Intrada Soundtrack Forum

This didn't do much for me either... for a start, his constant overuse of one theme (which wouldn't have been so bad if it had been a good theme like Eragon).

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"Now I don't wanna kill you and you don't wanna be dead!"

I've been feeling much the same, especially after listening to Nim's Island. It has the stamp of Patrick Doyle, but it doesn't sound like he was all that into the goings-on. It's just not all that interesting. I did however enjoy Sleuth as a classy minor effort.

I listened to Needful Things a few days ago to remind myself what I liked about Doyle, and it stunned me all over again. The huge choral music is exciting and bold, the themes memorable and malleable, and the orchestration even in the quiet moments is so colorful that it paints images. But it's not like I'm trying to pit old Doyle vs new Doyle, as there's some older scores of his that I don't find all that interesting either (Into the West).

He's still got the potential to write another stunner of a score, but even if that doesn't happen, he still has my respect.

Doyle's written a lot of scores which are in the style I like -- epic, broad, with orchestra & chorus -- but I have to say I've never really cared for any of them.

Henry V is widely regarded as his masterpiece; musically I thought it was fair, but dramatically I thought it was all over the place, effective in some scenes, overblown in others. And the extreme similarity between the big choral cue after the battle and John Barry's "Allons Gai Gai Gai" from The Lion in Winter has always bothered me. I still love Henry V as a film tho.

For me Doyle's best score is probably Much Ado About Nothing.

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The Last Legion is my favourite score from last year. So there.

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"He who hears music, feels his solitude peopled at once." - Robert Browning

"As long as the human spirit thrives on this planet, music in some living form will accompany and sustain it and give it expressive meaning." - Aaron Copland