The irony of
Tropic Thunder, of course, is that
Shapiro completely succeeded for his assignment despite doing absolutely
nothing beyond the expected. There is not an original idea in his entire
score for this film, and some may argue that it doesn't even translate
into a coherent listening experience alone, but alas, it's an extremely
competent and appropriate work. He begins with a remarkably wide group
of players, including a full orchestra, several ethnic soloists and
voices, and a variety of programmed electronics, and applies them to a
procession of familiar techniques. Unlike some parody scores in which
you can clearly point to a single point of reference for its imitation,
Shapiro instead tackles several areas within the realm of film music.
There's the
Rambo sound of orchestral bravado and ethnic accents
from Jerry Goldsmith and Brian Tyler, there's a range of ethnic flavor
that extends from James Newton Howard's epics to cheap scores like BT's
Stealth, and there's the straight rock-inspired contemporary line
molded by Ramin Djawadi for
Iron Man. Of course, no modern action
score would be complete without some rhythmic testosterone from the John
Powell library and a few (unfortunately underpowered) power anthems
derived from the early Hans Zimmer days. Along the way, you get a
handful of parodies within the parody, including faux sensitive music
that bridges, oddly enough, the styles of Alan Silvestri and Mark
McKenzie. Each instance of lampooning is executed well in
Tropic
Thunder, but not memorably. The score is rather weak thematically,
with only its wholesome theme of redemption (itself a rip-off of Randy
Edelman's
Dragonheart) pulling together some cohesion in "Real
Tears," and "Cue Bill Conti." Otherwise, the action motifs in
Tropic
Thunder are all over the place, and with the frantic shifts of
performers and emotions from second to second, there is no satisfying
flow to the score. Individual portions within cues do stand out, though,
and these typically appeal because of Shapiro's entertaining employment
of wailing ethnic woodwinds and mournful Lisbeth Scott vocals. The last
tracks on the album include the unique little pieces of score written
for the movies within the movie, and while quite palatable, they are
brief. A significant amount of rearrangement of the score album (which
only runs 40 minutes) is necessary to cluster some of the like-minded
cues together, because otherwise
Tropic Thunder will make your
head spin. The best route is to take the score's longest, most
representatively cohesive cue, "You're My Brother," as a three-minute
compilation of the score's best ideas and discard the rest. Again,
that's not to say that Shapiro failed here, but what's funny on screen
does not always translate into a functional album.
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