more than a standard crime drama with an extra perk for
skydiving fans. A few memorable elements did result from the film,
however, including the inspiration for a drop tower ride at Paramount's
amusement parks later in the decade and a popular score by emerging
action music star Hans Zimmer. In the era before the Media Ventures
organization's streamlining of rock and synthesizer-defined scores for
this genre of movies, Zimmer was collaborating with a few of his
earliest cohorts in this arena to shape the coming stereotypes of the
"blockbuster sound." These techniques ranged from the use of synthetic
sampling and manipulation of orchestral textures to the expansion of the
bass region to inject the music into a realm previously reserved for
only sound effects editors. Among the first scores specifically designed
to rattle the floors was Drop Zone, an almost completely
electronic work with only a few live elements thrown into a hyperactive
mix of keyboarded samples and drum pads. Its personality is guided by
the electric guitar solos that had existed in Zimmer scores like
K2, but never with such ferocious zeal exhibited in their
super-cool and occasionally wild performances.
The resulting rock score for Drop Zone is a favorite for many veteran Zimmer collectors, buoyed by its obvious placement in the trailers for several high-profile films in the following ten years. In retrospect, it was in many ways a substantial preview of subsequent blockbuster scores from the composer and his associates. There are keyboarded techniques, rhythmic devices, and specific samples in Drop Zone that would be explored further by Zimmer in everything from The Rock to Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl. There is no attempt made to mask the fact that Drop Zone is dominated by a harshly synthetic edge, the budding staccato movements accentuated by a particularly dry mix. This score represented the debut of Zimmer's first bonified custom sample library, the result of extensive sampling of live orchestral performers, and while the technology needed to run those samples at the time was impressive, the resulting sound is primitive and grating in retrospect. The most interesting aspect of the score is its relatively forceful density compared to its successors; there is a phenomenal level of activity in the work, accelerating in both pace and volume as it reaches its final two, action-packed cues. There isn't as much broadly conceived harmony as in Crimson Tide or The Peacemaker, nor are the work's themes as well developed. The balance of live and synthetic elements is nowhere as satisfying as in Broken Arrow, either. Instead, Drop Zone dispenses with subtlety and knocks you over with high-volume, brute force. Its main theme for the human element of the plot is somewhat swallowed up by the surrounding explosiveness. This idea is most often the domain of the electric guitar, conveyed clearly in "Drop Zone" and "Hi Jack" before dissolving into the aptly named "Too Many Notes - Not Enough Rests." The theme of lament at the end of "Hi Jack" and "Terry's Dropped Out" is a highlight of the score, the former cue translating the idea into an overblown anthem that typifies the glory of Media Ventures' heyday. An impressive secondary theme is explored at the outset of "Too Many Notes - Not Enough Rests," but its rendering on ultra-cheap sounding keyboarding diminishes its impact. Zimmer claims that his goal in these cues was to generate performances from the samples that would have been impossible for live musicians to produce, and while he may have succeeded to that end, the result isn't particularly pleasant to behold. The abrasiveness problem plagues several cues in Drop Zone; when Zimmer's electronics reach their higher ranks, they typically sound extremely rough, as in the music just prior to that last minute of "Hi Jack" and much of the rambling in "Too Many Notes - Not Enough Rests." The latter cue does feature the thirty-second passage at about 2:00 into the cue that not only proved to be the trailer favorite but also a precursor of the Pirates of the Caribbean scores. (Zimmer reportedly liked the use of that fragment in the trailers to such a degree that he decided to expand upon it for the actual score.) The middle of the score offers some respite from the pounding action material, light electric and acoustic guitar performances split between Zimmer's compelling, all-too-brief "Terry's Dropped Out" and Nick Glennie-Smith's "Flashback & Fries." A slight rap piece by Ryeland Allison ("Hyphopera") is a detraction, and is the awkwardly disparate rock style of "Falling Out of the Sky" by John Van Tongeren. Glennie-Smith provides most of the co-written material in the work, and he fares batter at emulating Zimmer's style. A little over half the score was written by Zimmer himself. The score's initial commercial album from Varèse Sarabande ran only 37 minutes, though a much-traded bootleg from the early 2000's added inconsequential filler cues to pad the length out to 42 minutes. In 2021, Quartet Records offered an official expansion limited to a scant 1,500 copies that pushed the presentation to 68 minutes, including a duo of alternate tracks at the end. The longer experience does little more than expose the more wretched portions of the work; the 1994 album featured almost all of the solo Zimmer music and easily compiled the work's highlights. The longer product will intrigue those interested in the evolution of Zimmer's early sample experimentation, but don't expect to find enough of the live accents for casual pleasure. One major note of exception comes in the film version of "Hi Jack," which offers soulful female vocals for the death scene in its final minute. The album version of this cue utilized an electric guitar for this passage instead. This moment is arguably the highlight of the score's presence on screen, and the Quartet album finally presents that brief moment. Ultimately, Drop Zone represents an important step towards defining the blockbuster sound that gripped the rest of the decade and well into the 2000's, and Zimmer enthusiasts will especially love the relentless barrage of muscular punches. Anyone looking for either thematic accessibility of consistent harmony or subtle accents in terms of live instrumentation, though, will be left with a headache caused by Zimmer's hyperactive bursts of extremely abrasive sampling. **
TRACK LISTINGS:
1994 Varèse Album:
Total Time: 37:18
* composed by Ryeland Allison and performed by Randelle K. Stainback ** composed by Nick Glennie-Smith 2021 Quartet Album: Total Time: 68:10
* previously unreleased ** contains previously unreleased material
NOTES & QUOTES:
The insert of the 1994 Varèse album includes a note from
the director about working with Zimmer. That of the 2021 Quartet album
contains notes about both the film and score.
Copyright ©
2010-2024, Filmtracks Publications. All rights reserved.
The reviews and other textual content contained on the filmtracks.com site may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of Christian Clemmensen at Filmtracks Publications. All artwork and sound clips from Drop Zone are Copyright © 1994, 2021, Varèse Sarabande, Quartet Records and cannot be redistributed without the label's expressed written consent. Page created 3/16/10 and last updated 5/27/21. |
