: (Harry
Gregson-Williams/Marc Shaiman) What the world's dictators and terrorists
could not achieve was instead accomplished by America's own Motion
Picture Association film rating system. Encouraged by the positive
response to their "South Park" concept on screens big and small, Trey
Parker and Matt Stone turned their attention to a comedy satire of
America's role in blowing up (brown) people and places around the world
in the early 2000's. In
, they plunder
every cultural stereotype for a decidedly racist, sexist, and juvenile
poke against American military exceptionalism, but they do so with
ridiculous puppets and miniature sets. No effort is made to hide the
puppets' strings as they engage in ridiculous action and sex scenes,
with the lead sex scene so graphic that the board at the MPAA repeatedly
slapped the movie with an NC-17 rating, forcing Parker and Stone to edit
out explicit depictions of urination and defecation during the sex to
achieve the necessary R rating. Left largely intact is one of the most
extraordinary scenes of a puppet vomiting, however, a sure favorite for
pre-teen boys in the audience. The plot of
involves a group of incompetent American commandos who enlist
the help of a Broadway actor to infiltrate the government of North
Korea, which plans to bomb everything and everyone across the planet.
Liberal interests, including famous actors, eventually try to stop them,
and much emotional trauma and destruction of landmarks ensues. It's so
overwhelmingly stupid that it's marginally funny, and that spirit is
emboldened by the 2004 movie's soundtrack. Continuing their uniquely
successful collaboration from
,
Parker and veteran composer Marc Shaiman set out to provide the
soundtrack with a slew of original songs making fun of both American and
foreign groups. Shaiman is legendary in the industry for his filthy
sense of humor, and together with Parker, the eight songs that result
from their depravity will be horrifying to any progressively minded
prude.
There is much to admire in the songs of
Team America:
World Police, assuming you have a tolerance for such raunchy and
offensive cultural ridicule. The retro piano-ripping jazz and blues
piece "Everyone Has AIDS" establishes the level of insanity in these
songs' lyrics, which usually start somewhat normally and then become
increasingly wacko as they progress. The county-western element makes
conservative America sound insanely dumb with the slide guitars and
twangy patriotic farce of "Freedom Isn't Free." The most memorable song
is "America, Fuck Yeah," a fast, 1980's hard rock anthem with "fuck
yeah" performed after a variety of phrases and words associated with
American lifestyle. (That is until someone mentions books, at which
point the "fuck yeahs" just stop.) The "Bummer Remix" of this song
reduces this it down to a hysterical but short romantic ballad. Back in
the country-western genre, "Only a Woman" is a guy's lamentation about
how he needs a female orifice fairly badly, his sexist lyrics not aimed
to please the ladies. Making fun of both Asians and those with mental
handicaps is "I'm So Ronery," a nostalgic Fred Rogers expression of
sadness switching every "l" with an "r" for racist purposes. Squarely
aiming at Berlin's "Take My Breath Away" is the structure and
instrumentation of "The End of an Act," the lofty complaint about the
quality of movies and acting from an industry insider's perspective.
Taking inspiration from electronic dance is "Montage," its synthesizers,
piano, and guitar joining hand-clapping effects for extra silliness.
Parker's performances in these songs are adequate in each circumstance,
and if not for the idiocy of their lyrics and intent, some of them might
actually be listenable for people not paying attention. Shaiman works in
two of his own themes into the song portion of the soundtrack, the first
being "Derka Derk (Terrorist Theme)," a clear parody of the "Cantina
Band" music from
Star Wars: A New Hope that suggests that Arabs
are true aliens. Expect an abruptly rude end to that cue. And then
there's "North Korean Melody," which is perhaps the single most racist
piece of film music to ever exist. With its intentionally nonsense
lyrics and blend of Asian instrumental and structural stereotypes, it
doesn't get any more outrageously offensive than this.
After completing the dastardly song entries for
Team
America: World Police, Shaiman recorded most of the associated
score, and that's where the production hit a major snag. The filmmakers
didn't believe that the composer's score was muscular enough to enhance
the militaristic bravado sought for especially the action scenes,
Shaiman playing the film with lighter shades than Parker had wanted.
With almost no time remaining in a production already running late due
to the issues with puppets and censors, the filmmakers turned to Harry
Gregson-Williams to make fun of exactly the Hans Zimmer and Media
Ventures sound that he had helped make overly ubiquitous during the late
1990's. (It's no small irony that Shaiman himself has been vocally
critical of the Media Ventures/Remote Control Production influence on
film music.) Gregson-Williams brought with him a number of regular and
upcoming Media Ventures ghostwriters to help flesh out this short but
not insignificant assignment, and Shaiman reportedly stayed aboard in
some capacity. While Gregson-Williams wrote the most memorable aspects
of the replacement score, he was aided in certain specific parts by
James McKee Smith, Steve Jablonsky, Toby Chu, Stephen Barton, and Heitor
Pereira. It's not surprising that the resulting score has a decent pair
of themes for the overall concept and the lead love affair while the
rest is fragmented stylistically. The Media Ventures parodies are there
but not as powerfully compelling as they could have been. In fact, only
a small minority of the score for
Team America: World Police
sounds worthy of a Zimmer or other 1990's score from that genre, much of
it providing the same tones of romance or silly action that Shaiman
could have produced just as well. The main theme by Gregson-Williams is
the occasionally obnoxious, upbeat march that guides the dumb heroes
into battle, but even here the brooding brass and bass choir effect for
their antics is limited to just a few explosions of grandeur. With
rambling timpani and snare, "The Team America March" offers its brassy
demeanor with a dynamically wide spread from the full ensemble.
Secondary ideas on trumpets are downright silly, augmented by trilling
flutes. A touch of the overblown choral significance of the closing
moments of
Chicken Run occupies the end of that suite of main
theme material.
The less obvious highlight of the score for
Team
America: World Police is its love theme for the Gary and Lisa
characters, its performances stretching on the margins to hit the Trevor
Rabin
Armageddon sound but most of it resorting to conservative
string meandering of nicely melodic concepts. The love theme is actually
a really pretty device, occupying woodwinds and violins in non-Media
Ventures style for extended times. The acoustic and electric guitar
performances of its tenderness do stray back towards the Zimmer mould
but not obviously. Outside of these two thematic sets, the score is
fairly haphazard in its coordination, but it suffices with decent but
not spectacular action. An extended cue like "Mount, Rush, More" is
about as anonymous an action espionage moment as possible. The Jablonsky
contributions to "F.A.G." are all over the map stylistically but do
provide a glimpse of forthcoming
Transformers material. Those
seeking harder electric guitar influences on the action will appreciate
"Putting a Jihad on You." Slight ethnic accents lace "Kim Jong Il" but
don't make much of an impact. Shaiman's song melodies don't carry over
to Gregson-Williams' score, an unfortunate byproduct of the original
score rejected. While the film's original songs are represented fully on
the album release, the score was not. That product from Atlantic was
famous for not including either Shaiman or Gregson-Williams' names
anywhere on the packaging, supplying instead a note that final
attributions were not available at the time of the release. The 28
minutes of Gregson-Williams score included on that product is assembled
from a totally jumbled ordering of cues to form six longer tracks of
like-minded music. While this approach might have been advisable if the
overall running time of the score portion was under 15 minutes, the
presentation doesn't really work for nearly twice that length. On the
upside, the love theme is mostly consolidated to its one lengthy track
for those who want to pluck that single side of the score from the rest.
Some notable music is missing, particularly the straight heroic victory
of the "Puke" cue. Ultimately, the album for
Team America: World
Police is an adequate souvenir from the film, and the songs will
satisfy most casual listeners. But there remains an opportunity for the
full Gregson-Williams score to be paired with the recorded Shaiman
alternative for an ideal chronological presentation of both approaches.
Until then, approach this music with a sense of humor or be prepared for
offense.
@Amazon.com: CD or
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- Music as Written for the Film: ****
- Music as Heard on Album: ***
- Overall: ***
| Bias Check: |
For Harry Gregson-Williams reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3
(in 40 reviews)
and the average viewer rating is 2.98
(in 55,298 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.
|
