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| Doyle |
La Ligne Droite (The Straight Line): (Patrick
Doyle) A genuinely unexplored segment of the sporting world on film is
blind running, a sport that requires its competitors to run alongside a
guide and therefore be in perfect synchrony with that other runner. One
such pairing is the focus of
La Ligne Droite, a 2011 French film
by acclaimed director Regis Wargnier. Obviously a topic of smaller scope
than normal for the director,
La Ligne Droite features a script
of solely his writing that does indeed shed light on the obscure sport
but dissolves into predictable romantic melodrama before long. A young
hothead runner loses his eyesight in an accident but wishes to continue
competing, and he ends up acquiring the help of a female guide whose
checkered past includes criminal activity and family problems. The
training sequences involving the male lead's adaptation to the concept
of blind running have been praised, but criticized with equal
disappointment has been Wargnier's rather bland handling of the on
again/off again romance that inevitably develops. The French language
film opened in the arthouse theatre circuit in its native country but
didn't make it far beyond. In its limited English-language reviews at
its debut, writers noted Patrick Doyle's score as being a very obvious
(and potentially distracting) element of the film at times, dominating
the race sequences with a forward mix. The composer's collaboration with
Wargnier goes all the way back to the early years of his writing career,
including strong dramatic music for
Indochine,
Une Femme
Francaise, and
Est-Ouest. After a period over two years from
2009 to 2010 with only one minor score to his name, Doyle entered 2011
poised to make a splash with
Thor and
Rise of the Planet of
the Apes, very high profile productions that pressed the composer
into learning current Hollywood blockbuster scoring techniques and
adapting his own style to fit that necessary mould.
Undoubtedly,
La Ligne Droite is about as far from
Doyle's other 2011 projects as one could get in terms of expectations,
though it should perhaps come as no surprise that when
La Ligne
Droite and
Thor debuted at roughly the same time, the former
was embraced as a work much more representative of Doyle's established
style than the latter. Both are outstanding works on their own, and
whereas
Thor is largely considered Doyle's take on the Hans
Zimmer/Remote Control influence in Hollywood,
La Ligne Droite has
been very commonly described as Doyle's take on the trademarks of Philip
Glass. Regardless of its obvious references to Glass' unmistakable
style, the score still manages to exude airy, rhythmic mannerisms that
are as purely Doyle as
Much Ado About Nothing. The only
difference here is the surprising enunciation of that style. The budget
for
La Ligne Droite was limited, but Doyle insisted that a
chamber ensemble would be best built to handle a story of this level of
intimacy. He thus hired ten members of the London Symphony Orchestra to
perform the spectrum of strings, a harp, and a piano (Doyle himself
contributes one solo piano cue) and recorded them at very close
distances to the microphone to enhance their size. A few of the fuller
cues sound as though they may have been overdubbed, though an additional
recording with the Hungarian Studio Orchestra is credited for the
soundtrack and may have been used to beef up the soundscape with some
extra strings instead. The emphasis on the performance, despite the fact
that the majority of the duties fall on the shoulders of the various
string players, is on the piano, the instrument playing a pivotal role
in a wide spectrum of emotional applications that range from very slight
rhythmic accents to rolling elegance reminiscent of
Est-Ouest.
The harp is unfortunately buried in the score's final mix, prominent in
"Stealing a Car" but almost indistinguishable in "Leila's Past" and
"Through the Tunnel." There is also a very, very slight accompaniment of
cymbals, tapped in "Leila Runs Free" and "Stadium Memories" but either
abandoned or lost in the mix thereafter.
Ultimately, this is a score for piano lovers, however,
featuring performances of both grace and fierce rhythmic force. The
sense of movement is something that Doyle clearly sought as a foundation
of
La Ligne Droite, almost every scene relating to the training,
racing, or romance utilizing various pace-setting devices from the
strings and piano. The composer is also, as usual, one of distinctive
melodic inclination. Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of
La Ligne
Droite, even exceeding the limitation of the recording to a double
quartet, is the fact that the score is surprisingly monothematic. Doyle
tends to write melodies for each concept or character in his scores, but
this time he connects all of the facets of this story with a common set
of underlying progressions of chords and specifically links the two
leading characters together with a primary theme that exists in many
guises but basically remains solid throughout the work. This
consistency, combined with the perpetuate drama of a minor-key
environment until the last few minutes of the score, is why
La Ligne
Droite will seem to be a bit of a redundant listening experience to
some collectors on album. From a technical standpoint, however, Doyle
accesses his common chord progressions and the two halves of the main
theme in such a variety of ways, even with the small ensemble, that the
score manages to remain fresh over its 40-minute running time on that
product. While Doyle's theme for the pair of runners in
La Ligne
Droite may seem a simple representation on the surface, the
deviation of its parts throughout the score is constantly rewarding. The
album starts briskly with "Leila Runs Free," which immediately launches
into the "A" phrase of the theme, five notes rising from and returning
to key. The "B" phrase immediately follows and traverses upwards in
similar fashion. Doyle sometimes blends these phrases into one fluid
movement, but before taking that route, he begins a technique of duality
in the score (logically for the reliance of the leads on each other)
that causes both phrases of the theme to be repeated twice. Instead of
simply doing this in basic John Barry style, Doyle uses different sets
of strings to literally answer each other in the performances of the
phrases.
Another technique that appropriately emphasizes duality in
La Ligne Droite comes in the simple but very effective
application of pairs of piano notes in the bass to denote gravity in
several cues. These quickly paired notes are a common thread in the
score, though Doyle brilliantly translates them into a series of lost,
echoing repetitions in "Stadium Memories" with extremely impressive
performance emphasis as the rhythm climbs the octaves in the latter half
of that cue (and falls back to earth in the final bars). In both this
cue and "Suspension Bridge," Doyle references the main theme by only
utilizing its progressions, allowing for some elusive distrust built
into the music. Reprising the rising nature and repeated piano notes in
the base of "Stadium Memories," both "Training Breakthrough" and
"Through the Tunnel" continue to use this sequence as a
momentum-building tool. The evolution of the main theme sees a somber
variant in "Seeing Her Son" which morphs into an optimistic form later
in the score that dominates "Yannick and Leila" and likely addresses the
straight romantic element of the plot. The beauty of this final cue is
its unashamed, trademark Doyle sensibility, dropping all of the
Glass-like rhythmic activity and even shifting into the major key for
the piano in the last thirty seconds of resolution. Portions of this
final posture for the main theme had been foreshadowed in the final
minute of "Running in the Sand" and throughout "Triple Training." Most
tellingly, as the score progresses, Doyle eventually deemphasizes the
full statements of the five-note "A" phrase of the theme and instead
concentrates on the "B" phrase; this choice especially influences "The
Race," which like "Yannick and Leila" allows the piano's layered lines
to relieve tension with a switch to the major key at its end. While the
thematic core of
La Ligne Droite is reminiscent of vintage Doyle
scores (led by the descending duo of notes at the end of the "B" phrase,
a technique heard in
Thor as well), the rhythms may be more
challenging for some of his collectors to appreciate. While you can
connect some of these rhythmic devices to previous Doyle scores
(including
Killing Me Softly and
Est-Ouest, among others),
there is definitely a Glass vibe that dominates
La Ligne Droite
at times.
The highly repetitive, cyclical nature of the rhythms
and their sparse rendering by familiar instruments will speak to those
who appreciate Glass' well known sound. Some listeners will also equate
parts of this score with Michael Nyman. Rather than simply emulate these
composers, however, it was more likely that the circumstance of the
ensemble size and Doyle's attempt to address the repetitive motions of
training and running in general informed his music for
La Ligne
Droite in this fashion. Out of context, these propulsive sequences
are often highlights that thankfully pull the score out of the few
doldrums it has. The application of these accelerated rhythms to the
sequence from "Running in the Sand" through "Rescued" is the hidden
highlight of the score, the ferocity of "Yannick Falls Overboard"
overcoming the small ensemble size (this is one of the cues where some
dubbed help is suspected). Even in the more ambient parts of the score,
as in the whining high strings of "Stealing a Car" and "Leila's Past"
(the latter the closest outward nod to Glass), Doyle doesn't allow much
time to pass before some basic rhythmic movement re-establishes the
pace; the pair of "You Tricked Me!" and "Suspension Bridge" accomplishes
this purpose all the while giving softer development to both phrases of
the main theme. The only cue that stands apart as really unaffiliated to
the rest of the score is "Playing Bridges," a brief passage that
features Doyle's own piano performances of a unique melody. If any cue
needs programmed out of your own arrangement, "The Other Woman" is the
only one that could be dropped without consequence. Overall,
La Ligne
Droite proves once again that some of the best scores written for
film continue to rely upon creative applications of small ensembles to
achieve fantastic emotional connections. The easy harmony and satisfying
progressions combine with outstanding performance emphasis from the
lower strings and piano players especially to create an ambience of
power from less than a dozen people. The beauty of the primary theme's
dual purposes, both as a competitive tool and one of tortured romance,
maintains a concrete narrative that resolves with lovely major key
conclusions in the final two tracks. Some will degrade the score for
being repetitive, ignoring its deceptively deep narrative
development.
On album,
La Ligne Droite is the kind of score
that is perfectly suited for a forty-minute listening experience, though
don't be surprised if you find yourself repeating the full presentation
several times. The Glass-like sequences of full ensemble rhythmic flow
can be combined into fifteen to twenty minutes of extremely compelling
propulsion, and "Stadium Memories" is a highlighting, masterful
exhibition of the sense of anticipation a lone piano can accomplish
before the strings harmoniously join its echoing alternation between
intentionally broken chords and flowing elegance to represent dreams
unrealized. The sound quality is as crisp as one could imagine; as a
side effect of the close recording position of the instruments, the
score is extremely dry (even more so than Doyle's usual sound).
Normally, such a dry ambience sucks the dynamism out of a performance,
but it works here. There may have been some temptation to artificially
increase the perceived ensemble size by adding a bit of reverb, but the
level of technicality and professionalism in the performance of this
score is so high that the additional attention to dry detail from the
string players is vital. Only the piano seems to have been afforded a
slightly wetter mix, and in moments such as "Stadium Memories," that
decision works wonders. Unfortunately, a CD of
La Ligne Droite
was only pressed by Varèse Sarabande's European branch,
Colosseum, and after a very brief period following the release date
during which the CD was available from Varèse through its
American storefront (but confusingly pulled nearly immediately), buyers
in the United States were forced to import the product if they want a
lossless version. It remains available as a download in all regions,
however. For a score of this quality, the CD is highly recommended, even
at import prices. This is the twentieth review of a Doyle score at
Filmtracks since 1996, and after awarding the composer four stars on
more than a dozen occasions,
La Ligne Droite finally transcends
to receive that fifth star. Given the high quality of those many
four-star scores, you should need no further evidence that this hidden
gem is worth your time and money. As mentioned in regards to
Thor
in its earlier review, Doyle's initial two entries in 2011 immediately
made him a lock for a Filmtracks nomination for composer of the year.
***** @Amazon.com: CD or
Download
| Bias Check: |
For Patrick Doyle reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.84
(in 32 reviews)
and the average viewer rating is 3.44
(in 25,530 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.
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The insert includes a note from the director about the film, score,
and composer.
