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Review of Masquerade Hotel (Naoki Sato)
FILMTRACKS RECOMMENDS:
Buy it... if you appreciate the immensity of Naoki Sato's more
engaging works, the composer staying true to form with his overtly
melodramatic mannerisms for this glitzy, overstated murder mystery.
Avoid it... if you lack patience for Sato's resoundingly wet, reverb-friendly mixes and his tendency to needlessly repeat the same phrasing and orchestrations without adequate variation within his works.
FILMTRACKS EDITORIAL REVIEW:
Masquerade Hotel: (Naoki Sato) An extravagant and
sometimes funny murder mystery set in an opulent Tokyo hotel, 2019's
Masquerade Hotel features a wealth of visual and aural glitz but
suffers from a tiresome running time and underwhelming conclusion. A
police detective trails a serial killer after the GPS coordinates of the
next murder are left on a card at each scene, and with the grand,
European-style hotel Cortesia as the next locale for the villain, the
detective goes undercover as a hotel employee to prevent the act.
Unfortunately for him, he's unkempt and fails to impress the woman
working the hotel's front desk who is tasked with training him. Not
surprisingly, romance emerges between them despite their tussling, and
the movie makes the most of the detective being faced with the many
humorously unreasonable guest demands as he learns the concierge trade.
The movie was directed by Masayuki Suzuki, which meant that collaborator
Naoki Sato followed for the score. The two had worked together on 2017's
Honnouji Hotel, for which Sato addressed the totally unrelated
hotel topic with a more traditional Japanese score bookended by one of
his trademark gorgeous themes. For Masquerade Hotel, Sato
supplies music befitting of grandiose mystery and suspense thrillers,
playing his role over the top at most points and staying very firmly in
his comfort zone. Collectors of Sato's music will recognize immediately
the composer's technique for unleashing a superb main theme but largely
abandoning it in the mass of the score. Likewise, the composer tends to
shift gears wildly in his works, never afraid to jump between genres and
emotional modes with little regard for the development of a larger
narrative. Also not be missed is Sato's tendency to mix his scores with
an immense amount of reverb and depth of symphonic presence, leading to
vast size in his music that masks his smaller ensemble sizes and
overwhelms individual performers. All of those standard Sato methods are
heard in Masquerade Hotel, his structures as divorced from
synchronization points as ever and, like the film, the general ambience
of the music impressing far more than any structure or performance
within. That said, it is more thematically coherent than many Sato
scores, so much so that some listeners may find the work annoying
repetitive.
The instrumental palette for Sato is rather conventional for Masquerade Hotel, perhaps the result of having less than three weeks to write upwards of 40 cues for the film. A separate string ensemble is mixed with 11 brass players, 6 woodwinds, harp, piano, programmed percussion, and various synthetic effects. The choir is recorded in such a way to suggest possible sampling, and subtle female vocals can be heard but have little impact given their rear placement in the mix. (This is not one of those Sato scores that really presses its female vocals to the forefront, sadly.) A bandoneon is the only instrumental solo of note, the miniature South American accordion appearing in "Masquerade Hotel - End Title" for extra flair. The harp and piano provide the moments of noir reflection for the mystery element while the woodwinds carry the romantic portions. A tumultuous string rhythm sets the table for a brass and choral theme for the murder element. None of this makes for a distinctly Japanese listening experience, the Western flavor dominant throughout. While the score might seem like a mash-up of unrelated ideas by Sato, there is some consistent motific development, even if the album's ordering doesn't make it particularly clear. The main theme of the film, like several aspects of Masquerade Hotel, is reminiscent of something Jerry Goldsmith would have written in his more creative days, the pompous, rowdy waltz announcing itself with Papillon bravado and complete with impressive xylophone accompaniment. As a representation for the Cortesia, the idea is relentlessly intrusive in glorious fashion, unafraid to slap you across the face with its superior attitude. Barely noticeable in the opening "Masquerade Hotel - Main Title" cue is the bandoneon, but the otherwise straight reprise of the similar recording for "Masquerade Hotel - End Title" replaces its strings carrying of the theme with this instrument. Those who hear accordions in their nightmares will flee with haste. Novice listeners may confuse the South American sound with a French one, but it's possible that Sato didn't particularly care. This theme doesn't inhabit the rest of the score in an obvious role, but it does get twisted into the one, most unexpected parody cue, "Notice." Here, Sato shamelessly adapts the theme into stalking James Bond mode, complete with the underlying Monty Norman motif, to yield a bizarre piece of David Arnold's Tomorrow Never Dies in the place you'd least anticipate it. While the main titles' theme in Masquerade Hotel will steal the most attention, Sato's most consistent identity is one representing the murder plot. This theme for the killer contains two parts: a churning bass string rhythm that raises memories of John Williams' A.I. Artificial Intelligence and Panu Aaltio's Tale of a Lake (indeed, not the most likely combination) and a pronounced series of deliberate two-note pairs heard on strings and/or choir. You hear both elements of the theme in each performance instance, starting in "Serial Murder Case" (the actual note pairs for the theme start at 1:11). This idea repeats itself extensively, both within the same cue and throughout the work. The churning string portion starts more ominously in "Accomplice" before exploring the same overlaid theme with Sato's standard gothic choral effects of absolutely immense stature. This cue is almost completely redundant with the longer "Five Rooms" on album. The killer's theme does exercise some appealing variation in "Alibi," the opening string motif translated to a more suspenseful chopping and the forceful note pairs shifted to an eerie synthetic string performance. The action material in the score exists separately, utilizing slurring trombones and generous percussion layers in "Room 508" and "New Facts" in ways that sound like filler remnants from Space Battleship Yamato. This lightly percussive tone extends into "X4," where it is eventually overwhelmed by the killer's theme on choir. A mystery motif in "Katagiri Yoko" and "Perfect Plan" offers a hypnotically rising harp or piano rhythm, the latter cue keenly adapting the killer's theme's fragments on top. For some listeners, the highlight will be the two romantic cues for the lead characters, both again taking inspiration from Jerry Goldsmith. In "Checkout," the love theme on oboe at 0:53 leads to a gorgeous rendition for two flutes, strings, and female voice. The subsequent "First-Class Hotel Man" has more varied woodwinds pick up the idea at 2:15 and blossom into a pretty and soaring performance of redemption, complete with brass counterpoint and an almost fairy tale ending. Overall, Masquerade Hotel provides a robust and familiar experience from Sato. His themes this time aren't the most memorable, but his rendering of them is melodramatically engaging as always. The aforementioned wet mix sounds fantastic per usual, and his fans will have much to rearrange into suites of music compatible with his other scores, aside from the uniquely raucous waltz bookending the work. A CD album was released commercially in Japan and is short enough to not overstay its welcome. ****
TRACK LISTINGS:
Total Time: 47:21
NOTES & QUOTES:
The insert contains a list of performers and notes in Japanese
from the director about working with Sato (including going out for
drinks) and from Sato about writing the score for so many characters
with a short time to do so.
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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 Masquerade Hotel are Copyright © 2019, Nippon Colombia (Japan) and cannot be redistributed without the label's expressed written consent. Page created 11/25/20 (and not updated significantly since). |
