DVD Review
Magnolia (1999) Film's cast includes: Tom Cruise, William
H. Macy, and Julianne Moore and Jason Robards. Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson,
Music by Jon Brion
New Line Home Video
N5029
Any soundtrack collector who's played the 49 minute Reprise album of Brion's
score and not seen the 3 hour long movie can have little understanding about
what they're listening to. Tracks lasting over 10 minutes are a rarity in
film music, and yet there are 2 of them alongside others generally over 4
minutes. In fact, although the album is a terrific listen, it's a bit of
mis-representation of the film. There the cues are much longer!
At any given time during the film's internal timeframe there are as many
as 6 independent story threads being intertwined. When initially edited together,
the picture must have been the driest viewing experience imaginable. To turn
the sound off while watching the picture makes many sections look like someone
is playing with your remote control and channels are being flicked between
at random. The director's craftsmanship is therefore to be congratulated
in several capacities. As the documentary accompanying this DVD presentation
explains, Anderson conceived this film with a very specific approach to music
from the start.
The only musical incongruity on the album is the 44 second long 4th track,
"wdkk theme". It's an upbeat jazzy quiz show opener, and ought really to
have been sequenced first or last so as not to interrupt the album's flow.
This piece was written and recorded during the shooting of the movie so as
to be used in playback during the scenes taking place around Jimmy Gator
(Philip Baker Hall) and Stanley (Jeremy Blackman) respectively hosting and
taking part in the popular 'What Do Kids Know?' TV hit. Anderson scheduled
the recording of this all together, so as to maintain the actor's momentum
and also have video playback on TV screens in the background of the other
character's sequences. Those other sequences were then shot in bulked together
isolation themselves.
Composer Brion was asked for 'something slow but fast, scary but romantic,
sad and happy, is this possible?' Their working relationship once the film
was cut together stemmed from Anderson gesticulating with his hands to articulate
the emotion he wanted carried across these sequences now they had been blown
apart and inter-cut with one another. So off Brion went to compose to these
uniquely unorthodox methodologies.
Meantime, Anderson had fallen in love with, and a deal had been struck for
songs by Aimee Mann. In the film's most controversial sequence, Anderson's
pre-conceived musical approach is illustrated at a far higher volume level
than most of Brion's mix-challenged score. All the principal characters suddenly
burst into a Mann song. In a far more universally appreciable manner than
the music, this technique explains that it's all one grand interconnected
story. Operatic if you will.
Brion's score performed exactly the same function throughout the film at
greater length, but sadly (as hinted at above) it's oftentimes buried under
dialogue and sound effect. Other sourced songs are allowed to do the reverse,
to actually swallow the principal soundtrack layer of dialogue, such as to
illustrate Claudia's drug-fuelled hearing problems. When the score is allowed
to shine it can be perceived as something almost waltz-like or certainly
cyclic in design. It revolves around itself in the same way as the editing
pattern which deals with each independent sub-story thread by turns.
The film won and was nominated for numerous international awards, but noticeably
none for music. It would be interesting to see critical opinion of the film
if presented with the piece devoid of music. Not only is this a fantastic
demonstration of the technical and emotional contribution a score makes to
a film, it's also a classic example of the craft being maligned as an invisible
artform.
Reviewer
Paul Tonks
[No rating given]
