FILMTRACKS.COM
PRINTER-FRIENDLY VIEW

Review of True Women (Bruce Broughton)

FILMTRACKS RECOMMENDS:

Buy it... if you enjoy large-scale television Western scores like Lonesome Dove and Buffalo Girls and want to hear one of Bruce Broughton's best ventures into the genre.

Avoid it... if only a small dose of typical Broughton action material can't justify the very lengthy sequences of quiet and respectful pastoral beauty.

FILMTRACKS EDITORIAL REVIEW:

True Women: (Bruce Broughton) Even as it would have seemed that the viability of massive Western productions for television should be reaching its natural end, Hallmark's True Women proved the genre still viable in 1997. The story progresses through the lives of three women starting in 1853 and follows their maturation over the course of 4 solid hours. While the film focuses on the personalities of these women, the usual array of wider issues is explored, ranging from politics, prejudice, sexuality, and slavery to death. Of particular note is the death, for there are plenty of heartbreaking moments in True Women. The difficulties of the era are soothed in some regards by composer Bruce Broughton, whose lengthy score for the film gained True Women its only Emmy award nomination. By 1997, Broughton was a respected veteran of Western scores, and his nomination here should have come as no surprise. If you look at the careers of Broughton, Basil Poledouris, and Lee Holdridge, all three have experienced significant success in the genre. Poledouris' Lonesome Dove is the standard for television Western music, and Holdridge remains the leader of the pack in the quantity of work in the area. But many could argue that Broughton's music for the Western is more consistently of high quality. Both his feature scores for Silverado and Tombstone are widely considered among the best in the genre's modern age, and his television score for How The West Was Won has also been recognized for its effectiveness. While True Women may not be as heroic or flashy as other scores in the genre, it is without a doubt one of the better ones in existence. Broughton returns to record once again with The Sinfonia of London, a group that served him well on Tombstone and several re-recordings of Golden Age scores for the Intrada label. While the results from this ensemble can be debated occasionally, there is no doubt that they are in form for True Women.

It's difficult to pinpoint the exact reasons why True Women succeeds so well both in the film and on album. The score has no one dominant element that draws you back to a particular cue. This is, ironically, the score's only weakness... the fact that it is consistently good, reaching towards excellence at times, but never defining itself as a classic. This mixture begins with the themes Broughton uses for the story; there are so many lines of plot followed in True Women that Broughton attempts to write material representing most of them, whether it's for a particular character, a coupling, or an underlying emotion. At some point, you get lost among all the ideas, for they're mostly tied together with the same hopeful, lush sensibility that lends romance and beauty to the location and its personalities. Even in its darker action moments, True Women is a score with little dissonance, though a sequence in the "Main Title" and "The Lynching" can call for a quick visit to the next track. The action is sparse, but when Broughton throws fuel onto the fire, he cooks with intensity. Both "Night Raid" and "Big Elm Draw" are furious rhythmic pieces similar to other wild ventures in Broughton's career. The majority of the score, however, is either pastoral in its performances for the entire ensemble, or lightly tender in its conversational accompaniment. The cues "Phemie Joins Sarah" and "Setting Out" offer a "sisters theme" that contains a few almost ethnic twists in progression that quickly distinguish the score from others in the genre. The score never becomes lost in the weight of the Americana spirit that it skirts during its running time, allowing it to be delightfully flighty at a snap. Easy melodies and harmonic progressions are almost always present. There are only a few moments of outward creativity in the writing, either by Broughton's hand or in the instrumentation; a sparse wail of a distant animal with a woodwind seems to be standard. Light percussive elements add suspense. The album can run long and thus warrant the temptation to copy 15 to 20 of the best minutes onto your own compilation, but even at its full length, it's a pleasantly respectful tribute to the personalities of the time.  ****

TRACK LISTINGS:

Total Time: 73:56

• 1. Main Title (3:04) • 2. Phemie Joins Sarah (2:49) • 3. Setting Out (2:32) • 4. Bartlett's Sonnet (1:53) • 5. Night Raid (2:24) • 6. The Sketch (1:31) • 7. Campfire Concerns (2:59) • 8. Passings and Crossings (6:44) • 9. Bartlett Returns (1:07) • 10. The Barn Fire (1:56) • 11. The Lynching (3:47) • 12. Trail of Tears (1:45) • 13. Big Elm Draw (3:23)

• 14. The Dove (1:46) • 15. Family Christmas (1:36) • 16. Mattie is Returned (5:34) • 17. Shoot Me, Then Yourself (6:09) • 18. Tarantula Saves Sarah (4:45) • 19. Seguin (1:40) • 20. Harvesting Babies and Cotton (2:07) • 21. William and Phemie (2:10) • 22. So Accustomed to Grief (2:21) • 23. Georgia Kills Haller (1:43) • 24. Georgia's Death (3:05) • 25. Reminiscences (4:31)

NOTES & QUOTES:

The insert contains a note from Broughton about the score.

Copyright © 1997-2024, Filmtracks Publications. All rights reserved.
The reviews and other textual content contained on the filmtracks.com site may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of Christian Clemmensen at Filmtracks Publications. All artwork and sound clips from True Women are Copyright © 1997, Intrada Records and cannot be redistributed without the label's expressed written consent. Page created 6/13/97 and last updated 12/15/06.