LES MISÉRABLES

BASIL POLEDOURIS

Rating:

Original Review: When you want someone to musically bring to life the latest screen version of Victor Hugo's classic story Les Misérables, you would not automatically go to Basil Poledouris. The funny thing is that the producers of this movie initially didn't either. After rejecting the original score from Gabriel Yared, the powers that be decided to put their faith into the very capable hands of Poledouris who, in return, has come up with a mature, lyrical, beautifully realised score which has been widely tipped to be a major player at the 1998 Oscars.

As one would expect from a Poledouris score, the orchestral sound is absolutely huge, and once again Poledouris uses the instruments at his disposal to the absolute maximum. Because Les Misérables is such a classic story, and because it has been retold so many times, people will no doubt compare Poledouris' composition here to Arthur Honegger's 1934 classic, Alex North's 1952 version, the recent French incarnation with music by Frances Lai and Michel Legrand, and even to the hit stage musical by Claude-Michel Schonberg. In my opinion, though, such comparisons would be unfair to Poledouris: he is writing music in a different era than Honegger and North, for a different type of movie than Lai, and for a completely different entertainment media altogether than Schonberg, and so his music here should be judged as a completely separate entity.

The main theme opens Suite 1, and captures the imagination straight away. Whereas the main theme from his last major score, Starship Troopers, was big and brassy, Les Misérables is yearning and romantic, with lush orchestrations and a gorgeous, graceful melody. The theme is a constant throughout the score, making regular appearances as the music progresses, occasionally embellished by percussion to add a sense of urgency. The rest of the score is, for the most part, very dark and very melodramatic, maintaining a rather ominous, foreboding mood and leisurely pace throughout, although Poledouris occasionally injects some emotional passages into the proceedings, and every now and again allows the orchestra to rise to a lovely, spine tingling crescendo. There also some other definite highlights: the sinister motif for the malevolent police officer Javert which is presented at 5:30 of Track 1; the lush romantic theme for Fantine which is aired at 7:10 of Track 2; the soft, delicate string/harp theme for Valjean and Cosette which opens Track 3; the brilliant (but short) action set piece at 10:30 of Track 3 for The Flight from Vigau, and the subsequent one in 'Funeral Attack' which opens Track 4; and the final, tragedy-laden conclusion are especially worth noting.

The surprising thing is that, on the whole, it doesn't really sound like a Poledouris score. Basil has a tendency to quote from his own scores in a way similar to, but not as blatant as, James Horner. Also, Poledouris has an easily recognisable style stamped over all his previous works: immense percussion and percolating strings being some examples. Here, though, Poledouris' work is a standalone, original composition. Who knows - maybe this score is opening a whole new era of music for him. As someone once wrote to me, Les Misérables is a "phenomenological epiphany". The only major quibble I have is with the album's awful presentation: obviously, the album's producers wanted to create a listening experience something akin to a 'proper' classical album and, as such, have arranged Poledouris' original 18 cues into four symphonic suites, ranging between 7 and 22 minutes in length, so that the listener can experience the score in a more complete form.

Although I acknowledge the fact that doing this probably made perfect sense at the time, it is nevertheless incredibly annoying for the listener as it makes it extremely difficult to identify each individual element of the score, and to tell where one cue ends and another begins - as you can tell from the score description above, I can only describe the music in terms of time rather than cue names. I would have to admit, though, that getting 22 unbroken minutes of music of this high quality is actually very good (as opposed to Hans Zimmer's mini-symphonies, which tend to have 15 minutes of nothingness surrounding 5 minutes of brilliance), but on the whole it would have been far better to stick to the regular way of presenting the score, and it is because of this that Les Misérables does not rate a fifth star.

One final thing to mention: in the liner notes, Basil dedicates the album to the late, great orchestrator Greig McRitchie, who worked with Poledouris on virtually every one of his scores since Conan back in 1981, and who died of a heart attack just before Christmas 1997 when aged 83. He will be sadly missed, but Les Misérables stands as a beautiful, fitting testament to the man who many called the greatest orchestrator since Ravel. Track Listing: Running Time: 49 minutes 17 seconds

Hollywood Records HR-62147-2 (1998)

Music composed and conducted by Basil Poledouris. Orchestrations by Lawrence Ashmore. Recorded and mixed by Tim Boyle. Edited by Curtis Roush. Album produced by Basil Poledouris, Tim Boyle, Eric Colvin and Curtis Roush.


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These web pages were designed and maintained by Jonathan Broxton copyright 1998. All opinions and views expressed on these pages are my own and are in no way intended to reflect those of my employer, the Trent Institute for Health Services Research, or those of the University of Sheffield.