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Review of Warlock: The Armageddon (Mark McKenzie)

FILMTRACKS RECOMMENDS:

Buy it... if you seek a somewhat campy but ultimately rewarding early horror score from Mark McKenzie, with two lovely melodies to sustain your interest.

Avoid it... if the underwhelming ensemble performances and abysmal recording quality in parts are too much of a detriment to an otherwise fine composition.

FILMTRACKS EDITORIAL REVIEW:

Warlock: The Armageddon: (Mark McKenzie) Sometimes the sequels to dumb and campy horror films take a stab at a serious follow-up to the obvious stupidity of the original. Luckily, director Anthony Hickox makes no such attempt with 1993's Warlock: The Armageddon, the sequel to 1989's Warlock. Actor Julian Sands returns for more hilarious overacting as a son of Satan, anxiously awaiting the opportunity to amuse himself at the expense of mortal humanity. His torment of innocent people is really the highlight of the film, but his acts are destined to be disrupted by the Druids who historically have contained his evil. In this case, two unsuspecting youngsters turn out to be the warriors meant to destroy the warlock, and along their adventures to save the world from doom, with magical transformations and ceremonious maturation, they fall in love. Violence, gore, sex, nudity, and profanity all grace Warlock: The Armageddon, but perhaps its greatest asset is its sense of humor regarding its own B-grade production characteristics. Whether you try to make your horror film campy or serious, a melodramatic score can't hurt, and young composer Mark McKenzie stirred up a frenzy of orchestral power for the occasion. Only the second feature film score of his career, Warlock: The Armageddon was the composer's second obscure horror project, which, at a time a decade later when he is typecast as a provider of fluffy Hallmark-style music, may seem odd. Already well known as an orchestrator, McKenzie was still testing the waters with his compositions and, needless to say, his talents were already clearly evident. His score for Warlock: The Armageddon exceeds anything you would expect from a second-time composer for a low rate horror film. Performed by an orchestra and choir of reasonable size, but suffering from occasionally questionable sound quality, it is McKenzie's melodic mastery that makes this score and album shine, ranking among the best of his career. Operating on an extremely tight budget, McKenzie had just a matter of days to assemble a makeshift studio for the recording and only a matter of hours in which to record it. Between copying mishaps, confusion amongst the players, and the warehouse that was ultimately transformed into a scoring page, the situation was a near disaster. Distracting stage sounds do plague the score's album.

By a miracle, though, McKenzie not only managed to get the music recorded, but he produced a remarkably enjoyable score. The sound quality, most likely due to its recording location, is suspect in parts, but the substance of the music well compensates for this occasional deficiency. Contrary to its genre title, Warlock: The Armageddon is not a pure horror film. Of McKenzie's several themes, the title piece for the warlock is an obvious tip of the hat to Jerry Goldsmith's establishing of relentlessly propulsive orchestral power and Latin chanting for The Omen. McKenzie opted not to copy Goldsmith's style for the original Warlock, however. The choral sequences are a tad light to be completely believable as religiously frightening, though they weave effectively in the mix with the orchestra during several cues. For the Dies Irae sequences (from the Latin Requiem), McKenzie provides haunting lyrics for the Catholic mass and utilizes them throughout the score as well. The score opens with a bombardment of orchestral majesty that attempts to muster the energy of Christopher Young's more robust, over-the-top horror scores. The attempt by McKenzie to produce the same level of fright is admirable, but even with the Latin chanting, the cues for the warlock far squarely in the corner of cheesy campiness. A re-recording with a proper ensemble and studio would make this music legitimately terrifying. The other two themes are beautiful melodies representing first the Druids and then the love story. The theme for the magical Druid element is downright gorgeous, introduced in "Ken's Magic" and expanded upon in "Samantha Becomes a Warrior." The somewhat muffled recording makes the muted solo horn in these cues sound like a fugelhorn or deep sax, and subsequent upbeat, faster tempo high brass performances are a little too upbeat in a silly, heroic sense, but the theme still deserves to be resurrected by McKenzie for a far better film. A separate theme for the love story is a string affair, with lovely whimsy in its performances; a few of those violin statements whine in the treble region, however. As usual, McKenzie (a firm believer in suites from his scores) took the time to compose a suite of the themes from Warlock: The Armageddon, appearing at the end of the album. Overall, this score is quite commendable given the circumstances of its creation. A re-recording by an accomplished ensemble in a suitable studio would be welcomed.  ****

TRACK LISTINGS:

Total Time: 40:59

• 1. The Battle Has Just Begun (4:57) • 2. Swimming (2:09) • 3. Birth of the Warlock (3:16) • 4. Ken's Magic (3:13) • 5. May I Help You Sir? (3:35) • 6. Give Me the Stones (2:33) • 7. Samantha and Ken's Love (2:10)

• 8. Party Crasher (2:25) • 9. Samantha Becomes a Warrior (2:34) • 10. Ken's New Life (4:09) • 11. Warlock Gathers the Stones (2:16) • 12. Armageddon Averted (3:21) • 13. A Warlock Fantasia (4:03)

NOTES & QUOTES:

The insert includes a note from the album's executive producer, Douglass Fake, from which following excerpt is taken:

"After his first composing effort, Son of Darkness: To Die For 2, Mark turned to another horror film, this time scoring for a large orchestra and chorus. The score was recorded using three different sized orchestras, but because of a number of insurmountable problems the largest and most difficult music had to be recorded in a single 90 minute period, a very difficult challenge indeed. The resulting work is impressive, large scale, combining huge gothic sonorities for full orchestra laced with complex and aggressive outbursts from the orchestra for the horrific moments."

The text for the chorus, derived from the classic Requiem Mass, includes:

Dies irae dies illa - The day of wrath, that day
solvet saeclum in favilla - shall dissolve the world in ashes
quantus tremor est futurus - what trembling shall there be
Tremens factus sum ego - I am made to tremble and to fear
et timeo dum discussio venerit - at the destruction that shall come.
Calamitatis et miseriae - calamity and misery
dies magna et amara valde - great and exceedingly bitter day

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