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| Goldsmith |
Warlock: (Jerry Goldsmith) Movies about the son of
Satan traveling through time to spur the end of the world can't be all
that bad, though
Warlock certainly tried its best to reside among
the worst. From the makers of the
Friday the 13th series,
Warlock also spawned a couple of sequels, but not ones that many
theologians would really want to remember. In this original entry, actor
Julian Sands is the perverse warlock pursued by a supernatural hunter
played by B-film equal Richard E. Grant, and the journey towards the
doom of mankind begins in 17th Century Boston and eventually (and
conveniently) plagues 1980's Los Angeles. Typical horror cliches,
including finger chopping, tongue biting, and a certain flair for sexual
deviation, occupy a rather lousy script that pulls elements without much
adaptation from
The Terminator and
Highlander. The movie
was plagued not only by last minute plot changes in an attempt to find
its proper tone, but the bankruptcy of its studio, which led to a
two-year delay in its release. Even after attempts to salvage the
project, everything about
Warlock was saturated with cheap,
1980's slapstick style, including its cheesy special effects and its
badly dated original score. Composer Jerry Goldsmith spent the late
1980's wandering between hopelessly failing projects in the darker
genres, including a notable rejected work along these lines. His
experimentation with electronic textures in the decade had led him down
a path to both his strongest and weakest works of the digital era, and
Warlock came at the same time as his least interesting synthetic
effort,
Criminal Law. But as heard in the also concurrent
Leviathan and
Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, Goldsmith
was still utilizing electronics in his scores to great ends when he
built the scores on top of a solid orchestral base. On the surface,
Warlock would have seemed like a project for which Goldsmith
could pull out some of his cheesy, over-the-top fun, especially with his
history in the franchise of
The Omen.
When Goldsmith's humor abounds in a horror environment,
the results are often enticing. Such music in
The 'Burbs and the
two
Gremlins films has proven to stand very well against the test
of time, at least in the composer's creativity department. Even the
score for the
Warlock sequel by Mark McKenzie would exhibit some
of that kind of unabashed feeling of humor and enthusiasm four years
later. Goldsmith, however, chose instead to write a very uninspired and
ultimately bland score for the original film, an odd stab at restrained
ambience that didn't really suit his style very well, begging questions
about whether or not he was specifically asked by the filmmakers to tone
back his composition's role in the picture. Your ability to appreciate
the musical atmosphere of
Warlock will depend upon how well you
can sustain your interest in the music due to its collection of
secondary Goldsmith trademarks: sound effects, instrumental choices,
recognizable motifs, and basic rhythms that carry over from the weaker
sections of the composer's previous works. He introduces a flimsy,
though easily adaptable theme in the opening cue and works it well into
both his suspenseful conversation cues as well as the outright bursts of
action, but the construct is so similar to a combination of motifs from
Under Fire and
Baby: Secret of the Lost Legend that its
end result is to simply remind you of better renditions of that theme in
other scores. Descending, echoing electronic tones from
Legend,
pipe-like sounds from
Under Fire, keyboarded synthetics from
Leviathan, and harsh brass tones from
Baby: Secret of the Lost
Legend are all employed in
Warlock, along with heavy roles
for the xylophone and drum machine. Some Goldsmith collectors will point
to the four or five final cues in the score as evidence of worthy action
material from the composer, and yet the rhythmic presentation of these
ideas was so much better realized in
Rambo III at the time (and
with a compelling theme as well) that
Warlock remains a
collection of washed up sounds even in its most active moments.
The opening and closing cues of
Warlock are the
most disappointing in the score, Goldsmith's electronics clunky in
execution as they regurgitate ideas from
Under Fire at
frustratingly slow and awkward tempos. It's hard to figure what
Goldsmith was thinking when conjuring these performances, because the
theme as presented doesn't serve to enhance any sense of terror, science
fiction, biblical importance, or even the romantic element involved with
the sophistication of language used between the two main characters, a
highlight of the film. Occasionally awkward xylophone rhythms only hurt
the cause. No convincing secondary theme for the artificially-rapidly
aging female star of the film is provided either. Overall, it's
difficult to sense that Goldsmith had any enthusiasm for this score at
all. He had written monumental music for films about the devil and the
end of the world in the past, and
Warlock, even more so than the
others, deserved a score that could shake the walls with impending doom.
Only in "Salt Water Attack" does he come remotely close. Muted sound
quality is a significant detraction in the equation as well. Goldsmith
sought to save money by recording the score in Australia, and while he
reportedly had no issue with the performances, the mix was another
matter. So unsatisfied with a channel of woodwinds and synthesizers, he
left that channel out of the album mix entirely, and the final film
version of the score tampered further with the mix as scenes were
changed. Released on the identical, relatively lengthy Intrada and Silva
releases long before the film ever debuted, a closer representation of
the film version of the score (and Goldsmith's desired outcome) took
until 2015 to be unearthed and pressed on a longer product. Even here,
on Intrada's 72-minute, limited alternative, the score still suffers
from rather understated ambient personality. The music simply isn't
likable on any level, and while the additionally released cues (led by
the full ensemble "The Headstone") and inclusion of the full mix is
commendable and perhaps an attraction for the most ardent Goldsmith
enthusiasts,
Warlock remains leagues behind the composer's
equivalent works. Seek McKenzie's score for
Warlock: The
Armageddon for a more passionate, engaging experience.
** @Amazon.com: CD or
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| Bias Check: |
For Jerry Goldsmith reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.26
(in 124 reviews)
and the average viewer rating is 3.29
(in 153,454 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.
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The insert of neither 1989 album includes extra information about the score or film.
That of the 2015 Intrada album contains notes about both.
