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FILMTRACKS.COM
PRINTER-FRIENDLY VIEW 
Review of Spectre (Thomas Newman)
FILMTRACKS RECOMMENDS:
Buy it... if you appreciate Thomas Newman's attempt to drive the
music of the Bond franchise closer to his own distinct suspense and
drama mannerisms that don't include many references to the concept's
past sense of high style and panache.
Avoid it... if you expect the song here to compete on any level with Skyfall or if Newman's score for that film did not appeal to your Bond sensibilities, in which case this entry will prove itself worse in both regards.
FILMTRACKS EDITORIAL REVIEW:
Spectre: (Thomas Newman) Enthusiasts of the James
Bond franchise have often wondered why the concept's villainous SPECTRE
organization from the 1960's ("Special Executive for
Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion") and its
memorable lead, Ernst Stavro Blofeld, had gone missing for so long. As
is usually the case, legal wrangling was the answer, a lawsuit pitting
Bond creator Ian Fleming and filmmaker Kevin McClory against each other
in the early 1960's yielding split copyright ownership, the odd
situation regarding Thunderball and its remake, and the
disappearance of SPECTRE from Bond films after Diamonds Are
Forever. With the main lawsuit players dead and the estates and
studio settling the issue, SPECTRE, now losing the acronym and simply
going by "Spectre," made its comeback in the 2015 film of that name.
Director Sam Mendes' second and reportedly final entry in the series,
Spectre takes the opportunity to both look backwards and
potentially conclude the Daniel Craig era of Bond's adventures. With
Spectre and Blofeld in the mix, the filmmakers took extensive liberty
to make connections to Fleming's novels throughout the backstory of
Spectre as well as tie in the Quantum storyline of the previous
Craig entries. The film was criticized for relying too heavily on old
franchise formulas related to locations and supporting characters,
though the movie's execution was widely praised. The movie was the most
expensive Bond production ever (and one the most expensive movies
overall), and studio misgivings about the project, revealed in a hack of
Sony e-mails during production, were realized when Spectre failed
to match its predecessor, Skyfall, in worldwide grosses.
Regardless, Spectre was something of a treat for fans of the
concept looking for some of the glitz, humor, and technology of prior
Bond generations, not only continuing the exploration of Bond's past and
its relationship to Blofeld, but in the token return of franchise
favorites in limited roles, such as the car from Goldfinger and
even actress Judi Dench. Though it was no shock that composer Thomas
Newman returned to score another Mendes film, the relative lack of
franchise influence on his music was a significant surprise given the
film's frequent glances over its shoulder.
While Newman's score for Skyfall was widely praised, including a Grammy win and an Academy Award nomination, it's not difficult to chalk up that success as riding on the coattails of Adele's magnificent title song for that film. Like the song, Newman's score was cognizant of the past, echoes of John Barry and David Arnold's successful entries in the franchise addressing the dramatic depth of Bond's familial journey with the composer's usual dramatic gravity. In the case of Spectre, Newman doesn't have that phenomenal title song to bolster the soundtrack in general, though with the Craig era formally killing the idea of coordinating the song and score creation process in these films, perhaps that relationship doesn't matter as much anymore. That's an awful shame, for Bond soundtracks have always been at their best when the composer of the score also contributes to the song. Now, not only is there a completely disjointed coexistence between the two, but issues related to studio, artist, and/or record label greed have led to the lack of the song's inclusion on the official soundtrack for these movies. It's a disgraceful turn of events that needs to be rectified for the benefit of listeners and movie-goers. Perhaps with Spectre this issue is not as pertinent, because the song is mediocre and the score is only marginally rooted in the Bond universe at best. The song was the result of only half an hour of writing time by British artist Sam Smith and his regular collaborator, Jimmy Napes, before they recorded a quick demo in an hour that eventually became the final performance. The lack of polish shows badly, for the song attempts to pilfer chord progressions from several Bond themes (The World is Not Enough at the forefront, most interestingly) much like Adele relied heavily upon the original Monty Norman elements. But it fails to generate any real sense of romance, lament, or determination. Its instrumental recording, while palatable in an orchestral sense, is generically John Barry and has little unique style with which to define itself. The performance by Smith his absolutely hideous as well, his voice far too nasal and rooted in the treble region to function in an environment that has thrived on either sultry females or more forceful male voices. Public reaction to "Writing's on the Wall" was mixed, with solid sales figures not necessarily reflecting public sentiment that the song wasn't near Skyfall quality. At least it surpassed the rejected song for Spectre by English band Radiohead, faint praise from this reviewer. As for Newman's score for Spectre, it's clear that the composer was headed in one direction while the production was rooted in another. Despite all the film's tributes to Bond's past, Newman largely abandoned his attempts to address the Barry and Arnold standards of the franchise's sound that existed in Skyfall and instead used Spectre to push the concept further into his own stylistic domain of preference. Listeners will have to separate the style of the Spectre score from its substance, because while the style is really lacking, the substance within this Newman realm is really quite good. Lengthy arguments can be made about the tragedy of the loss of high style and panache in Newman's music for Bond here. Gone are the times when flourishes of jazz accompanied the character's swagger and smug smirks. Gone are the readily accessible thematic mechanisms that repeated endless in the Barry era to make their scores so memorable. Gone is the free-wheeling sense of fun that you got from those scores, often defined by infusions of rock elements. It's truly sad to hear a score for Spectre that espouses very little of the vintage Bond "sound," especially in the context of this film's story, and, for some listeners, Spectre's soundtrack, along with the tepid song, will be a significant failure. Even in comparison to Newman's own sometimes flamboyant style in Skyfall, this sequel may disappoint. The highlights of these Newman scores are the locational transition shots in the movie, and whereas these cues in Skyfall often received overwhelmingly harmonic, cymbal-tapping coolness, such applications in Spectre are comparatively muted and abbreviated. Instead, Newman seems to have approached this score as he would have a pure suspense thriller, with more passages that will remind you of Whispers in the Dark than anything resembling traditional Bond material. There is extreme subtly in the score for Spectre, some of which quite intelligent and admirable, but one has to question whether this franchise, and especially this film within that series, is the right place to be exploring clouded nuance. It's a boon in some ways for Newman's own collectors, but it's something of a disservice to the general population. Even for film music collectors, the number of cues of ensemble romance or attractive, sustained action worthy of inclusion on a Bond compilation will be minimal, with few truly standout moments of excellence amongst a significant amount of introversion and atmosphere. The instrumentation employed by Newman for Spectre is closer to that of his own career this time, dulcimer and worldly woodwinds merging with droning electronic textures to anchor the work firmly in the composer's trademark suspense sound. That said, he occasionally uses a flute, the brass, and bass strings to evoke certain reflections of Bond scores of the past (especially the flute), though this usage seems token at times, especially by the time wild trumpets make the their two or three most notable, short contributions. Expect the lengthy sequences of ambient electronic texture to dominate at times, especially in the latter half of the score as these passages come to define the villains of the entry. On other hand, do not expect the album presentation to exhibit many bursts of coolness, the trailers for Spectre utilizing Barry's On Her Majesty's Secret Service nothing more than an unfulfilled tease. You have a couple of moments when Norman's theme is the basis of movement on the 80-minute album (which omits only about 20 minutes of additional music in the film), leaving the style of the score reliant upon Newman's own themes. They are more plentiful than you might think, the composer providing a couple of action motifs and a villain's theme that translates into the score's main love theme, too. In Skyfall, Newman devised a rising brass motif of action reminiscent of Trevor Jones' reality-altering theme in Dark City, and that is heard here once again (perhaps most obviously at 0:20 into "Westminster Bridge"). A much longer motif of action is developed rather elusively by Newman (it is built upon 7-note ascending phrases usually heard in pairs) and is best heard in "Backfire," arguably the score's top cue. The villain's theme (extending out from Blofeld to represent the sum of Quantum and Spectre) is introduced in "The Eternal City" and appearing in numerous conversational and suspense cues before really exposing itself in "Silver Wraith" and "A Reunion." For those seeking the progressions of the idea clearly, seek out the second half of "Silver Wraith," where ethnic accents grace its creepiness over pulsating electric bass. It's not a great theme by any means; in fact, it's downright forgettable outside of its purpose in generating a specific mood, but by the time it morphs into the sparse love theme variant for "Madeleine" and "Out of Bullets," it achieves greater purpose. Newman extends the romance into "Donna Lucia" and the latter half of "Spectre," the tone much like the composer's past morbid drama identities. It's pretty material but definitely darkened compared to other love themes for Bond's girls. One element additionally missing from Spectre's score is a clear narrative, a surprising reality given the motific coordination Newman afforded the film. The album release is particularly challenging to enjoy in the absence of pre-credit highlights, a song, or a truly satisfying payoff at the end. This circumstance leaves the album as one to be pilfered for its individual highlights, a tactic that worked quite well for Skyfall. The quantity and snazziness of the highlights here are diminished, however. The opening "Los Muertos Vivos Estan" cue presents Norman's rhythm in an ethnic setting, blurting brass notes on key a highlight of any performance of that theme. The choral element in the score is a little awkward in how suddenly it explodes into the scene, but it produces two of the scores best highlights: the location shot at about a minute into "The Eternal City" (the underlying descending phrase reminds heavily of Skyfall's equivalent) and the chase portion at two minutes into "Backfire" (which builds anticipation to a harmonic resonance when the choir comes in that is actually startling in its beauty). By comparison, the fight sequences in "Snow Plane" and "Tempus Fugit" aren't as impressive apart from the film. The source-like "Day of the Dead" is of little consequence. The Jaws-like villain isn't given more than a thumping piano motif in "Hinx," and the metallic grating of this cue is a bit hard to take. The pair of "Detonation" and "Westminster Bridge" resurrect some of the excitement from "Backfire," but not enough to ultimately salvage the album's listening experience. Don't be surprised if the impression with which you leave the Spectre album is defined by the long sequences of ambient, electronically-aided, vaguely worldly environment. Cues like "The Pale King," "Kite in a Hurricane," "Secret Room" (aside from its nice location shot sequence at the end), "Safe House," "Careless," and the first half of "Spectre" are all dedicated to development of Newman's quietly bumbling suspense motif, and together they cause the album to suffer serious pacing issues. Overall, Spectre is graced with a sub-par song and an adequate but somewhat misguided score. Newman's contribution here does not match the quality of his replacement of John Williams for Bridge of Spies at any level. In that score, he tackled the topic using his voice in a way that functioned just as well as a Williams score might have. In Spectre, Newman proves that he still hasn't figured how to adapt his voice to a franchise that thrives on a sense of nostalgia that includes reverence for its past musical style. Hopes are high for a David Arnold return to the concept for both song and score.
TRACK LISTINGS:
Total Time: 79:31
NOTES & QUOTES:
The insert includes no extra information about the score or film.
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