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Review of A River Runs Through It (Mark Isham)
FILMTRACKS RECOMMENDS:
Buy it... if you, like many, became infatuated with this
respectfully beautiful and restrained period score in the context of the
movie's memorable visuals.
Avoid it... if vibrant and dynamic Western melodrama is your desire, for Mark Isham's music intentionally maintains static thematic structures and extremely conservative ambience during its entire length.
FILMTRACKS EDITORIAL REVIEW:
A River Runs Through It: (Mark Isham) The topic of
Robert Redford's 1992 adaptation of Norman Maclean's famous
semi-autobiographical novel "A River Runs Through It" is the subject of
bittersweet debate amongst current residents of Missoula, Montana. While
Maclean's recollections of growing up in the town and its local rivers
are beloved almost universally, Redford chose to shoot the vast majority
of A River Runs Through It in other Montana cities, an
unnecessary show of disrespect for Missoula, a city that still features
much of its architectural tradition and neighbors pristine rivers that
look the same today as they did in the 1920's. The fly fishing culture
depicted by Maclean still exists; it's not uncommon to see people wading
and fishing in the Missoula area's rivers while passing by during a
daily commute, and many outdoorsmen continue to receive the emotional
benefits from the peaceful activity that Maclean's story accurately
conveys. Through this spiritual bonding experience, the author tells a
rather simple story of his family's growth from the 1910's to the
1930's. In the years since his death (which was followed just a few
years later by Redford's film), local journalists have debunked many of
the facts in the personal narrative of the story, but that diminishment
doesn't affect the personal appeal that Redford managed to convey in
A River Runs Through It. With an Academy Award win for its
cinematography, the critically acclaimed and well-respected film has
long been admired for its stunning visual beauty and the warmth of its
original score, though the latter was by no means a smooth aspect of the
production. Redford had hired the legendary Elmer Bernstein to write the
music for A River Runs Through It, and after the composer had
completed a fair amount of his work, he and Redford disagreed about the
tone of the score. Short passages of Bernstein's score were recorded in
subsequent years, and the highlight of that music exists in a rousingly
dramatic Western-related idea that merges the composer's past mannerisms
in the genre with a dose of the immense gravity that defined John Barry
and James Horner's approach to the same landscapes. Redford clearly
sought a more introspective sound, and after Bernstein was dismissed
late in production, the director turned to Mark Isham and supplied him
with several source pieces applied as temp tracks to promote a softer
tone for A River Runs Through It. Isham, who was not yet an
established name in the industry at the time, rushed to completed the
work in four weeks and was rewarded with his only Oscar recognition
through the first two decades of his career.
Isham wrote a series of restrained, pretty themes for A River Runs Through It based upon the best portions of the temp track and he eventually applied several of these to various concepts in the story. All of his ideas for the film are rooted in the same respect for subtle ambience; since fly fishing is an activity defined by only the sound of running water and wind through trees, these sequences had to be handled with care. Perhaps Bernstein's music was too extroverted to suffice for this quiet sport, but regardless of that speculation, Isham nailed the appropriate spirit while also maintaining enough folksy influence in his progressions and instrumentation to suggest a different era. The string and woodwind-dominated score (with occasional hints of brass, harp, piano, and Uilleann pipes) meanders lightly through its thematic core with constant reminders of tonal simplicity and the application of flutes and fiddles to saturate the soundscape with authenticity. Some of the more jaunty portions remind of Thomas Newman's rhythmic mechanisms at the time (Redford, not surprisingly, did finally turn to Newman for The Horse Whisperer a few years later) and Isham's technique at applying a rambling bed of piano rhythms to accompany natural beauty foreshadows James Horner's similar usage. The themes of A River Runs Through It are both a strength and weakness. Their multitude and consistency in tone is crucial to maintaining the score's respectful environment, yielding a very smooth listening experience that will lull a person to sleep in context or on album. At the same time, Isham doesn't do much to really enunciate his different themes or truly represent the evolution of the relationships in the movie. The main theme for the landscape (heard immediately on album) is static in its statements, which makes sense, but the ideas for the brothers' common attachment to the water ("A Land Filled With Wonder" and "A Four-Count Rhythm") and the primary idea of romance ("Jessie and Norman") are not allowed to grow and change as the characters age. All of these ideas are restrained by the necessity for reverence to the landscape, and this cautious choice by Isham will work very well for some listeners. For others, A River Runs Through It will sound too conservatively rendered and underdeveloped despite the appeal of its simple and lovely personality. Several source pieces are sprinkled throughout the soundtrack, and you hear Isham seemingly adapting traditional melodies into his original recordings at times. The album is a sentimental favorite for film music collectors, its original CD release supplanted by a remastering of the same contents in 2005 (and accompanied by a rather useless interview with Isham that focuses mostly on Redford and not the music). This score does 1920's Missoula proud, but its very slight stature puts it a step behind Isham's enduring classic of similar character, Fly Away Home. ****
TRACK LISTINGS:
1992 Milan Album:
Total Time: 58:11
2005 Milan Album: Total Time: 66:07
NOTES & QUOTES:
The inserts of neither album include extra information about the score
or film. Some copies of the film on DVD list Elmer Bernstein as the composer in
the opening credits.
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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 A River Runs Through It are Copyright © 1992, 2005, Milan Records (Original), Milan Records (Re-Issue) and cannot be redistributed without the label's expressed written consent. Page created 2/7/12 (and not updated significantly since). Just for the record, the owner of Filmtracks is terrible at fly fishing; the fish love him because the only things he catches are trees and the back of his shirt. |
