presents many
solid arguments to reside in second place. The crew of
,
including director David Anspaugh and writer Angelo Pizzo, reunited
seven years later for
, conveying many of the same underdog
elements of a very personal nature in an Indiana setting while ensuring
that the sports scenes are restrained enough to maintain the film's
placement outside of the stereotypical sports genre. The story of
follows the real-life 1970's journey of Daniel Ruettiger,
whose youthful dream of playing football for the Fighting Irish of Notre
Dame was countered by the reality of poor grades and marginal athletic
ability. With the passion of his heart, however, he gained admission to
Notre Dame and managed to be assigned to the practice squad for the
team. At the end of the season and after becoming extremely popular for
his determination, he enters a Notre Dame game for a few plays in the
fourth quarter, sacks the opposing quarterback, and remains the last
player to be carried off the field by his team. While the quality of
, it's an equally lovable
variant of the same concept, and the role of Jerry Goldsmith's music in
both films is pivotal to their success. Goldsmith had been asking
Anspaugh and Pizzo for another
scratched that itch for both the composer and his
fans, Goldsmith passed away just a year before an opportunity for a
third collaboration would present itself in 2005 (
). The highly predictable outcome and feel-good subject matter
made
a mockery for many film critics to feast on, and
although the film has its fair share of faults due to its simplicity,
the score is no slacker. Goldsmith's ability to merge the heart of a
personal journey with the adversity of a sports environment is
masterful, resulting in music that has been used for everything from the
Academy Awards and John McCain's 2008 presidential campaign to the
National Football League itself, its game-related theme becoming the
most famous soundtrack theme of all time for the sport.
If you're looking for an inspirational orchestral score of
undeniable heart, there are few that can compete with
Rudy.
Interestingly, Goldsmith's score has historically come under an unfair
share of criticism and experienced a slight backlash due to its immense
popularity. One published argument against it many years ago claimed
that the score is a softly repetitive, non-complex, and bland piece of
music. Others have criticized the score and album for not including
enough Irish spirit or simply the theme song for the Fighting Irish of
Notre Dame. Aside from the palpable tension in the first minute of
"Accepted," there is nary a troubled moment. Most of these arguments,
however, come from the mainstream, a mass that doesn't much care for
Goldsmith's early 1990's habit of concentrating on intimate character
scores like
Angie,
Love Field, and
Forever Young.
As for the complaints about a lack of Irish flavor, Goldsmith integrates
hints of old Irish influence into the swing of his secondary theme for
the football sequences, leading to some general similarities between the
rhythmic movement of this theme in
Rudy and the far more verbose
variant of the same idea to be heard in
The Ghost and the
Darkness. (The renditions of this idea on oboe and trumpet are
particularly a clear foreshadowing of the 1996 score.) There is some
merit to criticism about
Rudy's structural simplicity;
intellectually, the score is really little more than an alternation
between tonally basic variations on its two primary themes. Few moments
pass without either one of the two themes in performance, and while both
of them have merits, one easily overshadows the other. The weaker is
ironically the main theme, representing the sweet heart of the title
character during his journey. The most robust performances of this
tender theme exist in "Main Title," which is actually heard over the end
titles in the film, and the climactic performance in "The Final Game,"
where its superior, victorious interlude sequence really shines. Guided
most prominently by solo flute, it occupies many of the lighter cues in
the first half of the score. While the theme extends itself to the same
pleasant woodwind performances of a score like
Powder, Goldsmith
here emphasizes the larger than life aspirations of Rudy and the
associated "Hollywood happy ending" with a light choral accompaniment
that is somewhat unusual for the composer in this context.
Although the choral contribution to
Rudy is a
nice touch, it is mixed so conservatively against the players that you
can barely determine its presence, and this very slight handling of the
fantasy element persists until a full burst at the end of the film. More
poignant is Goldsmith's shifting of the shamelessly major-key theme into
the minor in "More Training" and "Waiting" during moments of adversity,
bringing some semblance of variance to the work. A touch of humor even
prevails for the theme in the bubbling "More Girls," and slight hints of
synthetic accompaniment provides a minor dose of mystery early in "The
Plaque." Some listeners will find the main theme of
Rudy too
sappy for casual enjoyment, and if you don't typically appreciate
Goldsmith's highly personal woodwind themes of the era, then you'll
easily favor the more memorable secondary theme in the score. The most
attractive parts of
Rudy exhibit this rhythmically charging,
optimistic theme for the football sequences and the field on which they
occur. Just as Goldsmith used a secondary theme in
Hoosiers to
anticipate and drive the action on the basketball court, he creates a
motif of descending pairs and accompanying lyrical rhythm that builds in
intensity throughout the score as Rudy comes closer to realizing his
dream on the field. While only suggested in "To Notre Dame" and "A
Start," the theme begins innocently (as Rudy watches the practice
scrimmages of the Notre Dame team) with solo oboe in "Waiting" before
handing off to solo trumpet and eventually involving the entire ensemble
in subsequent cues. In "Back on the Field" and "Tryouts," the theme is
accompanied by rumbling timpani and eventually tambourine, with the
string and brass sections alternating primary and counterpoint
statements of the deliberate but powerful progression, emulating
something of a dance moment to match the slow-motion shots of the
players on the field. By the final game of the season, heard in "Take Us
Out" and "The Final Game," this theme is joined by snare rips and a
significantly more anxious tempo. The idea so well balances the
competitive spirit of the game with the fierce determination of Rudy
that the maturation of this theme throughout the score is one of the
highlights of Goldsmith's later career. The ambitious merging of the two
primary themes in "The Final Game" caused the performing ensemble to
give the composer a standing ovation at the end of the recording and
playback of that cue.
The effect of the score for
Rudy on its film is,
as with
Hoosiers, immeasurable, and the music is a necessary
inclusion for any Goldsmith collector. Additionally, it has been
suggested that the theme he wrote for the football sequences in
Rudy is the best ever written to represent the sport, regardless
of the college or professional level. In 2006, NBC commissioned John
Williams to write a theme for their newly acquired Sunday Night Football
broadcasts, and while adequate in its task, its stately, trumpet-heavy
flair has never seemed appropriate for the bold brutality of the sport.
Anyone who has appreciated the impact of the cue "Take Us Out" from
Rudy could likely make a strong argument that these two minutes
of music would much better serve as an orchestral football anthem. The
short, 37-minute album for the score in 1993 by Varèse Sarabande
rearranged the order of the cues for a listening experience that spread
the two themes' performances throughout the presentation, negating the
smart narrative teasing and eventual realization of the football theme.
In 2022, however, the label offered a "deluxe" edition of the score that
expanded the Goldsmith score to 49 minutes and includes three minutes of
Notre Dame-related source music spread over two tracks. Appended are
three tracks that feature different album mixes, though don't expect
major differences between these and the film versions that otherwise
define this album. Three brief cues that were stricken from the final
cut also debut in proper narrative order, and these tend to favor
whimsical renditions of the main theme. The most intriguing of these
rejected cues is the anticipatory "Team Play/Ready Champ?" The 2022
product is a vital improvement despite providing a dose of arguably
unnecessary and redundant performances of the main theme because it
illuminates the composer's smart narrative evolution of both themes. The
sound quality on this product is noticeably improved, though Goldsmith's
distracting humming while conducting at 3:07 into "Main Titles" remains.
The source cues will likely be a must-skip for most listeners, but
Goldsmith enthusiasts will find appreciable merit in the longer
presentation. It's clear from the final result that Goldsmith loved
scoring these sports character films, and the 2022 album expresses that
sincerity with love and care. Still, in the end,
Rudy is rather
simplistic and does not reprise the almost mythically powerful appeal of
Hoosiers, but it remains one of the more remarkable and memorable
sports-related scores ever written.
**** @Amazon.com: CD or
Download
| Bias Check: |
For Jerry Goldsmith reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.26
(in 124 reviews)
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