: (Hans Zimmer) If you want to study
about a film that definitely should never have been made, then
is your target case. It's hard to imagine how director Richard
Donner couldn't see the writing on the wall, but the screenplay for
by David Mickey Evans had been passed around
Hollywood with extremely high interest, and Donner took it upon himself
to bring this terrible fantasy tale of child abuse to the big screen.
The director's first film being
was perhaps some
indication at the time, however, that he could take any film about a
troubled child and shape it into a classic. Unfortunately,
falls into the trap of an impossible reality: a mother of two
children remarries an abusive alcoholic, but she doesn't know that he is
beating the younger son. Having seen another child try to fly on his
Radio Flyer wagon (and being crippled by it), the two brothers decide
that the only way to escape the abuse is to build their own flying wagon
and attempt to have the beaten brother fly away to safety. The whole
film exists in this fantasy world, balancing the horrors of his beatings
with the imagination of flight that is the boys' goal. The older brother
tells the story some years later, and despite the film's glossy,
misleading ending (which indicates that the escape was not only
possible, but the flight actually happens), the brother inevitably dies
in the attempt. It's a hideous, malformed story that had millions pumped
into its making, and segments of Hollywood remember it as one of the
most fiscally disastrous projects of all time as of 1992. Donner had
worked with A-list composers throughout his career, most notably John
Williams and Jerry Goldsmith, and for
he chose
relative newcomer Hans Zimmer, who was building his fame in giant leaps
and bounds in the early 1990's. Zimmer took on the project with a sense
of challenge since children's music was a new avenue for him. The
problem with the film and score, however, is how the music would be
approached. Would the score mirror the horrors of the abuse? Or would it
exist solely in the fantasy world of the boys? Would it simply attempt
to be a serious version of Goldsmith's youthful escape music for
Zimmer and Donner argued about the music's emotional
stance throughout the scoring process, debating how airy and child-like
the score could actually be. "We fight like nobody's business. He can
take it and I can take it," Zimmer stated during the recording sessions.
"So as a composer I have to evoke childhood," Zimmer said, "but you
can't do that by being childish about the music. As soon as you do that
it doesn't mean anything to them. They just think you're being childish
by intellectualizing it." The resulting score is consistently fluffy and
positive in its atmosphere, with only occasional, rumbling sidebars in
the darker moments. On the whole, Zimmer's emotional response is
undeniably charming, happy, and lovable. Unfortunately, some critics
dismissed the score right there as a total loss, because it got caught
up in Donner's ill-fated attempt to gloss over the topic of child abuse.
On its own, however, the score has considerable merits. Zimmer wasn't
sure if he could be successful at writing upbeat children's music, but
he managed to impress himself by his own ability to do it. The score is
gracefully melodic and extremely pretty in parts, with heartwarming
rhythms of excitement that could invite you to run outside and skip down
the street like you are a kid again. Portions of the score even become
innocently silly, reminding the listener of Jerry Goldsmith's
accomplished works in the genre. Pieces of
Dennis the Menace and
Mom and Dad Save the World will come to mind given that Goldsmith
was in a similar phase of his career during the early 1990's as well.
Adventurous rhythms in
Radio Flyer are more wholesome variations
of similar ideas in
Muppet Treasure Island. A hugely orchestral
recording, Zimmer accents his orchestra with some mild electronics
(mainly drum pads and bass enhancements) and soloists on harmonica, pan
pipes, piano, and clarinet. The
Rain Man pipes in particular will
give you goose bumps with their elegance, foreshadowing (along with
flute and whistle) some of the awesome beauty of
The Lion King.
Some cues border on the carnivalesque (with even a few Randy Newman
rhythms here and there), but the constant tingling of the fantasy
environment often pulls the wishy-washy parts of the score into line. If
anything, the score could possibly irritate the listener with its shiny
optimism, and if similarly minded Goldsmith scores above aren't your cup
of tea, then be careful when approaching
Radio Flyer.
There are some darker moments in
Radio Flyer
that need mentioning. Zimmer does slip into near tragedy mode at times,
but always maintains the cue's instrumentation from the perspective of a
child. The "Lost Secrets and Fascinations" cue is of particular
interest, with a beating heart underneath a music box, leading to the
snare drum quickly imitating the cocking of a gun, a bass drum signaling
the gunshot, and an overwhelmingly solemn solo boy's voice performing a
tragic melody that would make Danny Elfman proud. A few similar moments
slow the steadily optimistic progression of the score, but if you didn't
know that
Radio Flyer is a horrible tale of child abuse, you
won't realize it based upon this score. The film's premise is so
offensive to some people that the score's fluffy approach is an equally
offensive part of that sour taste. If you've never heard of the film and
are a Zimmer collector who stumbles upon this album, it could be an
extremely wonderful listening experience. It is likely the pinnacle of
Zimmer's writing in the children's and Americana genres, putting later
scores like
Thunderbirds and
Madagascar to shame, and it
came at a time when Zimmer not only wrote most of his scores by himself,
but also relied more heavily on unique instrumental creativity of an
organic nature. There is an intimate sense of style and genuine spirit
in
Radio Flyer that began draining away as Zimmer became a
"producer" of film scores in the 2000's. The album went out of print in
the mid-1990's (when the label ceased to exist), though it has remained
relatively inexpensive on the secondary market. Like the promotion for
the film in 1992, the album was produced in decent numbers, so don't
overpay for it. Its presentation is arranged into three long and
inconvenient suites by Zimmer, followed by an unrelated source song.
Occasionally poor mixing and artifacts like the distortion at the 8:00
mark into the first track make this score a good candidate for an
expanded release at some point in the future. It is tempting to rate
this score very poorly as it was heard in the film, but Donner is far
more to blame for that circumstance than Zimmer, who confessed to
becoming very cynical about the project by its completion. For film
music fans or otherwise, the movie itself cannot be recommended at any
level, and it should rightfully be boycotted if you are among those who
seek serious messages about child abuse. As a standalone piece of music,
though,
Radio Flyer on album is a surprisingly engaging, tonally
diverse, and enjoyable score. It represents everything missing from
Zimmer's brooding simplicity of the late 2000's and remains a fond
reminder of more exciting times in the man's career.
**** @Amazon.com: CD or
Download
| Bias Check: |
For Hans Zimmer reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 2.84
(in 121 reviews)
and the average viewer rating is 2.96
(in 298,172 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.
|
