Well, dear readers, I am sitting here like so much out of it fish, listening to a real film score by a real film composer named Bernard Herrmann, namely the brilliant score to Fahrenheit 451. Why? Because earlier this evening I do believe I heard the worst score in the history of film. I have no idea if the film would play any better if it had a John Williams score or a Jerry Goldsmith score or a Lalo Schifrin score or a John Barry score, all of whom could have written a really good score for this type of film. Considering the film had a major director, was adapted from a hit novel by Robert Ludlum (well), and had a major star, it is inconceivable to me that this major director would have ever let this hideous score accompany his film, unless he simply didn’t care or if the composer was foisted on him. I was worried about it from the get-go, because this director has worked with some of the greatest film composers ever. This director has made several classic films with great scores. The main title is not good, but it’s hard to tell where it’s going to go. And where it goes is straight into the toilet. It is actually so bad that I began to laugh out loud every time it occurred. Yes, that’s how bad it is. It makes the film seem ludicrous. Now, the film may have still seemed ludicrous with a good composer, but I guarantee you it would have not seemed as ludicrous as it is. The film is entitled The Holcroft Covenant. I’m pretty sure I read the book, as I was reading some Ludlum back then. He was an extremely lucky writer, in that he wasn’t very good, but came up with good titles and plots that held the attention despite the truly mundane prose. The star is Michael Caine, and the film also features Anthony Andrews, Victoria Tennant, Michael Lonsdale, and others. The director is John Frankenheimer, which is the reason I watched, as I’d just finished his superb film version of Black Sunday. Now, to be honest, Mr. Frankenheimer went through a very bad period of making very bad movies – I don’t think it’s much of a secret that he went through a heavy drinking period, since he’s talked about it. But with Black Sunday, he was really back in top form. But after that, it was back to some pretty weird stuff and then a resurgence with some TV movies. But from the beginning of his career he had really good taste in composers. His first film, The Young Stranger, had a score by the excellent Leonard Rosenman. His second film, The Young Savages, had a great and unique score by a newcomer, David Amram. For his next film, All Fall Down he had Alex North. For Birdman of Alcatraz, Elmer Bernstein. For The Manchurian Candidate it was back to David Amram. Amram also wrote the score for Seven Days in May but it was said not to work for the film and Jerry Goldsmith wrote a short and effective score as a replacement. For The Train, we got a good Maurice Jarre score, for Seconds we got one of Jerry Goldsmith’s best scores, for Grand Prix it was Jarre again, and Jarre did his next two films, both huge flops – The Extraordinary Seaman and The Fixer. Elmer Bernstein was back for The Gypsy Moths, but Frankenheimer seemed to be completely at sea at this point. I Walk the Line was Johnny Cash and a very bad film. For The Horsemen he had Georges Delerue, and beyond that he worked with Michel Legrand, Mancini, John Williams, Leonard Rosenman again, and Goldsmith. All flops save for Black Sunday, but at least great composers. And then came The Holcroft Covenant. And who did we get? Stanislas. Say what? Who or what is Stanislas? He does have a last name, Syrewicz. He has since gone on to score a lot of movies, none of which I’ve seen, so I have no idea if they’re as bad as this, but any chance this film had was taken away by this horrendous music. The final rewrite of the script was by George Axelrod, who wrote The Manchurian Candidate, and his quirky, weird humor does come out every now and then and it’s pretty funny. But the plot is so lugubrious, the pace is funereal, there’s way too much talking and little action, save for a little incest, and it’s just a very bad movie but with a nice and committed performance by Mr. Caine. I recommend it to one and all as a textbook example of how music can instantly take a film into the toilet and put listeners in film score hell. In a book about Frankenheimer, he thinks it was a good movie – never mentions Stanislas – which shows you that directors mostly love everything they do.
Well, that was a very long paragraph, wasn’t it?
Well, that was a very short paragraph, wasn’t it? Yesterday was yet another completely off day due to another night of four hours of sleep, the tree trimmers again, getting the news of no Emmy nominations, not that we were really expecting any, but there were some nice things – we should have our Vernon Duke disc next week, Wacky Noodles – but I was so damn tired I just couldn’t write much, which was very annoying as I wanted to finish the section I’m in. I did get in bed for a couple of hours and slept a bit, but that didn’t really help. Then I watched the movie. I came back to the computer and tried writing, but for whatever reasons, the computer was being ornery and it was too frustrating to write. I did do two or three pages, but I wanted to and was ready to do more. It finally got so annoying that I did the update that’s been ready to do for a few days, so that took almost twenty minutes and then of course it takes ten for the computer to boot up properly, but by the time everything was working, I didn’t feel like writing because I knew I had to write these here notes. And that brings us current.
Today, I’ll be up when I’m up – not setting an alarm and really need a good night’s sleep and will be going to bed no later than one-thirty – I’ll do whatever needs doing, I still haven’t checked with the mail place so I’ll do that and go pick up if something is there, which I doubt, I’ll definitely write as much as I can, and then I’ll watch, listen, and relax.
The rest of the week and weekend is writing and doing whatever needs doing.
Today’s topic of discussion: What are your favorite films of John Frankenheimer and Mr. Michael Caine? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, hoping to never hear such an awful film score again, but fearing I will.