Fred Schepisi's acclaimed Last Orders tells the life of a London man in flashback as his friends remember him after his funeral. The extremely low-budget film features a stellar cast of British talent - Michael Caine, Tom Courtenay, David Hemings, Bob Hoskins, Helen Mirren, Ray Winstone - and is Schepisi's first real diversion from comedy in a while. For the music, he turned not to his usual collaborator Jerry Goldsmith but instead to his Australian countryman Paul Grabowsky. Grabowsky had contributed a couple of source cues to Schepisi's brilliant Six Degrees of Separation but his only work previously released was the rather disappointing tv score for Noah's Ark.

Last Orders is not a major score but it is a delightful one. The clichéd melodrama that the score would have been had it been done in Hollywood is completely avoided - Grabowsky turns instead to a fairly small jazz ensemble, augmented by synthesised strings on occasion, in a score that instantly recalls Goldsmith's Fierce Creatures (also directed by Schepisi). The main theme is catchy, light and breezy, often played by bass clarinet accompanied by piano, percussion and guitars. It is heard often during the relatively brief album, but not to the point of redundancy. It's old-fashioned but also somehow fresh, a nice change in pace from the over-egged puddings that have dominated film music recently.

I alluded to the brevity of the album but this is no bad thing - presumably this represents the score in its entirety anyway, so it's a moot point, but a shade over 35 minutes is just the right length for this sort of thing. It's very well put together and a promising milestone in Grabowsky's career.

The only real fault is highly-annoying, but hardly detracts from the quality of the music - that is, Varèse Sarabande has somehow managed to spell his name incorrectly on the front cover and spines of the album. Mysteriously, it's correct on the back cover and the CD itself, so someone clearly did know how to spell it, but quite how a soundtrack speciality label managed to let that one slip under its radar is beyond me. I guess not many people will notice (well, unless they read this review of course!) but since it's Grabowsky's highest-profile release to date he is presumably not too pleased. That aside, this is a winning album, a really lovely and delightful work.

Buy this CD by clicking here!