Movie Wave Home
Reviews by Title | Reviews by Composer

Composed by
GRAEME REVELL

Rating
*

Album running time
35:31

Tracks
1: Main Title (3:20)
2: Stations Ready (2:28)
3: Searching for Answers (2:50)
4: Prepare to Dive! (1:13)
5: The Haunted Hull (2:50)
6: Sealing Off Compartments (1:02)
7: Charred Remains (3:17)
8: Strange Forces (:57)
9: Searching for Truth (1:01)
10: Odell Solves the Mystery (2:25)
11: Going Up! (:54)
12: Facing the Truth (2:12)
13: Haunted by Dishonour (3:50)
14: Safe Harbour (6:50)

Performed by
UNNAMED ORCHESTRA
Conducted by
UNCREDITED

Orchestrated by
TIM SIMONEC

Engineered by
GEOFF FOSTER
Edited by
JOSH WINGET
Produced by
GRAEME REVELL

Released by
VARÈSE SARABANDE
Serial number
VSD-6416

Artwork copyright (c) 2002 Miramax Film Corp.; review copyright (c) 2003 James Southall


Visit Amazon.com, the world's biggest soundtrack store!

BELOW

Below-par
A review by JAMES SOUTHALL

Australian director David Twohy followed up his surprisingly good science fiction film Pitch Black with this haunted-submarine tale starring, believe it or not, Matt Davies and Bruce Greenwood. Such big names. Anyway, one aspect of Pitch Black that just didn't work was Graeme Revell's absolutely atrocious score, unworthy of a $250 student film, let alone a big Hollywood production. That Twohy turned to him again for Below is unbelievable, but a few lines in the liner notes seem even more bizarre: Twohy says he originally conceived the film without any music at all, but then realised it needed it so allowed Revell to be let loose after he'd been waiting to score the film for months.

To allow him to be let loose is one thing, but to let him turn in a score that is half a sub-Media Ventures Crimson Tide rip-off (well, it's set on a submarine, so using identical music is obviously the answer) and half generic, bland, boring suspense material. Revell wrote what is arguably the worst score ever to feature in a big-budget film in Tomb Raider but frankly he's written several others that verge on being as bad. I'm sure he's a nice guy but his continued employment continues to surprise me - not every score needs to be big and orchestral, film music would be pretty boring in fact if that were the case, but surely it needs some sort of hook of its own at the very least. To just have an orchestra rumble along for an hour and a half seems a total waste of time and money, in fact if you're going to do that then frankly you may just as well rely on the natural sound effects to do their thing and forget about having music completely.

Below is the sort of score commissioned by a director who doesn't have a clue about how to use music in a film and, while I would love to say this in a nice way I'm not sure it's possible, it's the sort of score written by a composer who doesn't have a clue about how to write film music. At least, after 35:31, it ends.

Buy this CD by clicking here!