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FILMTRACKS.COM
PRINTER-FRIENDLY VIEW 
Review of Moby Dick (Christopher Gordon)
FILMTRACKS RECOMMENDS:
Buy it... if you enjoy adventurous scores rich with ambitious brass
and percussion performances that hail back to the glory days of Golden
Age high seas epics.
Avoid it... if the traditional sense of grand, swashbuckling style is an outdated sound for your 21st Century ears.
FILMTRACKS EDITORIAL REVIEW:
Moby Dick: (Christopher Gordon) While the 1956 John
Huston adaptation of the 1851 Herman Melville novel will easily remain
the more famous of the two, the 145-minute miniseries made by Hallmark
for a debut on the USA Network in March 1998 is a worthy entry. The
quasi-Australian production led by Franc Roddam is faithful to the story
of Captain Ahab and his 1840's quest to take his whaling ship Pequod to
the ends of the Earth in search of the white whale who maimed him
previously. The circumstances behind the casting of this television
adaptation are worth mentioning because of Patrick Stewart's
involvement. With a foreshadowing of this role in his Star Trek
work, it was perhaps inevitable that Stewart would tackle Ahab. More
interesting, however, is the cameo by Gregory Peck --star of the
original Huston film-- as Father Maple early in the first part; it would
be one of the actor's final screen performances. The film was met with
great critical and popular success, with nearly every element of the
production securing acclaim. The only negative worth mentioning is some
of the CGI work, especially when related to the whale, which looks
particularly weak in its above-water appearances. Announcing himself to
the film score community with grand style was composer Christopher
Gordon, whose work for Moby Dick essentially put him on the map
for most collectors. He would continue his work for Hallmark and other
television productions with success in the following years as well. In
Moby Dick, his large-scale orchestral score would be omnipresent,
especially in its repeated usage during the transitions to commercial
breaks. Despite its profound impact on the film, the confines of
television sets of the era caused the score to be somewhat dissatisfying
in its limited scope of sound, a problem somewhat rectified by a lengthy
album release. The performances of the players in Australia are
outstanding, as is the quality of the recording in digital form. It
proves once again that scores with a touch of Americana don't
necessarily have to be performed in the United States to be
convincing.
The brass title theme for Moby Dick figures prominently in the sea-faring scenes of grandeur in which the Pequod sails under full masts, as well as in those pesky commercial break lead-ins during the initial showings. It is a flowing, multi-layered swashbuckling affair that will remind of Hollywood's Golden Age of sea epics. Because the film was broken into two parts, Gordon presents the theme in full during the conclusion and resumption through the break ("Midnight Sea"). Another dominant theme is introduced when the Great White Whale makes his first appearance. A shrill howl of brass --not unlike the technique employed by Elliot Goldenthal at the time-- adequately represents the wrath of God that the whale symbolizes, and it has an odd effect in the film. The above-water CGI effects of the whale are some of the most embarrassingly poor scenes in the film, and the pronounced shrieking of the brass just makes those scenes seem more awkward. But if you're one of those people who think that Melville intended the whale to embody the duality of nature and knowledge of God, then a multi-layered, angry burst of trombones is probably a good choice. On the subject of Melville's commentary on life that so dominates the novel (and, to some extent, the film), the score could have been a bit more terrifying. The burning and sinking of the Peaquod is inevitable, and the novel contains an enormous amount of foreshadowing. At no time does the score use the darkly dramatic themes revealed in the climax to any subliminal extent in the first half of the film. The "Jonah and the Whale" cue for Peck's prophetic sermon in Nantucket is a significantly missed opportunity (perhaps a nod to Philip Sainton's score for the original film here would have been too much to ask for). Instead, Gordon plays towards the more heroic elements of the story, caught up occasionally in its melodramatic events. He does present an astounding array of metallic percussion, with cymbal rolls representing sea waves with great effectiveness; the opening of "The Pequod Burns" contains a wild collection of these performances. Despite some of the disjointed presentation of thematic ideas in the score, there are individual scenes in which the music is worth mentioning. When the Pequod is overtaken by a sudden storm and lightning causes the masts to glow like the Trinity, Gordon uses a choir for the first and only time. Because of the blatant religious overtones of the story, it's surprisingly that the choir was not utilized further. The scene is among the best in the film, and the music matches both Ahab's obsessive perseverance and Starbuck's growing animosity towards him; Gordon uses a strangely intoxicating pulsation of high strings and organ to accompany this scene. Also of note is the motif used by Gordon to represent the spiritual Queequeg. When Queequeg sits praying to his idol or sticks out his tongue and hisses at the captain (something we've always wanted to see happen to a Starfleet officer, no?), the music reacts with a South Pacific style of chanting, flutes, and rattles. This combination may seem a bit cliched for some listeners, but it basically works. The later action cues offer the most enticing single moments in Moby Dick. As the hunt reaches a frenzy in "Lower the Boats," Gordon's rhythms are rich with layers of harmonic brass. By "Fate's Lieutenant," the brass section brilliantly elaborates on a wild scherzo introduced earlier in the film (when the whale debuts in "There She Blows!"). On album, fans were blessed by the lack of outrageous re-use fees that allowed Varèse Sarabande to offer 70+ minutes of music from the film. This lengthy presentation does expose some of the weaker moments of underscore in Gordon's recordings, and the short length of many of the cues will be problematic for some listeners. While a 45-minute presentation may have been a better collection of highlights, the album's cues are mixed together with transitional overlaps that aid the flow of the score, especially late in the second act. Gordon would never capture the same sweeping, epic sound in his well-known scores of the following ten years. It is no doubt that this score impacted his hiring on Master and Commander several years later, though no music in that better known film can compete with the material in Moby Dick. ****
TRACK LISTINGS:
Total Time: 73:24
NOTES & QUOTES:
The insert includes a note from the director.
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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 Moby Dick are Copyright © 1998, Varèse Sarabande and cannot be redistributed without the label's expressed written consent. Page created 3/24/98 and last updated 7/22/07. |
