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Review of The Legend of Tarzan (Rupert Gregson-Williams)
FILMTRACKS RECOMMENDS:
Buy it... if yet another regurgitation of vintage Hans Zimmer blockbuster methodology, including predictable
derivatives of the good old power anthem days, can satisfy your lesser
cognitive state of mind.
Avoid it... if you wonder exactly how a fruitless Transformers score variation can find its way into this classic Edgar Rice Burroughs environment without having some tomatoes and heads of lettuce hurled its way.
FILMTRACKS EDITORIAL REVIEW:
The Legend of Tarzan: (Rupert Gregson-Williams)
Between the countless film and television adaptations of Edgar Rice
Burroughs' Tarzan concept since 1918, one might think that audiences
would have had enough of John Clayton's tiresome antics among the apes
of Africa. But, alas, another solid box office success awaited Viscount
Greystoke in 2016 when Hollywood released what could be arguably deemed
a sequel to the acclaimed 1984 Oscar-nominee, Greystoke: The Legend
of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes, by far the most respected Tarzan movie
in recent years. The David Yates-directed continuation of the Greystoke
tale in 2016's The Legend of Tarzan fills in the later chronology
of Tarzan's life, returning him from Great Britain to the jungles of the
Congo in an effort to combat socio-political forces of colonial
enslavement, among other scores to settle. Of course, it doesn't take
long for his shirt to be torn off, his wife Jane Porter's shirt to be
partially torn off (why not go with full nudity? Isn't this the
2010's?), and the devouring of shirt and human flesh by crocodiles.
Offended by this film might be the Belgians and the apes themselves, the
former rather unflatteringly blamed for most of the ills of the story
while the latter provided extremely poor visual effects depicting them,
of all things, awkwardly and unnaturally swinging about the jungle.
Still, the script attempted a dose of thoughtfulness, and this
intelligence was applauded by critics otherwise not particularly
enthralled by the slow pace of the film. Yates hired the relatively
unknown Bulgarian composer Mario Grigorov for the project, a major break
that reportedly yielded a completed score for The Legend of
Tarzan that was ultimately rejected in post-production. When the
filmmakers and studio rubbed their magic lamp for a replacement score,
which genie appeared? David Newman and his phenomenal score for 2014's
Tarzan? No! It was the great Hans Zimmer, of course, and with a
snap of his fingers, Yates and Warner Brothers received exactly what
they wished for: a safely derivative Zimmer blockbuster score perfect
for a contemporary, metallic Transformers movie but suitable for
the vintage jungles of the Congo with just a few minor alterations.
The Zimmer minion of choice for The Legend of Tarzan? Rupert Gregson-Williams, a veteran of the Media Ventures days still struggling to shake those Zimmer ghostwriter origins. In all seriousness, Rupert Gregson-Williams, bother of the much better established Harry Gregson-Williams, is among the more talented of the army of Zimmer clones to rise through the Media Ventures/Remote Control ranks. Despite enjoying solo projects of note for more than a decade by the time of The Legend of Tarzan, however, most of Gregson-Williams's recognition has come from the genre of utterly stupid comedies. Perhaps the greatest disappointment regarding this 2016 project has been the massively wasted opportunity to showcase not only a Grigorov endeavor, but really any intelligent score at all, because Gregson-Williams and his own ghostwriters, perhaps due to time constraints, produced a minimally effective, devastatingly derivative Zimmer-clone score for The Legend of Tarzan, one with no originality whatsoever. Zimmer reportedly had nothing to do with the music's composition, but somebody may as well have copied and pasted pieces of his scores from the mid-1990's to mid-2000's indiscriminately and achieved the same end. A veteran Zimmer collector will either accept this mass regurgitation at face value and enjoy its melodic passages or will approach it as infantile amusement as he literally guesses each upcoming chord progression with ease. It's almost as though Gregson-Williams tried to address the region with a combination of Beyond Rangoon and Tears of the Sun, the melodrama of the characters with The House of the Spirits and Pearl Harbor, and the action with The Dark Knight and Man of Steel. And that's just in the tone of the orchestrations and mix. When you throw in the themes, you receive the only marginally redeeming aspect of the score, ironically aping other Zimmer ghostwriters' imitations of 1990's Zimmer power anthems. It almost sounds as though these interchangeable, incestuous, muscular themes are no longer imitations of the original Zimmer inspiration but rather an extension of those imitations that have come before. So when you listen to The Legend of Tarzan, you're less inclined to be reminded of a Zimmer "classic" than you are the Jablonsky, Glennie-Smith, and Rabin emulations, among many others, of that sound. For most of its length, The Legend of Tarzan truly sounds like a Jablonsky score ready-made for the Transformers franchise. Expect no significant narrative development for characters or location. There's no meaningful difference in the tone of the music for the scenes in England and those in the Congo. The latter is simply treated to some ethnic woodwinds and the mindless percussive pounding and electronic effects suitable for the Batmobile. Churning strings and moody brass are familiar players, light choir offering the fantasy appeal in several places. Zimmer collaborator Lebo M composed vocal lines for the opening cue, though the somber performances by Zoe Mthiyane have little impact on score as a whole. Both the suspense and baseline action cues in The Legend of Tarzan could often be classified as stock Remote Control filler, achieving nothing other than grinding or thumping ambience. Where Gregson-Williams excels to some degree is in the rendering of his melodies. More specifically, his use of counterpoint in the score is quite adept, so much so that he muddies his themes by allowing the counterpoint lines to exist by themselves at times. Good luck trying to definitively separate out each idea, because they blend together in progression quickly. The highlight is the main theme, heard at 1:23 into "Catching the Train," 0:29 into "Jungle Shooting," 2:16 into "On the Boat," and with gusto at the end of "The Legend of Tarzan," the last of which the brainless, easy-listening highlight of the score. Meanwhile, a heroic alternative theme is teased at the end of "Diamonds" before enunciating itself fully at 0:53 into "Where Was Your Honor?" and 2:25 into "Stampede," the latter the score's most ambitious action cue. There's a location theme of sorts at 0:50 into "Returning Home" and 1:39 and 3:05 into "Stampede," and a variant of this idea seems to exist at 1:28 into "Boma Port." All of these thematic mutations share minor-third progressions. The muted love theme, however, is the score's greatest weakness, developed in "Togetherness" but devolving into understated mush in "Tarzan and Jane" and "Campfire." Those who admire Zimmer clone scores will find solid enjoyment in the last four or five tracks on the arduous album release, which ends with an unrelated but surprisingly non-offensive rock song. The vocal, percussive and woodwind accents are sometimes buried in the mix, leaving the basic string and brass passages of power anthem origins as the only aspect of the work worth recommending. The Zimmer machine cranks out another one. **
TRACK LISTINGS:
Total Time: 71:19
* written by Rupert Gregson-Williams and Lebo Morake, performed by Zoe Mthiyane ** written and performed by Andrew Hozier-Byrne
NOTES & QUOTES:
The insert includes session photography and a short note from the director about the score.
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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 The Legend of Tarzan are Copyright © 2016, WaterTower Music and cannot be redistributed without the label's expressed written consent. Page created 7/27/16 (and not updated significantly since). |
