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| Lennertz |
Marmaduke: (Christopher Lennertz) Talking animal
films are usually a disgrace aimed at parents trying to figure out what
to do with their unruly kids on rainy summer days. As an adult, you can
simply pray that the popcorn won't make the kids fat and that there's
enough humor aimed at adults to make the two hours barely tolerable. The
latter unfortunately wasn't the case with the 2010 adaptation of the
56-year-old "Marmaduke" comic strip by Brad Anderson, a universally
bashed live action production that used CGI to animate the talking
animals' mouths so that they would match the dialogue. For some viewers,
seeing the mouths of all the canines awkwardly move about with the words
proved to be a deal-breaker by itself. Others desiring some kind of
redemptive plot or amicable characters to relate with were left with a
dull excuse for stupid pet jokes and, of course, the same scatological
humor that is inevitable in all such horrid pictures. Tom Dey's film did
succeed to lure in several reasonably big household names to perform the
speaking and live parts, expressively coercing the animals on their way
to stardom while peddling organic dog food. They run away, fall in love,
find themselves in peril, rescue each other, and generally come to
accept their failings at the end. Redemptive acceptance rarely smells so
bad. Not only did critics fail to see the point of the predictably
boring plotline, but audiences didn't fall in love with
Marmaduke
either; the film was a short-lived disaster at the domestic box office
and required worldwide grosses to have any hope of breaking even. It
marked yet another entry in the transition of composer Christopher
Lennertz from the realm of television and video games to a reliable
workhorse for trashy feature productions. The fiscal success of
Alvin
and the Chipmunks a few years prior was undoubtedly a catalyst for
Lennertz's involvement in the silly animal-related comedies that
followed, including
Marmaduke and
Cats & Dogs: The Revenge of
Kitty Galore. This material is predictable to a fault, the kind of
thing you'd expect to hear from Theodore Shapiro, James L. Venable, or a
host of others who toil with such wretched assignments. It is music that
usually resides one step below the level of John Debney and David
Newman's long lists of career entries in this genre, though the
highlights of these composers' struggles with things like
Marmaduke will sometimes remind film music collectors of the
style of the better known composers.
It's hard to fault Lennertz for basically doing his job
for
Marmaduke. Giving scores like this one a low rating for all
the same reasons that adults find the film insufferable is unfair to the
composer. He has proven his chops in several genres now and clearly can
handle an assignment like this one in his sleep. There are never
expectations of greatness in scores like
Alvin and the Chipmunks
or
Marmaduke, and it's remarkable that they continue to be
pressed onto CD despite the relative disinterest from dedicated film
music veterans. They are full of short cues, cheap thrills, bursts of
parody, and factory-pressed sensitivity of character. Lennertz pushes
all of these buttons in
Marmaduke, yet another effective but
ultimately forgettable children's score. Like most these days, it
combines orchestral tradition with the coolness of rock and/or jazz, a
necessity given the amount of song placements in most such productions.
The orchestra is well rounded and applied in all the right, wholesome
ways. Sweeping string themes with brass counterpoint highlight the
redemptive portions while piano and solo woodwinds and brass handle
moments of deeper contemplation. Accents include acoustic guitar to add
even more warmth to the latter scenes and a combination of electric
guitar and Hammond organ to let rip with hip bursts of rock in several
cues. The score alternates between these two disparate sounds quite
haphazardly, the cue "Hang 20" very abruptly switching personality
several times with such suddenness that it almost seems as though the
cue was badly edited together for the album presentation. As for the
strictly orchestral passages, the score's late cues finally offer some
sustained, entertaining performances. The convincing personal depth of
"Peace Offering/Running Away" yields to interesting shades of
threatening tone in "Chupadogra" before more coherent action rhythms in
"The Search" and "Saving Marmaduke" all combine for ten minutes of
palatable genre material. The score's primary theme, an idea that is a
bit generic in a Debney sense, receives notable treatment at the end of
"Saving Marmaduke." The recording of the ensemble is remarkably crisp,
with the orchestra allowed a wet, reverberating sound while the soloists
are clearly discernable up front. Overall,
Marmaduke serves its
purpose, but makes for a redundant album experience. Ten to fifteen
minutes of music from this score would make for a solid presentation,
assuming you have any taste for light children's music in the first
place. As of 2010, Lennertz still produces far more interesting music in
the genre of hideous pop-culture parody films, where he's allowed to
branch out into more fruitful, creative directions.
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The insert includes a list of performers, but no extra information
about the score or film.
