Bill Conti’s music to “North and South” is not lonely one of my favorite scores, it is furthermore one of the best soundtracks you can listen to. The TV adaption of John Jakes book trilogy about the Civil War made Patrick Swayze to star. Mostly people think of the two volumes of the series, the third one is crap, so we can forget about it. Also, Conti composed just the music to book one and book two, so I am concentrating on that. Finally, you can buy the whole soundtrack and not just these six tracks which were released with the CD of “The Right Stuff”, the score Conti won finally an Academy Award for. The series "North and South" is the title of three American television miniseries broadcast on ABC in 1985, 1986 and 1994. The first two miniseries can be considered as classics, but the third and final installment is not worth talking about. The first one is still the seventh-highest rated miniseries in TV history and made Patrick Swayze a star. Here is a trailer: Producer David Wolper, a long-time independent producer of high-quality documentaries for television, revolutionised TV in 1977 with his award-winning production of Alex Haley’s family saga "Roots" about American slavery. In 1983, he produced the classic "The Thorn Birds" with Richard Chamberlain as priest Ralph de Bricassart and Rachel Ward as Meggie, with a fabulous score by Henry Mancini. "North and South" had two crucial elements for a successful miniseries: a very well-written best-selling novel by John Jakes and a historical subject that is still affecting American life. The plot is about the friendship between Orry Main from South Carolina, played by Swayze, and George Hazard from Pennsylvania, played by James Read, who become best friends while attending the United States Military Academy at West Point. The slave-owning Mains are rural planters, while the Hazards are part of the industrial revolution in the more progressive northern states of the US. The different lifestyles result in conflicts, mainly driven by George’s sister Virgilia, played by Kirstie Alley, and her opinion about freedom for the slaves. Orry falls in love with Madeline, played by the beautiful Lesley-Anne Down, but she marries the sadistic Justin LaMotte, played by David Carradine. The main difference with John Jakes’s book is that Orry died in the first book, but in the TV series Orry he survived. Since Swayze was not interested in returning to his role for the third season, he had to be killed at the start. Philip Casnoff as Elkanah Bent, the nemesis of Orry and George, achieves this in the first minutes of the third series. It is clear that the producers used old material for the only scene when you see Orry; the person getting killed is being played by a faceless actor. That was the moment I switched off my TV and did not carry on watching the third series. Set before and during the American Civil War, the series is a modern Gone with the Wind and takes back to those days. The series features a lot of popular and well-known actors such as David Carradine as Madeline’s sadistic husband, Hal Holbrook as Abraham Lincoln, Gene Kelly as Bent's father, Robert Mitchum as Colonel Patrick Flynn, Jean Simmons as Orry’s mother and Jonathan Frakes as George’s older brother, to mention just a few. Even today, the series is worth watching, and in my opinion Swayze did not get enough credit for his role, even though he sometimes overacted. The action scenes are very good overall, but the second installment focused perhaps a little bit too much on the sadistic scenes of war. However "North and South" is still great entertainment. Bill Conti did a marvelous job, and his music is one reason that the series become a huge success. As the music of "North and South" is typical of Conti’s style of composing, I decided to introduce this composer with this music. The music After composing the music for the Rocky movies, winning an Academy Award for "The Right Stuff" (1983) and even composing the music for one James Bond movie, Conti was in high demand. Even though he had never scored a mini-series before, Conti already had experience with composing music for television and created the title themes for various successful TV series. In the liner notes to the CD release of "North and South", Conti explained that producer David Wolper said: “I want "Gone With the Wind”. After playing the theme on the piano, Wolper and director Richard T. Heffron were very pleased. Here you can listen, why: In the liner notes, you also get an idea of Conti’s great sense of humour when he asked: “When do we go on air?” and got the reply: “In three weeks”. He felt that this shortened his life by six months. Conti explained in the liner notes the murderous schedule he was facing, but when listening to the music, you will understand it was worth all the effort. Conti explained that "North and South" is for him “melodic, operatic, Italian”, and this approach was 100% right. Here is an interview: “The real miracle is that it happened at all – and that it didn’t kill me. I had to write like an animal.” For the first week, he composed from early morning until late at night, during the last two weeks, he woke up at six in the morning and wrote until six at night, then went over to the scoring stage and recorded every night from seven to twelve, and this had to start all over again the next day. Conti explained that because of the murderous schedule he was writing in a stream of consciousness, and for Conti as an Italian, that is melodic, operatic, Italian. “I can do that in my sleep, that’s me,” he pointed out. The soundtrack for the series comes in two CD sets called books, each one with three CDs, and the first book also has a fourth CD with source music from this era. The music has a lot of highlights and starts, of course, with the powerful and majestic main theme. There is also a shorter, faster version played for the end credits, and different versions of these main themes can be found throughout the second book. The tracks for the second book are generally shorter, so it is difficult to highlight a few tracks. It might also be a little boring to listen to the whole music all at once. The music is a little repetitive, but if you consider that the music was over four hours long, that is not surprising. People who know the series can go directly to their favourite scenes and play the music to these scenes. By listening to the whole soundtrack, you can discover some unexpected highlights such as "Billy’s Duel". People who are familiar with Conti’s music will also discover that some parts are very similar to his score to The "Formula" (1981), especially the music for Billy and his love interest Augusta. In his musical approach, Conti used Richard Wagner’s leitmotiv approach, so he used typical themes for each character. Except for the main theme, there are individual themes for the peaceful life in the southern states at that time, an Irish theme for George’s wife Constance (Disc 1, track 38), or a heavily percussion-based version of the main theme for the Hazards from the industrial northern states in track 16 "Hazard Iron". Because "North and South" is a love story, there are plenty of romantic moments in this fabulous score. One great piece is the love scene between Orry and Madeleine in Madeline and Orry (CD 2, track 4), a true masterpiece in the tradition of the melodramatic Italian opera style of Giacomo Puccini. This track alone is worth buying the CD set for. Many of these very emotional and melodramatic pieces can be found in the soundtrack, for example "The Wedding Night", with a very sad variation on the main theme, or Church Meeting, a similar track when Orry sees Madeline at the end of episode 2 as they try to accept their situation as it is right now. How Conti guides the emotions during this scene is indeed a sign of how gifted this composer is. There are plenty of marvelous action tracks to discover. One is "En Garde, Bent" (CD 1, track 11) when Bent wants to give a sabre lesson to Orry, but Orry is stronger than he expected. Another great track is the already mentioned "Billy’s Duel" (CD 3, track 18) about a perilous trap set for Billy and, of course, the full number of action tracks in the second CD set. One track worth mentioning is George’s rescue with Orry and Charles in "Orry Frees George" (CD 3, track 04) or a short one called "Charles Chase" (CD 1, track 7), great, fast-forward action music. One highlight is, of course, "Orry to the Rescue" (CD 1, track 24) when Orry finally kills Justin and gets Madeline. This whole track is composed in a scherzo style, a style in which John Williams likes to compose, but overall still pure Conti. It is practically impossible to mention all the highlights. You have to discover them for yourself, and this is great fun. As someone who watched North and South as a teenager and always wanted to have Bill Conti’s whole soundtrack in my hands, a dream came true when these two CD sets were finally released. I still prefer the music to the first book, too much war music for me in the second book, but I do not want to miss tracks such as The Wedding, when Orry gets finally married to Madeline, or "Augusta Inside", for the love scenes between Charles and the lovely Augusta. Take your time to discover this music and bring your first listening session to an end with "Friends Farewell" and the shorter version of the main theme at the end. Here is the end title: Bill Conti said in the liner notes: “North and South was a great experience. It’s one of the things I’m most proud of”. I agree. "North and South" is a perfect example of what amazing movie music can do. Well done, maestro! Copyright © Stefan Riedlinger, 2014, all rights reserved. The reviews and other textual content contained on the amazingmoviemusic.com site may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of Stefan Riedlinger.

I decided to rewrite the review because I am writing now on publishing my first book and want to change some wordings, but more important to put this review in the structure I developed within the last months. I was so lucky to see the movie in the Royal Albert Hall in London November 6th, 2016, with a live performance by the Royal Philharmonic Concert Orchestra conducted by Ludwig Wicki and with an enthusiastic audience of 7500 people. As a special surprise, James Cameron and Sigourney Weaver with Gale Ann Hurd came to the stage after the performance and showed their respect to James Horner who died June 22th, 2015 in an airplane accident. I was living and working at Google at that time and just really shocked when I checked my phone after leaving the building and saw the sad news about Horner’s death. The movie “Aliens” is the second movie in the Alien franchise and for me the best in the series. James Cameron followed Ripley as she returns to the moon where her crew encountered the hostile Alien creature. Aliens is a 1986 American science fiction action horror film written and directed by James Cameron, produced by Gale Anne Hurd and starring Sigourney Weaver, Carrie Henn, Michael Biehn, Paul Reiser, Lance Henriksen, William Hope, and Bill Paxton. It is the sequel to the 1979 film Alien and the second installment in the Alien franchise. The film follows Weaver's character Ellen Ripley as she returns to the moon where her crew encountered the hostile Alien creature, this time accompanied by a unit of space marines. Cameron wrote a 45 pages’ treatment for the Alien-sequel before he started shooting “Terminator”. The producers liked his ideas, so Cameron was also assigned as director. This movie was heavily action-packed, the audience was now able to see not only one Alien, they see a lot of them, and these Aliens are ready and very willing to kill again. Some critics say this movie was like Vietnam in space. Cameron was given a budget of $18 million, and the film grossed $180 million worldwide. In an interview with Richard Schickel in “Time”, Cameron pointed out he was inspired by the situation in the Vietnam war: A lot of soldiers with modest equipment find out that these weapons and also their training are totally inappropriate for the situation they are facing. Therefore, “Aliens” can be described as a War in Space. Here is the trailer: The music It was the second time that James Horner composed the music to a sequel, and Jerry Goldsmith is very well-known for his music for the original Alien, directed by Ridley Scott. With the second “Star Trek” movie, Horner established himself as a mainstream composer. Director Nicholas Meyer said that he hired Horner for this movie because he could not afford Jerry Goldsmith, but years later when Meyer directed the sixth Star Trek movie, he could not afford to hire James Horner anymore. Cameron knew Horner from their time with Roger Corman, and Cameron wanted a totally different score than the first Alien scored by Jerry. The music should emphasize the action scenes. Cameron put a lot of pressure on Horner and gave him just two weeks to compose the score. Horner complained about Cameron’s behavior. Therefore, it took them eleven years to work together again, this time on “Titanic”, and Cameron and Horner received Academy Awards for their second collaboration. “Aliens” is a great action score with fresh new ideas; especially the use of the percussions is remarkable. The London Symphony Orchestra played, conducted by Horner. The Deluxe Edition contains 75 min of music. You can listen to a lot of tracks that were not used in the final movie because Horner was forced to compose the music without seeing the finished movie. Cameron was still directing and behind the deadline. Even though “Aliens” is a great action score, it is also typical for Horner’s plagiarism. Especially later in his career, Horner became a little lazy and used motives from other scores when composing new film music. From the beginning, Horner liked to use pieces or motifs from classical music. In “Aliens”, for example, he heavily used the adagio of the ballet “Gayaneh”, composed by Aram Chatschaurjan, a piece of music which was already used in “2001: A Space Odyssey”. The difference with Horner’s use of music is that he does not mention on the CD that he is using this piece of classical music. Listeners to the soundtrack who do not know the ballet, think this great piece of music is composed by Horner. So, why stealing music from other composers? That Horner had just two weeks time to compose the music is not really an excuse. If you want to buy the soundtrack, and if you do not have it in your collection, I highly recommend to do so, buy the “Deluxe Edition” and take the chance to listen to the just-percussion track on the “Ripley’s Rescue” track. Horner was great in composing fast-forward action tracks such as “Futile Escape” and “Ripley’s Rescue”. He had a great sense of drama and was highly praised for developing melodies and creating emotions. Horner’s piece with the melody by Chatschaurjan is a wonderful example, how lonely you must feel in space. I found a great live performance of "Futile Escape", the orchestra and the conductor are doing a hell of a job: On Wikipedia, you can read that some tracks of the soundtrack have been used many times in trailers for other movies. As of April 2011, there were reportedly 24 different movie trailers that used "Bishop's Countdown" alone. James Horner composed a lot of great soundtracks in his career, and I will discuss a lot of them here on my blog, but in my opinion, “Aliens” is far one of his best, and after seeing it live on stage, I have to say that Horner cannot be praised enough for this soundtrack. Copyright © Stefan Riedlinger, 2014, all rights reserved. The reviews and other textual content contained on the amazingmoviemusic.com site may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of Stefan Riedlinger.

John Badham’s „Dracula“ (1979) is half of a good film. If the director, the author and the producers would have put more effort into this movie, it would have been the best Dracula movie ever. John Williams’ score to “Dracula” is a masterpiece and with “The Fury” among his best scores. The movie Everyone who read Bram Stokers “Dracula” Gothic horror classic from 1897 is enthusiastic about the great dramaturgical structure of this novel. The plot is mostly told in epistolary format, as a series of letters, diary entries, newspaper articles, and ships' log entries. The narrators are the novel's protagonists. Even though Stoker’s book was not the first vampire and was perhaps influenced by Sheridan Le Fanu’s novel “Carmilla” (1871) about a lesbian vampire and also by John Polidori tale “The Vampyre” (1819) who portraited a vampire as an aristocratic man, Stoker’s novel became the ultimate Vampire novel. The book is still a great read, but it lacks a very good showdown. Therefore, every movie tries to create a new one, but just a few succeeded in this approach. In my opinion, Francis Ford Coppola failed by turning the ending too much into a love story and the adaption becomes a little trashy. Here is the trailer: John Badham’s movie was not based on the novel. It was based on famous Dracula actor Bela Lugosi’s movie which was based on the stage play by Hamilton Deane and John L. Balderston. Frank Langella received a Tony Award-nomination for his performance in the play that runs over 900 times. Even though Badham’s movie is not based on the novel, it is still one of the best “Dracula” movies because Badham did not focus so much on the horror elements, he adapted “Dracula” as a love story. Interesting is that in 1979 three major Dracula films were released simultaneously around the world: Werner Herzog's re-telling “Nosferatu” with Klaus Kinski, not a good one, George Hamilton’s “Love at First Bite”, a so-so parody of the vampire genre with a wonderful performance of Richard Benjamin as the Van Helsing character, and John Badham's “Dracula”. W.D. Richter’s adaption of the story highly emphasized on the love aspects, but also caused some irritation by changing the names of the female characters. Now Lucy is haunted by Dracula and not Mina. There is no reason for doing so. Richter created also a new showdown that brings the story to a surprising end. Two years ago, John Badham directed “Saturday Night Fever” and made John Travolta into a star. For “Dracula”, Badham brought a terrific cast together: Donald Pleasance turned down the part of Van Helsing and played Dr Seward, Laurence Olivier played instead Van Helsing, and Kate Nelligan played Lucy. Frank Langella did not show any vampire teeth during his performance and was much younger than Christopher Lee when he first played Dracula. When Lee is approaching women in his movies, you sometimes get the feeling that these women want to sleep with their father because of the age difference. Langella played Dracula as a very well-educated and elegant man with manners and a touch of tragedy mentioned in the dialogue with Lucy when they are having dinner at his home. He also can act immediately very brutal and violent, as you can see in the beginning, the killing of Renfield and in the showdown. I chose one scene to show the elegance of Frank Langella in this movie: The movie is wonderfully photographed by Gilbert Taylor. The love scene is very romantic but also a bit trashy. Anyway, if you have not seen this “Dracula” movie, I highly recommend watching it. The music John Williams’s music is amazing, one of his best soundtracks even though there is just one main theme. This theme is haunting, darkly melodic, gothic and just beautiful. The balance between the string and the brass section in the first track of the score is truly a sign of the great composing qualities of John Williams at his best. The score has a lot of great tracks, and it is difficult to mention just a few of them. Another highlight is the second track, “To Scarborough”, a fast-moving Scherzo piece with a high emphasis on the brass section. The highlight is “The Abduction of Lucy”: Here you can hear again the haunting Dracula theme in the string section, but listen especially to the use of the flutes and the percussion in that track. We now have finally “The Love Scene”, a surreal wedding scene, and if you listen carefully, you can hear one of the few musical ways to transform a sexual orgasm into music. The last two tracks “Dracula’s Death” and “End Title” bring the album to the musical climax and a satisfying ending, wonderfully played by the London Symphony Orchestra. I like especially the first seconds of the last track with the flute before the brass and strings enter the stage with the gothic Dracula theme before a clarinet takes over. People on Amazon criticize that this album has just one theme, and that the whole music is composed around this theme. That is right, it is a very efficient way to compose a soundtrack, but also typical for Williams’ soundtracks in general. I found one video with the seduction scene, and here you can really see why I think that Frank Langella is such a great Dracula and gives an amazing performance in the video, it is a shame that the movie is not better, otherwise it could have been the best Dracula ever. In the end, you have to admit that the movie is a big disappointment. It was a good chance to tell the Dracula story in a new way but failed in his approach; too much violence, too much awkward scenes and too much trashy ones. Langella’s performance of Dracula is truly remarkable, and his and John Williams’ music are responsible that this movie is still not forgotten. Copyright © Stefan Riedlinger, 2014, all rights reserved. The reviews and other textual content contained on the amazingmoviemusic.com site may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of Stefan Riedlinger.

Jerry Goldsmith’s soundtrack to „The Burbs“ is one of the best scores he ever composed, and in my opinion, one of the best soundtracks ever. This is really amazing movie music, and this soundtrack is also the proof that you find the best soundtracks, not for the big blockbusters, you will find them mostly for the smaller movies. Perhaps the composer thinks that the music for a smaller movie should be more notable than for a big blockbuster? This is an interesting phenomenon and worth talking about it. The movie Joe “Gremlins” Dante directed 1989 this comedy with a lot of satire, but also horror elements and continued the very successful collaboration with Jerry Goldsmith by working on this picture. Goldsmith even composed this last soundtrack “Lonely Tunes in Action” for a Dante movie before the composer died of cancer in 2004. “The Burbs”, based on a screenplay by Dana Olsen, makes fun at suburban environments. On Wikipedia, you can read a quote by the author: “I had an ultra-normal middle-class upbringing, but our town had its share of psychos. There was a legendary hatchet murder in the thirties. As a kid, it was fascinating to think that Mr XY down the street could turn out to be Jack the Ripper.” Here is the trailer: When I wrote this review of the score, I was based in San Francisco since one year and could even more appreciate the humor of the movie. One of my friends was living in these typical suburban areas and told me that life is really as boring as portrayed in the movie. He was telling me of a neighbor who was throwing old shoes at the house when my friend partied again too loud. Tom Hanks played the male leading role and this was before he was becoming famous and won two Academy Awards. Hanks’ wife is portrayed by Carrie Fisher. Bruce Dern gives a marvelous portrait of a war veteran who is married to a dump, but beautiful wife, portrayed by Wendy Schaal. When the new neighbors called Klopeck arrive in the city and starting doing their strange stuff, Hanks and Co. begin to investigate. Finally, some action in the boring neighborhood! As I remember in the original version, the Klopeck speak English with a German accent. Okay, blame the Germans again, but who cares? Henry Gibson, one of the judges in “Boston Legal”, is just marvelous bizarre as the head of the Klopeck family. What is really hopping in the plot and especially at the end, I will not tell, so you all can enjoy the movie. Here you can find a fan video with the best scene with Bruce Dern: The music Jerry Goldsmith’s music is a firework of ideas! The soundtrack is a great example how he was able to combine a classical orchestra with modern electronics. This score is furthermore also one of the best examples why Goldsmith was a better composer than John Williams. If you ever want to buy one soundtrack, then buy this one because it is a perfect example what movie music is able to do when a really gifted composer is working on a picture. There are so many great tracks in this music that it is really difficult to just mention a few. One of my favorite ones is called “My Neighbourhood”. In this short piece, Goldsmith composed a parody of his famous “Patton” score – the trumpet-echo - and used also a special instrument to make some squeak noise. This works wonderfully in the film scene. Another very funny track is called “Let’s go” and composed in the typical Western style of Ennio Morricone, even with gunshots. In the first track of the score, you can hear a musical barking of a dog. These quirky ideas make this score outstanding. For the “Neighbors from Hell”, Goldsmith used an organ in the style of gothic horror music. These organ parts are the best of the music and working fantastic in the movie. There is one haunting scene when Hanks and his friends are watching the Klopecks bringing out the rubbish in a rainy stormy night. If you see this scene with Goldsmith’s music in the movie, you know what amazing movie music really is. One wonderful and highly entertaining piece is the track called “The Dream”. The scene portrays a nightmare, and it is full of visual jokes. Goldsmith also used in this track a choir in the style of the mythological sirens. This track is also a great example of Goldsmith’s use of different percussion instruments. The best title is the last track, “Square One / End Titles” for the last minutes and the credits. In this four minute piece, Goldsmith created a musical firework and the perfect end credits music: He uses all the various themes of the score (the lovely suburban theme, the Gothic horror theme, the western theme and also the heroic war theme for Bruce Dern) and brings the score and the album to a great ending. The musical structure of this piece is highly complex: You have nearly three layers in the music, listen especially to the special usage of the strings in the background before the Organ enters. This track is one of my most favorite tracks ever, and especially when you listened to this music, you can understand why Jerry Goldsmith is my favourite film music composer: He had so much more to offer! It seems this soundtrack is pretty difficult to get but try to buy it, especially the “Deluxe Edition”, it is worth every penny. It’s a shame, but not surprising that Goldsmith was not even nominated for this soundtrack with an Academy Award. Remember, even Bernard Herrmann’s “Psycho” was not even nominated. “The Burbs” is astonishing movie music and my favourite Jerry Goldsmith score. Copyright © Stefan Riedlinger, 2014, all rights reserved. The reviews and other textual content contained on the amazingmoviemusic.com site may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of Stefan Riedlinger.

This is the second review of a Hans Zimmer soundtrack on my website. I want to talk about this soundtrack because the movie is right now in the theatre. Some critics think that this movie is not the best of Christopher Nolan, they still prefer the Batman movies, but I have to say that I like “Inception” and “Interstellar” more than the Batman films. The movie "Interstellar" is an epic SF film directed, co-written and co-produced by Christopher Nolan. The movie stars Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway and Nolan’s regular movie actor Michael Caine. Set in a future in which humanity is struggling to survive, it follows a group of astronauts who travel through a wormhole in search of a new home for mankind. I look forward to any new Christopher Nolan film. He is the only director of this generation who can really tell a story in a mind-blowing movie experience every time. I always feel exhausted after watching a Nolan movie, especially the later ones. Nolan’s films are so full of emotion and great scenes that you keep thinking of the visuals after seeing it, for example the Paris scenes in Inception and the bookshelves scenes in Interstellar. Of course, this movie is a homage to SF classics such as Stanley Kubrick’s "2001 – A Space Odyssey" (1968), perhaps also Fritz Lang’s silent movie masterpiece "Metropolis" (1927) and other SF classics such as "Blade Runner" (1982), "Star Wars" (1977) and "Alien" (1979), which might have inspired the production design. I do not want to talk here about the different SF topics in the movie, e.g. the time travel and its physical and logical aspects. There are many articles from much more sophisticated people than me who can explain you the possibility of these various aspects. For me, Interstellar is a very personal movie, perhaps Nolan’s most personal film so far. It is a movie about love, more specifically about the love for the people we love, and especially how much we need our family and how sad we feel when we are separated from them. Here is the trailer: The music Hans Zimmer mentioned in an interview he again came early on board. Nolan just gave him one piece of paper, nothing about the movie, just a very personal note that touched Hans, and so he composed the music. What I do not like in Zimmer’s approach to write film music is that he mostly finished the music before the final cut of the movie. In general, he composes suites and he or his team will fit these suites to the final movie. Goldsmith, for example, composed the music in a way that the music fits perfect to the movie and in general composed the music when the movie is finished. Having got rather tired of the usual overblown music found in the latest Hans Zimmer soundtracks, I was really impressed by his music for this film. In an interview with Hollywood Reporter, the composer discussed the intense collaboration with Christopher Nolan and his ideas for the music. In the liner notes to the Interstellar CD, Nolan explained his “radical new approach” with this movie. He asked Hans Zimmer “to give me one day of his time. I’d give him an envelope with one page – a page explaining the fable at the heart of the movie-to-be. Hans would open the envelope, read it, start writing and at the end of the day he’d play me whatever he’d accomplished. That would be the basis of the score.” Therefore Hans Zimmer “took me at my word, and several months later, he gave me my day, forcing me to start my own creative journey by sitting down to write out my page.” Later that day, the composer called the director and played a simple piano melody that went directly to Nolan’s heart and worked as the emotional guide. This track was called Day One. Zimmer had composed a four-minute piece for piano and organ: “I really just wrote about what it meant to be a father. And Nolan came down and sat on my couch, and I played it for him. He goes, ‘Well, I better make the movie now’. And I’m going, what is the movie? And he starts describing this huge journey, this vast canvas of space and philosophy and science and all these things. And I’m going, ‘Hang on. I've written you this tiny little thing here.’ And he goes, ‘Yes, but I now know what the heart of the story is’. So, he was writing with this piece of music sort of keeping him company all the way through the writing process, all the way through the shoot. At the end of the filming of Interstellar, Nolan gave Zimmer a watch. On the back it says, ‘This is no time for caution,’” said Zimmer. Here is a clip from a concert in Prague: In the liner notes to the CD, Hans Zimmer mentioned that it started with Christopher Nolan’s idea of using a pipe organ this time. Even though I read that Zimmer had no idea that this movie would be an SF movie, the use of an organ reminds us of Kubrick’s 2001 and the first notes of the fanfare of Sunrise from Thus Spoke Zarathustra by German composer Richard Strauss. Richard Strauss composed this tonal poem inspired by Friedrich Nietzsche’s philosophical book in which Nietzsche explained his ideas of the “Uebermensch” as a person who gives himself his own rules and fights against the obsolete morals of society. Strauss’s fanfare starts with a sustained double low C on the double bass, contrabassoon and organ. This transforms into the brass fanfare and introduces the “dawn” motif (from Zarathustra’s Prologue, this motif includes three notes, at intervals of a fifth and an octave, as C–G–C). I listened to this piece during a concert in London’s Royal Albert Hall, and the fanfare is still very impressive and powerful. Elvis Presley used it as the opening piece in his concerts between 1971 and 1977. Using an organ for an SF movie might sound a little bit like a stereotype, but Zimmer used it not just for an opening track but made it an essential part of the whole score. Zimmer and Nolan visited London’s Temple Church to record the 1926 four-manual Harrison & Harrison organ played by the church’s music director Roger Sayer. Because of the use of the organ, this score by Hans Zimmer stands out among his recent works. In the liner notes, Zimmer explains his early love for the organ as the most complex man-made musical device and his joy when he was finally old enough to reach the pedals. For this music, Nolan asked Zimmer not to use the big action drums or the propulsive string ostinato that the composer liked to use before. Hans Zimmer started to synthesis sounds of air and wind to include in the music. Zimmer explained the exceptional process of the score when he composed and played the tracks, “with every note played solely by me”, and then Nolan and his team fit the music to the scene in the movie. Zimmer mentioned that he never had the actual film in his studio to look at it while he wrote, an entirely unusual process compared to the other composers I have talked about in this book. But Zimmer and Nolan had always planned an experimental music expedition to London to see what the “extraordinary musicians and the magnificent acoustics of two great churches could bring to the project”. Zimmer’s friend Richard Harvey suggested visiting Temple Church, and in the liner notes in a heart-warming way Zimmer explained his worries and then his astonishment at the organist Roger Sayer and his way of “taming the beast”, Zimmer’s nickname for the big organ. The best music track of the score is the music to the Docking Scene. When I immediately went out after seeing the movie and bought the music album, now called the standard edition (with 16 tracks), this track was not on the album, and I had to download it via a link I found on Hans Zimmer’s website. How could he not include this powerful music for one of the best scenes in the movie on the album? Here is a fan version: The music has the right balance between the overblown pieces such as "Coward, Where We’re Goin’" and "The Wormhole" with the organ and the more lyrical ones such as "Afraid of Time", "Detach", "I’m Going Home", "S.T.A.Y" and "Stay" (perhaps the best two tracks after the music for the Docking Scene called "No Time for Caution"). There is one track called "Mountain" in which Zimmer uses a clock-like instrument and includes the typical clock ticking in the music as a musical concept of time. I do not want to mention any more tracks from the album. The whole score has a good flow and typical of Zimmer in its musical approach. There are many more tracks that stand out other than the few I have mentioned. On the standard album I bought I missed the kind of end credits tracks that bring the album to a satisfying ending. You also have to decide which album presentation you want to buy, and I do not understand why, other than for financial reasons, there is not just one album with all the essential cues on it. For me, "Interstellar" is one of Zimmer’s best works in recent years, even though it lacks a satisfying musical and dramaturgical structure. I still prefer his earlier and more theme-based soundtracks, but this music is exceptionally good on screen, and the track for the docking scene astonishingly good even when separated from the movie. Copyright © Stefan Riedlinger, 2014, all rights reserved. The reviews and other textual content contained on the amazingmoviemusic.com site may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of Stefan Riedlinger.

This week another legendary soundtrack, John Williams "Raiders of The Lost Arc". With the role of Henry Indiana Jones Jr Harrison Ford get his second role in another very successful franchise and became finally a legend for action fans. John Williams composed the music for both franchises, and “Raiders of the Lost Ark” was another step in becoming the best-known composer of soundtracks. The movie The first movie in the “Indiana Jones”-franchise was the result of George Lucas' intention to create a modern version of the serials of the 1930s and 1940s he watched as a kid. These series had a very straight forwarded storytelling and each episode ends with a cliffhanger, a scene which features the main character in a very dangerous situation he had to escape off, e.g. he was confronted by a many of bad guys, lost his weapons, fall into a trap, was locked into a room with a bomb etc. The idea of these cliffhangers was to make sure that the audience will return to see how the hero survived this difficult situation. Here is the trailer: “Raiders of the Lost Ark” is a 1981 American action-adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg, with a screenplay written by Lawrence Kasdan, from a story by George Lucas and Philip Kaufman. Harrison Ford plays the archaeologist Prof. Henry Jones who finds himself soon fighting against a group of Nazis who are searching for the Ark of the Covenant, which Adolf Hitler believes will make his army invincible. The film co-stars Karen Allen as Indy's former lover Marion Ravenwood who returned for the fourth movie and finally get married to Henry Jones. Paul Freeman plays Indiana's rival, the French archaeologist René Belloq, John Rhys-Davies gives a great performance as Indiana's sidekick, Sallah, Ronald Lacey is unbelievable good as the sadistic Gestapo agent Arnold Toht who is killed in a shocking way in the end; and Denholm Elliott gives his first performance as Indiana's colleague Marcus Brody the typical stereotype of an academic lecturer who has trouble to survive in the real world. The first movie is perhaps the best in the whole franchise. The sequel is unnecessarily violent, and the fourth one is overall not a good movie. With Sean Connery playing Indiana Jones’ father, the third one is by far the most entertaining one of the series. The showdown of “Raiders” scared the crap out of me when I saw it as a teenager, especially the face melt scene, but also the opening scene... my God, I hate spiders! “Raiders of the Lost Ark” opened at #14 and grossed $1,673,731 during its opening weekend. The film, made on an $18 million budget, grossed $384 million worldwide, and was the highest-grossing film of 1981 in the US. It remains one of the top twenty-five highest-grossing films ever made when adjusted for inflation. The music By composing the music for this movie, I am sure John Williams had no idea that he was composing the music for the next big franchise his name became tight to. The Raiders-March is one of the most popular themes in movie history and like the Imperial March from “Star Wars”, the “Superman”-theme, the theme for “Jaws” or recently the “Harry Potter”-theme another iconic theme Williams composed. If you compare all four soundtracks to the “Indiana Jones”-movies, I think the first one is the best. What I really like in this score is the haunting atmosphere, similar to John Williams’ music for “Dracula” which I discussed in this book, too. Therefore, my favourite track is the "The Map Room Down". Here you can listen to a perfect example of how to underscore a movie scene in a perfect way. The piece starts slowly with the haunting theme, builds then up the suspense, and when the sun finally comes out and shows Indy the way to the Ark, the orchestra opens and the music finally erupts. If you listen to this music, you have immediately the scene in your mind. This track is for sure one of the best tracks Williams ever composed. There are different versions of this soundtrack, so I will not mention the track listing here. The CD I have has 19 tracks and begins with “The Raiders March”. If you compare this soundtrack with the later Indiana Jones scores, then this music is the most modern one in the way of composing. Some tracks are very dependent on the dramatic structure of the film, e.g. “Main Title: South America, 1936” when Indiana Jones get introduced in the movie. A fabulous scene, and I wish that Spielberg would have created such a scene for the fourth movie when Indy appears finally on screen after such a long waiting for the fourth “Indiana Jones”. The next track “In The Idol’s Temple” is orchestrated in an astonishing way. Listen to the way Williams underscores the scene when Jones discovers the spiders. Williams builds up perfectly the haunting atmosphere and creates musical suspense until Indy finally stands in front of the golden statue. The music then switches immediately to action when Indy must escape. A perfect piece of music! With “Journey To Nepal”, we hear the first time the wonderful love theme (longer and better later in the track “Marion’s Theme”), but here it is immediately interrupted by the theme for the Arc. I do not want to comment on every track, so let’s mention “The Basket Game” as one of an early example of the typical funny tracks in the scherzo style that is Williams famous for. “Airplane Fight” and “Desert Chase” are good examples of Williams action writing with its dominant focus on the brass section to underscore the military aspects of the movie. Before we have the music for the showdown, the track “Art Trek” gives us another strong performance of the haunting Ark theme. “The Miracle Of The Ark” is underscoring the shocking finale with its amazing special effects. Williams transforms the whole magical atmosphere into music and underscores the shocking effects with rude and nearly brutal orchestra attacks. This kind of violent music is typical for the early soundtracks of Williams, and therefore, I like these scores much better than his later score which are more easy listening. The music for the death of the Nazis is so close to temporary classical music as Williams has never been before. The last minute brings this piece to a majestic ending, again with the Ark theme. “The Warehouse” and the “End Credits” bring the soundtrack to an end. You can argue if “Raiders of the Lost Ark” is Steven Spielberg’s best action movie, but for sure, this score is the most astonishing score in Williams’ whole career. He was never better, and for me, this score tops even his “Star Wars” soundtracks because of the perfect balance of romance and action, but especially because of the rudeness of the orchestral approach. Find here the famous Riders March: Copyright © Stefan Riedlinger, 2014, all rights reserved. The reviews and other textual content contained on the amazingmoviemusic.com site may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of Stefan Riedlinger.

„Rocky“ is American history. It is the movie that made Sylvester Stallone famous, it is the movie that made composer Bill Conti famous, and it is still one of the best sports movies ever. So, it is time now to talk about the “Rocky”-franchise. One of the rules I set for my blog from the beginning is that I will talk just about one score of a franchise when the composer is still the same. Therefore, I will not review the other “Rocky”-scores in a separated review even though I think that the best tracks of the franchise are on the score for “Rocky 2” and “Rocky 3” and even “Rocky 5” has one track that is very nice, it is track for the fighting scene in the end. The movie “Rocky” is a 1976 American sports drama film directed by John G. Avildsen and both written by and starring Sylvester Stallone. It tells the typical American Dream story: Rocky Balboa is an uneducated but kind-hearted working class Italian-American boxer. He works as a debt collector for a loan shark in the slums of Philadelphia and gets the chance to fight against the heavyweight boxing champion, played by Carl Weathers. Here is the trailer: Most film fans know the story that Stallone got inspired by the fight between Muhammad Ali vs. Chuck Wepner, “The Bayonne Bleeder”. Chuck was able to fight against Ali fifteen rounds, he got not knocked out early as boxing experts supposed, and he could hit Ali very hard in the ninth round, a scene which you can also find in the movie. Producers liked the story but not the fact to see the unknown Stallone in the role. Stallone was fighting for his project, and we all know the rest. The film, made on a budget of just over $1 million and shot in 28 days, was a sleeper hit; it earned $225 million in global box office receipts, becoming the highest-grossing film of 1976, and went on to win three Oscars, including Best Picture. “Rocky” is considered to be one of the greatest sports films ever made and was ranked as the second-best in the genre, after Raging Bull, by the American Film Institute in 2008. “Rocky” started a franchise with six sequels: “Rocky II” (1979), “Rocky III” (1982), “Rocky IV” (1985), “Rocky V” (1990), “Rocky Balboa” (2006) and “Creed” (2015). Stallone portrays Rocky in all six sequels, wrote the first five, and directed four (Avildsen returned to direct “Rocky V” and Ryan Coogler directed “Creed”). From all the movies, I like “Rocky III” best because I think it has the best story and the ideal of the fallen champion who underestimate his opponent, lost his appetite (“Eye of the Tiger”) because he is afraid of losing again, but fights back with the help of a friend, is a great storyline and proofs that Stallone is a great screenwriter. Also, I think that especially the quieter parts of Bill Conti’s score are the best of the series. I grew up with the “Rocky” movies. I cannot count how often I saw the movies. The Rocky movies are not only an inspiring story, they are great for your own motivation. Never give up, always stand up after a punch in the face and keep going until you succeed and reach your goals. The music Bill Conti worked with the director before and composed a score for “W.W. and the Dixie Dancekings” (1975) that was ultimately rejected by the studio as Conti explained in an interview with “Emmy TV Legends”. In the interview, Conti explained that composer David Shire, at that time Talia Shire’s husband, was not composing the music, he did not know the reason, then another guy also could not do it, so Avildsen then reached out to Conti again due to the film's relatively low budget. "The budget for the music was 25 grand," said Avildsen. "And that was for everything: The composer's fee, that was to pay the musicians, that was to rent the studio, that was to buy the tape that it was going to be recorded on." Therefore, Conti recorded the music in one three-hour session. Each film music fan considers “Rocky” as one of the most amazing movie soundtracks ever. When Rocky is running up the steps to the Museum of Modern Art in Philadelphia, you are still impressed by the energy of this scene combined with the powerful score by Conti. The main theme song, "Gonna Fly Now", was placed by the American Film Institute as 58th on its AFI's 100 Years...100 Songs. “Rocky” is like John Williams’ score for “Indiana Jones” a simple, but powerful composed score and has a characteristic motif that you can easily play on the piano. The music is pure Italian – both Conti and Rocky have Italian origins - in its sense of a lovely melody and, of course, also a product of the 70s in the use of electric guitars. Even after 40 years, the training music has such energy that you just have to put the music in your tape recorder, pardon you have to upload it on e.g. iTunes and transfer it to your iPhone or iPod, and can start your own training and have also a perfect rhythm for pumping the iron. Here is another great peace of music that shows how Bill Conti is able to create emotions. This is the music after the last bell and the fight is over: There is a great interview on YouTube with Bill Conti playing the famous “Gonna fly now” on the piano. Conti explained that this song was not actually planed as a song; it came up by adding different pieces together. John Avildsen came to Conti and said he needs nearly 90 seconds for the training music. So, Conti composed the fanfare and went over to the beat. Avildsen needed more music because he did not use the medicine ball and push-ups, so Conti composed more, then the director needed another 30 seconds and another 30 seconds. Therefore, Conti began adding these pieces together, and it became the now famous song. A great example of composing a piece of unforgettable music! Copyright © Stefan Riedlinger, 2014, all rights reserved. The reviews and other textual content contained on the amazingmoviemusic.com site may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of Stefan Riedlinger.

“Backdraft” was the first Hans Zimmer CD I bought, and it is still one of my favourite scores. I am not sure if it’s the orchestration of Shirley Walker, but in my opinion, this music is a much better way of underscoring action scenes than the sound Hans Zimmer developed in recent years with a high focus on electronics. The last track of this score is one of my favourite Hans Zimmer tracks, and I really liked listening to it while travelling or starting my day. The movie "Backdraft" is an action-thriller directed by Ron Howard from 1991 about a group of firefighters in Chicago. With a total gross of over $ 152 Mio., this movie is the highest grossing film ever made about firefighters. Furthermore, the movie received three Academy Award nominations, and Hans Zimmer won for his music the BMI Film Music Award. Here is the trailer: The story about two brothers, played by William Baldwin and Kurt Russell, is not very well developed and the love story is crap. Additional and remarkable appearance is made by Robert De Niro, Donald Sutherland with some great scenes, and Scott Glen. The very realistic fire scenes are the stars of the movie, and on a big screen, this movie is still breath-taking. Firefighting professionals mentioned that the fire in the movie is pretty close to reality, but more realism would have resulted in the fact that in almost every fire the smoke conditions completely obscured all vision. Also, the idea that the fire is acting like a living entity is not very realistic, but exactly this idea gives the film a very special and demonic touch. The music Before he was assigned to compose the music for “Backdraft”, Hans Zimmer already scored a lot of film scores and was well-known for this contribution to “Rain Man” (1988) with Tom Cruise and Dustin Hoffman, Ridley Scott’s “Black Rain” (1989), and especially for his lovely score for “Driving Miss Daisy” (1989). Zimmer’s musical approach for “Backdraft” featured a good mixture of electronics and orchestra and choir and a very majestic main theme. Looking back at Hans Zimmer’s career, I prefer the soundtracks from the 1990s. Here, Zimmer tried to compose various soundtracks in different styles and created lovely melodies such as the theme for “Miss Daisy” or “Rain Man”. In “Backdraft”, Zimmer transformed even the characteristics of this “Backdraft”-Fire into music. A backdraft is an explosive event caused by a fire, resulting from rapid re-introduction of oxygen in an oxygen-depleted environment, for example, the breaking of a window or the opening of a door to an enclosed space. The film shows the danger of this backdraft for firefighters in a great way. On Filmtracks, you can read that Hans Zimmer and Ron Howard who developed a strong collaboration with James Horner before did not work very well at the beginning because of miscommunication. Zimmer nearly got fired during the project. The idea to compose an “ode to fireman” was finally exactly achieved by Zimmer’s final approach. For this, the composer used a 95-people orchestra with a heavy emphasize on the brass and percussion section (high dominance of the snare drums) and also sometimes a female choir, especially in the action scenes. Here is an interview: The first track “Fighting 17th” sets the tone for the whole soundtrack. It is a slow and majestic start that introduces the main theme. The second track, “Brothers”, presents the love theme that is similar to the love theme later in “Pearl Harbour” (200), this track also introduces the sound effects that underscore the fire scenes because this scene is shot in a parallel storytelling about the two brothers: one has sex, the other fights against the fire. Track 3 “The Arsonist’s Waltz” introduces a nice Waltz approach into the music, before with the next track “333” the action starts. Track 6 ”Burn It All” is a now famous action track for the firefighting scenes that introduces the special Hans Zimmer approach to underscore action tracks. This highly effective music drives the action forward, no matter how loud the sound effects are. The female choir works very well here. A great idea: Men are fighting a fire, and Hans Zimmer uses a female choir to underscore this! We continue the action with the melodramatic “You Go, Wo Go”. Zimmer also transformed the hammering of an axe into music, such as Jerry Goldsmith the dropping of a basketball in “Hoosiers” (1986). The second last track called “Fahrenheit 451” - title refers to the temperature 451 °F (233 °C) that was thought was the autoignition temperature of paper, scientists now believe it is 440 °F to 470 °F – is another fabulous action track, the second part of this track underscores the funeral. The solo trumpet, also heard in the first track “Fighting 17th”, gives the track the necessary majestic and patriotic tone. In the Milan CD, I have, there is no break between “You Go, We Go” and “Fahrenheit 451”, these tracks belong together. Here is the track to "Show me your firetruck" in a different version with more electronics: The Milan CD is not perfect, the sound quality sometimes not so good and the cues out of order than used in the movie. Even though, “Backdraft” is a great movie music CD, very visually on the one hand but also independent from the movie. Especially the last track “Show me your Firetruck” is a wonderful piece of music and one of my all-time favorite tracks. Great job, Hans! Why not composing more in that style again? I found a nice live performance of the score: Copyright © Stefan Riedlinger, 2014, all rights reserved. The reviews and other textual content contained on the amazingmoviemusic.com site may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of Stefan Riedlinger.

“The Secret of NIMH" is one of the best soundtracks Jerry Goldsmith ever composed, it was also the first soundtrack with Jerry's music I heard, and it was the first soundtrack I bought in my life. Therefore, three reasons to start my blog with this soundtrack. The movie "The Secret of NIMH" (1982) is an American animation movie, directed by Don Bluth, former Animation Director at Disney. It is an adaption of Robert C. O’Brien’s novel “Mrs Frisby and the Rats of NIMH” (1971) that I read after seeing the movie. The style of the movie is very like Disney's animation style, but it is sometimes very dark, and I do not consider some scenes suitable for very young children. During the production, the name of the main character has changed to Mrs Brisby because of trademark concerns with the Frisbee discs. 1998 it was followed by a direct-to-video sequel without involvement of Don Bluth or Jerry Goldsmith. Here is the trailer: The movie has a complicated production history. Bluth’s intention was to return feature animation to its “golden era”, so he focused on strong characters, a good story and experimenting with unusual and more labour-intensive animation techniques. Among these techniques were rotoscoping and multiple passes on the camera to achieve transparent shadows and multiple colour palettes for characters to fit in different lightning situations. The tight budget resulted in a very tight schedule. Producer Gary Goldman recalled working 110-hour weeks during the final six months. Bluth made several changes to the story, mostly by adding mystical elements that are most apparent in the magic amulet given to Mrs. Brisby. The film was finally a financial success. In competition with blockbusters such as “E.T.”, it performed better in the opening than “Poltergeist” (with another great Jerry Goldsmith score) and “Rocky III” (a fabulous Bill Conti score) and “Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan” (James Horner’s best Star Trek score). Compare these scores with today’s scores and you realized how spoiled we were at that time. Because of the strong competition “The Secret of NIMH” made just $14 Mio. in North America but was more successful on home video. The music “The Secret of NIMH” was Jerry Goldsmith’s first animation movie as he explained in the notes to the soundtrack release. Jerry finally decided to treat this movie like a live action movie and developed the same kind of extended themes and musical structure. He pointed out: “Also, scenes are much shorter for animated films, and thus, on reflection, seem to lend themselves to music’s playing an even larger, unifying role than usual. I therefore decided to score the picture as though it were live action, believing that this would strengthen the sense of continuity.” You can see in the final duel between the good and the bad guy what Goldsmith meant. If you did not watch the movie so far, then do not watch the scene now: It is very interesting that composing music for animation seems to be a very difficult field, and even a very gifted composer such as Elmer Bernstein had trouble to find the right approach to composing the music for Disney’s “The Black Cauldron”. Goldsmith returned to animation with his excellent score for Disney’s “Mulan” (1998). Goldsmith explained in an interview that the scoring process was difficult because he had to deal with a lot of unfinished scenes. The approach to treat this movie as a live action one was exactly the right one, so Jerry could avoid the typical mickey mousing and concentrate more on the darker parts of the story. Because the film starts with Nicodemus, the wise and mystical leader, telling the story of Mrs Brisby’s husband, Goldsmith starts the score with a haunting “Main Title” before you will hear the beautiful main theme played firstly on a trumpet. The score is very good balanced between the darker and the more lighter parts. “Allergic Reaction / Athletic Typ” is first a darker one with some nice action music. Jerry uses the full force of the orchestra and finishes this track with a beautiful melody. I normally do not listen to the songs, so I will not mention them. “The Tractor” is an excellent piece for a very dramatic scene in the movie. Because Mrs Brisby’s son Timothy has fallen ill and should stay in bed, Mrs Brisby tries to prevent the farmer to plow his field. Here is the scene: I have two favourite tracks, the first is called "Moving Day". This piece is a great example how you can build up tension and drama. The music follows the film scene very detailed and has an excellent dramaturgical structure by using different themes. Just by listening, you will understand why Goldsmith is, in my opinion, the best film music composer ever. This is music you can play without any changes in a concert hall. The music is modern in a very good way without being atonal, not always an easy-listening track but time-less in its way of giving a perfect example of great film music. Another astonishing track is “Step Into my House”. This music underscores the scene when Mrs Brisby visits Nicodemus. Goldsmith creates a haunting, but later also a magic atmosphere in his music. Another example of this musical magic is “House Raising”: Jerry composed here an action track for the dramatic final scene when all animals try to rescue Mrs Brisby’s house but fail. Then Mrs Brisby uses the magical amulet and… but you should see this scene in the movie. This is excellent musical story-telling! My second favourite track is the last track, "Flying High/End Titles". Here Goldsmith gives the film a wonderful ending by musically visualizing the final love scene between two ravens and brings one of his most beautiful love themes to an end. This track is very short but also dangerous. Years ago, I was sitting in my apartment in Munich. My idea was just drinking one glass of wine after a long working day and listening to this track once. In the end, I finished nearly the whole bottle, played the role of the conductor in front of an invisible orchestra and listened to this track over 10 times. Especially the music from 1’21 is excellent. Listen to the strings! Here is the whole track: If you will ever start your collection of film music with one soundtrack start with this one! This is film music at its highest level of excellence! Copyright © Stefan Riedlinger, 2014, all rights reserved. The reviews and other textual content contained on the amazingmoviemusic.com site may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of Stefan Riedlinger.