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Musically speaking, Besson is best known for his long collaboration with French composer Eric Serra, whose offbeat soundtrack for The Fifth Element has remained just as much a cult favorite as the film itself. For Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, however, Besson turned to the most accomplished French composer of the day, Alexandre Desplat, to provide an immensely intelligent symphonic alternative to the songs heard throughout the narrative. Having been recently removed from Star Wars: Rogue One, Desplat's transition on Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets represented a relief to fans eager to hear the composer's space opera variant to his much revered, incredibly intellectual music for The Golden Compass and Godzilla. Without a doubt, Desplat delivers the goods in the 2017 fantasy epic on the technical front; rarely does film music exist in such startlingly overwhelming complexity in this era. The composer's writing style is so massively intricate in its orchestrations and hyperactive level of activity that you cannot help but appreciate this score as a marvel of texture. All the Desplat techniques you've heard before are on affectionate display here, from wildly fluttering woodwinds to synthetic bass pulses, and there are times when you must revisit an action cue several times to take note of all the concurrent lines of performance, particularly on brass, in this work. Some nods to the furious wall of sound approach of Elliot Goldenthal in Final Fantasy and others is made, including the obnoxiously suspenseful trilling trombone technique. Desplat supplies love to a woodwind section like none other, using flutes especially as well as John Williams to supply the full sonic spectrum something to do at any given moment. The synthetic elements in Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets are tastefully applied, even those bass thumps that tend to ruin less frenetic Desplat scores. (That said, they are pretty irritating in parts of "Showtime;" Desplat's truest collectors have probably grown immune to that sound.) Arguably his most electronically manipulated cue, "Medusa," is actually a highlight of the score in how it uses a processed piano in a driving bass rhythm (under those wild flutes and resolute brass lines) to create the tension of a countdown. One can't help but compare this ticking clock technique in a slow crescendo of ominous force by Desplat to the Hans Zimmer crew's far less interesting application of the equivalent technique in the concurrent Dunkirk.

At almost every moment in Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, Desplat provides a magnificent treat for the ears. He handles each location and set of characters with an appropriately exotic twist of musical personality, none so much as passionately weird as the primitive Boulan Bathors tribe in the cue "Le Souper du Roi," a Middle-Eastern throwback to Alex North's Cleopatra rhythms with humorous Desplat woodwind effects and tapped cymbals in tow. The action cues, led by the stunning "Spaceship Chase," are effectively propulsive in each case and containing more than enough explosive energy (and a touch of manipulation) to generate muscle and volume. Other location cues, such as the less obvious Middle-Eastern take on the Big Market setting, offer more stylish and occasionally affable tones. There have been comparisons made between Desplat's technical acuity in this score and John Williams' in the later Star Wars scores; aside from both composers utilizing orchestral lines with superior complexity, their styles are completely divergent. The biggest difference between the two is their adherence to thematic guidelines in their works. Williams remains the true master of leitmotif handling whereas Desplat continues to struggle to conjure memorable themes that transcend their films. In Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, there are three major themes and a few secondary motifs for locations, but, as with the composer's other masterful triumphs in the science fiction and fantasy genres, few fans will likely remember any of these themes after the fact. Desplat's three main themes are supplied in all the right places, but their constructs are forgettable, perhaps due to the fancifully obtuse orchestrations conveying them. Some listeners may have difficulty identifying all the phrases of these themes even after repeated listens apart from the film. The major heroic identity exists for Valerian, introduced at 0:08 into "Valerian's Armor," repeatedly on brass and thrust into fuller action at 1:02 in "Spaceship Chase," and in grandiose rescue mode at 1:42 into "Boulanbator Combat." Desplat exercises the idea's more contemplative possibilities early in "I Am a Soldier" before thrusting it back into action fragments throughout "Final Combat." Unfortunately, this theme doesn't really bookend the movie as a whole, despite the slight celeste performance that closes out the final track. It's a decent theme, but its statements are not presented in any way that could represent a franchise identity. Surely, part of the problem is the intrusion of the pop songs in places where a main franchise theme should have been placed.

The most frequently referenced theme in Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets is that for the species known as the Pearls, who, outside of the two human leads, are the main plot point in the story. Their plight in the film is extensive and ranges across a broad swath of emotions, allowing Desplat to really express their theme with extensive variety. Its idyllic natural personality is heard at 0:42 into "Pearls on Mul" with the composer's seemingly effortless woodwind fancy. By 1:02 into "Showtime," the manipulations in "Pearls Attack," and the ominous incarnations at 1:58 into "Pearl's World," the theme is clearly tragic and desperate, though hope returns for the idea at 4:16 into that last cue. In "The City of 1000 Planets," the theme picks up expected momentum mid-cue before solo performances late bring suspense. The victory of the Pearls is expressed with monumental tonal bliss in "Pearls Power" and a brief, final heroic send-off at 4:59 into "Final Combat." Comparatively far less engaging is the awkwardly limp romance theme in the work, Desplat exploring the idea on strings in "Shoot" and interpolating it fleetingly in "Boulanbator Combat" before better enunciating it late in "Bubble." The performance on piano near the end of "I Am a Soldier" is badly underplayed for the scene. Lesser motifs for locations include a jaunty, attractive theme for the Big Market heard at the outsets of "Reading the Memo," "Big Market," and "Flight Above the Big Market." Some speculation has persisted that this motif is a theme for Valerian himself, but it disappears after the Big Market scenes. The Boulan Bathors theme heard in "Le Souper du Roi" is previewed at the beginning of "Fishing for Butterflies" and returns in "Boulanbator Combat." If the incidental similarities between this theme and the title identity of Alan Menken's Beauty and the Beast bother you, then so will hearing Jerry Goldsmith's Basic Instinct theme in "Submarine." Overall, the score for Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets is a sonic marvel of extremely intelligent rendering, but it's one without an effectively consistent thematic heart. Its motifs could have been better developed into a franchise identity, but Desplat never affords the audience the guilty pleasure fanfares or other simple techniques of memorability necessary for his music to compete in this genre with that of Williams. You could blame the songs, which, depending on the international album you acquire for this soundtrack, might be intermingled with the score as in the film. But, at the end of the day, Desplat has created a work of art worth extended admiration from a small group of devoted aficionados and destined to fade from the minds of the mainstream. In that regard, the composer only amplified the film's fatal flaws.  ****   @Amazon.com: CD or Download

Bias Check:

For Alexandre Desplat reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.39 (in 31 reviews) and the average viewer rating is 3.22 (in 16,383 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.

Total Time: 100:21