Soundtrack Review: Cowboys & Aliens (2011)
| Reviewer: JØrn Tillnes |
Cowboys & Aliens Soundtrack Review: This is a review of the film score Cowboys & Aliens by Harry Gregson-Williams.
"The balance is all wrong, this is simply not working."
This is an interesting concept. You take a perfectly good wild west town and introduce a tough character with some issues, which could be a film in itself, then you unleash a spaceship… and aliens! So we have a western town, Arizona, 1873 and we have an alien invasion to take over the earth. Normally you would think that the alien technology would make this an easy task, but apparently it isn't. Director Jon Favreau has brought along Harry Gregson-Williams to do the score.
Tracklist
| 1. Jake Lonergan | ***** |
| 2. Palms to Heaven | *** |
| 3. Col. Woodrow Dolarhyde | *** |
| 4. Attack & Abductions | **** |
| 5. A Kid, a Dog & a Woman | *** |
| 6. Emmet's Close Encounter | *** |
| 7. Alien Air Attack | *** |
| 8. She's Gone | *** |
| 9. I Know Where They Are | *** |
| 10. Jake's Army | **** |
| 11. Godspeed | *** |
| 12. Goodbye Jake | *** |
| 13. I See Them | ** |
| 14. Ella's Mission | *** |
| 15. Do You Remember Me? | *** |
| 16. Return to the Cabin | ***** |
| 17. See You Around | ***** |
I would love a hybrid western/sci-fi score, but sadly that isn't the case. It starts off very promising with a western flair. 'Jake Lonergan' is a really smart theme for the main character and the film. Very western-like without adding any sci-fi elements. Unfortunately, most of the score reverts back to standard sci-fi action scoring and even that is lacking somewhat.
There are some examples of good sci-fi action scoring in cues like 'Attack & Abductions', but it's far from the quality of recent action sci-fi films such as Skyline and Battle: Los Angeles.
Most of the cues seem to wander about without any direction. It's like you want to roll with your eyes and shout “get on it with it already!”. Unfortunately it does go on and on with the same uninteresting tone. Maybe the score is trying to hard, but I feel it lacks inspiration. At least try to bring in some heroics and themes that I can enjoy.
Conclusion
Is it a western or is it a sci-fi? Judging by the score, it's 90% sci-fi and 10% western. The balance is all wrong, this is simply not working. It could have worked if the sci-fi parts were remotely interesting, but apart from a couple of cues, it's nothing to write home about. It lost interest for me soon after 'Jake Lonergan' and didn't catch up until the very end. A lackluster score by Williams who knows a lot better than this.
CUE RATING: 68.2
Listen to the Cowboys & Aliens soundtrack by Harry Gregson-Williams below:
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