was
extremely well received, generating substantial awards recognition and
surprising grosses. It has also become something of a pop culture icon,
representing both road trips and women gone astray. Two contemporary
ladies from Middle America with little excitement in their lives go on a
vacation for a few days in their 1966 Thunderbird convertible. Along
their way, they shoot and kill a drunk rapist and assume that the
authorities will prosecute them, so they start a journey to Mexico while
eluding both local authorities and the F.B.I. They become hardened
avengers in the latter stages, robbing a store and destroying a fuel
tanker. When they're finally cornered at the edge of the Grand Canyon,
they famously drive their Thunderbird off the edge and plunge to their
deaths. Although Geena Davis and Susan Sarandon were far from Scott's
ideal choices for the lead roles, they both earned Academy Award
nominations. (Alas, facing off in the same category, they both lost).
The film also introduced a shirtless Brad Pitt to the mainstream and
allowed fan favorite Harvey Keitel to keep his clothes on. Despite all
the problems that Scott faced with the producers of
over Hans Zimmer's unappreciated score for that film, the two continued
their collaboration in
. Thankfully, this new
assignment went as smoothly as it could have for the composer. The film
features surprisingly little original score in its duration, but Scott
was so enthusiastic about Zimmer's theme for the fade-out finale and end
credits that he shot an all-new opening titles scene simply to
accommodate another presentation of that identity. Zimmer, meanwhile,
has always accepted praise for this theme, titled "Thunderbird," but has
never particularly understood why his fans want to hear the rest of the
score.
About the fanaticism over
Thelma & Louise,
Zimmer explains, "People are under the impression there is [more good
music from the score]. But I go around that one 'Thunderbird' theme a
couple of times, plus some little rock-n-rollish type things. I hate
overstaying my welcome on these CDs, so there's just not enough. If I
allowed a score-only
Thelma & Louise CD, it probably would have
been only 10 minutes long." On this matter, he has a perfectly valid
point, because while the iconic "Thunderbird" theme, as well as the
gospel-influenced finale piece, is worthy of a place in any collection
of Zimmer's stylish early works, the rest of this decent but rather
underwhelming score is a largely forgettable series of bluesy
minimalism, sparse action motifs, irritating hoedown comedy, and
unsatisfactory fragments of that primary theme. The underlying
constructs of
Thelma & Louise are quite simple. A lonely electric
guitar theme with the personality of a battered rock ballad serves as
the identity of "Thunderbird" and, by its adaptation throughout the
film, most of the score. Zimmer was in the process of becoming quite
fond of super-stylish guitar solos at the forefront of his pop-oriented
film scores during the early 1990's. His collaboration with Pete Haycock
for
Thelma & Louise was an early representation of a partnership
that continued in
K2,
True Romance,
Calendar Girl,
and
Drop Zone, among others. The power behind the solo
performances is neither as forceful nor memorable here as in
Days of
Thunder, replaced by a slightly dejected and alienating tone as
required by this story. Zimmer augments Haycock's contribution with
familiar keyboarding, loops, and drum pads. He makes no attempt to use
his electronic samples of an orchestra to specifically emulate an
organic tone for the story, instead leaving a synthetic edge in nearly
every cue to reinforce the disembodied rock style. In the reunion scene
("Giving Up"), the score approaches the new age genre if not for the
stylish guitar.
Two secondary identities are established by Zimmer in
Thelma & Louise to compliment the main "Thunderbird" theme. The
first is plucky Western minimalism with a harmonica and banjo,
inhabiting a bluesy tone for Pitt's escaped convict. This material
eventually develops into full-fledge hoedown territory, with "Bitches
From Hell" (the tanker scene) previewing the more developed symphonic
variant in
Cool Runnings. The other secondary identity is the
subtle gospel influence that very tragically but beautifully emerges in
"You've Always Been Crazy" as the women decide to commit suicide. This
music is similar to Zimmer's many other uses of soul and gospel in his
scores at the time, but the duet between the guitar and voices for the
"Thunderbird" theme in "End Titles" is a highlight of the score. The
only other aspect of
Thelma & Louise worth mentioning is the
influence of
Black Rain on a sort of "determination motif" that
Zimmer uses to propel the protagonists to their fateful decision. Heard
first in the subtly keyboarded staccato string chopping and harmonica
late in "Charged With Murder," this idea matures in the composer's
familiar action tones in "Chase." Overall, Zimmer is correct in that
there's only about ten minutes of lasting music in
Thelma &
Louise, but that didn't stop a First Born Records bootleg from
slapping 40 minutes of it on a decent-sounding CD later in the decade.
The commercial MCA album had only included the four-minute "Thunderbird"
suite amongst the usual collection of songs. In 2011, the Kritzerland
specialty label pressed a slightly rearranged version of the bootleg
presentation on a 1,200-copy product that sold out immediately, despite
the reality that the eight minutes over the final two tracks on the
bootleg are the only ones definitely worth having. The same contents
were re-pressed for another 1,000 copies in 2017 by the young specialty
soundtrack label Notefornote Music. The La-La Land Records label
expanded the presentation further in 2025, again rearranging the tracks
and adding several alternates and Geoff Zanelli's 2000 concert
arrangement demo. Given the comparable sound quality on all the
products, there's no need to seek the later editions if you are
satisfied with an earlier one.
*** @Amazon.com: CD or
Download
| Bias Check: |
For Hans Zimmer reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 2.85
(in 130 reviews)
and the average viewer rating is 2.89
(in 301,506 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.
|
