ALEX NORTH - SPARTACUS (COMPLETE BOX: 6CD + 1DVD + 168 BOOK)
- Bucholc Krok
- Jean-Baptiste Lully
- Posty: 17506
- Rejestracja: wt wrz 16, 2008 20:21 pm
- Lokalizacja: Golden Age
- Bucholc Krok
- Jean-Baptiste Lully
- Posty: 17506
- Rejestracja: wt wrz 16, 2008 20:21 pm
- Lokalizacja: Golden Age
obszerna opinia, i to nie byle kogo :
Posted: Jul 31, 2010 - 1:26 AM
By: Jeff Bond (Member)
The stereo presentation is terrific and does include a lot of my favorite moments from the score: the opening and the music for Batiatus's caravan; the prelude to the fight between Spartacus and Draba and the heartbreaking aftermath of the fight; the rousing Metapontum triumph and the Vesuvius training sequence; the music for Spartacus's vigil with Verinia on the eve of the final battle and the grinding "formations" prelude to the final battle. Still there's a LOT of music that didn't make the cut in stereo that I love--the gladiator training scenes, the fanfare for Crassus and his house in Rome, the aftermath of the final battle, the love theme for Crassus and Verinia (which I actually like better than the Spartacus love theme) and the music for Spartacus and Antoninus as they wait for death and are forced to fight each other.
I'm only up to the slave revolt in the mono material but some of the biggest, most complicated stuff does seem to struggle to get heard in the mono mix. On the other hand the slave revolt cue sounds spectacular. Without wading too much into the Cleopatra vs. Spartacus debate, I probably prefer Cleopatra as a total listening experience, but I prefer Spartacus as a film and its score's most powerful moments are still devastating to me. Cleopatra as a film aimed at the mind and fell somewhat short; Spartacus aims at the gut and the heart and at least for me, hits more than it misses. I understand why people dislike this film--it's in many ways a Hollywood product and in some ways a comic book. But just as with Spielberg's A.I., I've always found that a great deal of the film's power lies in the way Kubrick's innate impulses struggle against the conventional elements of the movie. Kubrick added a level of cruelty and intelligence that raised the stakes more than a conventional director would have, and for me he legitimizes some of the film's excesses, at least to a degree. Oddly I find Ben-Hur more distancing and cold than Spartacus, maybe because as much as I love both Heston and Douglas, Douglas seems more human, more vulnerable and fallible than Heston in a movie like this.
Spartacus still has some of the most emotionally powerful moments for me in film: the prelude to the Draba fight with Douglas and Woody Strode silently studying each other (a brilliant touch that only Kubrick would have added, focusing on fear and resolve in an intimate, human way instead of giving the audience an expected moment of spectacle); the shadow of oppression moving over each of the gladiators in their cells in the aftermath of the fight; the famed "I'm Spartacus" scene and even the final fight between Douglas and Tony Curtis. The film's ending has always been a tearjerker, moreso when the restoration put back in Verinia's plea to Spartacus to please die and end his suffering on the cross (apparently taboo to the Catholic League of Decency or something on the film's original release). After becoming a father and losing an infant son, that final shot of Verinia holding her infant son up so Spartacus can see him for the final time now effects me in a way I can't even describe. Maybe all of this is sappy and cartoonish from a modern perspective, maybe to some it was sappy and cartoonish then. But it's this emotional punch that North's music conveys most effectively. There's a circus atmosphere to the scenes of the freed slaves that does become overbearing, but it also provides delirious heights like the Vesuvius sequences. In the film the love theme just perhaps wears out its welcome a bit midway through the film in scenes that don't quite come across because they're too studio-bound. But the payoff even for the rather conventional romance is tremendous as the film and score reaches its final stages. North's handling of human anguish, death and loss and hopeless longing, is peerless. The nobility of the "I'm Spartacus!" scene, the fragility of the Crassus/Verinia music (with echoes of the Spartacus love theme haunting it from within) as Crassus woos the gladiator's wife in his house, the beautiful elegy for the slave revolt in "Afraid of Death," and North's ingenious, and heartbreaking interpolation of the love theme during the fight music for Spartacus and Antoninus, are pinnacles of film scoring as an exploration of human emotions. North could write the most elegant and intellectual music (as in Cleopatra) and he could go directly for the gut, and I have to think he preferred the latter, for all his training and sophistication. Sometimes human emotions ARE hyperbolic and larger than life, and North could tackle those moments and bring them across in purely musical ways. That's what's stayed with me about this score. That doesn't diminish Cleopatra or anything else North did. But to me Spartacus is a masterpiece of emotional film scoring.
Posted: Jul 31, 2010 - 1:26 AM
By: Jeff Bond (Member)
The stereo presentation is terrific and does include a lot of my favorite moments from the score: the opening and the music for Batiatus's caravan; the prelude to the fight between Spartacus and Draba and the heartbreaking aftermath of the fight; the rousing Metapontum triumph and the Vesuvius training sequence; the music for Spartacus's vigil with Verinia on the eve of the final battle and the grinding "formations" prelude to the final battle. Still there's a LOT of music that didn't make the cut in stereo that I love--the gladiator training scenes, the fanfare for Crassus and his house in Rome, the aftermath of the final battle, the love theme for Crassus and Verinia (which I actually like better than the Spartacus love theme) and the music for Spartacus and Antoninus as they wait for death and are forced to fight each other.
I'm only up to the slave revolt in the mono material but some of the biggest, most complicated stuff does seem to struggle to get heard in the mono mix. On the other hand the slave revolt cue sounds spectacular. Without wading too much into the Cleopatra vs. Spartacus debate, I probably prefer Cleopatra as a total listening experience, but I prefer Spartacus as a film and its score's most powerful moments are still devastating to me. Cleopatra as a film aimed at the mind and fell somewhat short; Spartacus aims at the gut and the heart and at least for me, hits more than it misses. I understand why people dislike this film--it's in many ways a Hollywood product and in some ways a comic book. But just as with Spielberg's A.I., I've always found that a great deal of the film's power lies in the way Kubrick's innate impulses struggle against the conventional elements of the movie. Kubrick added a level of cruelty and intelligence that raised the stakes more than a conventional director would have, and for me he legitimizes some of the film's excesses, at least to a degree. Oddly I find Ben-Hur more distancing and cold than Spartacus, maybe because as much as I love both Heston and Douglas, Douglas seems more human, more vulnerable and fallible than Heston in a movie like this.
Spartacus still has some of the most emotionally powerful moments for me in film: the prelude to the Draba fight with Douglas and Woody Strode silently studying each other (a brilliant touch that only Kubrick would have added, focusing on fear and resolve in an intimate, human way instead of giving the audience an expected moment of spectacle); the shadow of oppression moving over each of the gladiators in their cells in the aftermath of the fight; the famed "I'm Spartacus" scene and even the final fight between Douglas and Tony Curtis. The film's ending has always been a tearjerker, moreso when the restoration put back in Verinia's plea to Spartacus to please die and end his suffering on the cross (apparently taboo to the Catholic League of Decency or something on the film's original release). After becoming a father and losing an infant son, that final shot of Verinia holding her infant son up so Spartacus can see him for the final time now effects me in a way I can't even describe. Maybe all of this is sappy and cartoonish from a modern perspective, maybe to some it was sappy and cartoonish then. But it's this emotional punch that North's music conveys most effectively. There's a circus atmosphere to the scenes of the freed slaves that does become overbearing, but it also provides delirious heights like the Vesuvius sequences. In the film the love theme just perhaps wears out its welcome a bit midway through the film in scenes that don't quite come across because they're too studio-bound. But the payoff even for the rather conventional romance is tremendous as the film and score reaches its final stages. North's handling of human anguish, death and loss and hopeless longing, is peerless. The nobility of the "I'm Spartacus!" scene, the fragility of the Crassus/Verinia music (with echoes of the Spartacus love theme haunting it from within) as Crassus woos the gladiator's wife in his house, the beautiful elegy for the slave revolt in "Afraid of Death," and North's ingenious, and heartbreaking interpolation of the love theme during the fight music for Spartacus and Antoninus, are pinnacles of film scoring as an exploration of human emotions. North could write the most elegant and intellectual music (as in Cleopatra) and he could go directly for the gut, and I have to think he preferred the latter, for all his training and sophistication. Sometimes human emotions ARE hyperbolic and larger than life, and North could tackle those moments and bring them across in purely musical ways. That's what's stayed with me about this score. That doesn't diminish Cleopatra or anything else North did. But to me Spartacus is a masterpiece of emotional film scoring.
NO CD = NO SALE
info dla Ciebie Bucholc
: cła nie ma bo Varese się okazało wspaniałomyslne i najwyraźniej na całą EU paczkują cenę 20$ na kopercie..
szacuneczek im za to.. co do wydania - pudełko zbiorcze ma dokładnie taką samą wysokość i długość/głebokość jak box Indiany - jest tylko o 4 cm szersze, bo wchodzi tam do niego dodatkowo pudełko box 3cd (taki jak Cyd np). Także ładnie wchodzi na półkę. Zboorcze opakowanie jest bardzo twarde, laminowane i porządnie zrobione - nie jest to żadna tekturka pokryta=obklejona marną imitacją skóry jak w indianie.. Książka ma twardą okładkę, też laminowana, papier kredowy.. Naprawdę porządne wydanie.


NO CD = NO SALE
- Bucholc Krok
- Jean-Baptiste Lully
- Posty: 17506
- Rejestracja: wt wrz 16, 2008 20:21 pm
- Lokalizacja: Golden Age
- Bucholc Krok
- Jean-Baptiste Lully
- Posty: 17506
- Rejestracja: wt wrz 16, 2008 20:21 pm
- Lokalizacja: Golden Age
- Bucholc Krok
- Jean-Baptiste Lully
- Posty: 17506
- Rejestracja: wt wrz 16, 2008 20:21 pm
- Lokalizacja: Golden Age
płyta pierwsza brzmi genialnie, normalnie jak cyd, a przecież to nie rerecording tylko staroć 50 letni
i kolejne foto boxu:
od lewej - sama góra : pudło zbiorcze , książka w twardej oprawie
od lewej - 2 rząd od góry : pudełko ala El Cid z 4CD (dyski 1-4) , pudełko zwykłe na 2cd (wariacje love theme - dyski 5-6) i zwykłe pudełko z filmem na dvd
płyty : czarne (wariacje 2cd) , biała (dvd) , czerwone (dyski 1-4)
co ciekawe oznaczenie varese club ma tylko pudełko-box z 4cd.. pudełko z wariacjami love theme i z dvd mają numer seryjny jak standardowe edycje varese, choć brzeg mają czarny jak edycje klubowe..


od lewej - sama góra : pudło zbiorcze , książka w twardej oprawie
od lewej - 2 rząd od góry : pudełko ala El Cid z 4CD (dyski 1-4) , pudełko zwykłe na 2cd (wariacje love theme - dyski 5-6) i zwykłe pudełko z filmem na dvd
płyty : czarne (wariacje 2cd) , biała (dvd) , czerwone (dyski 1-4)
co ciekawe oznaczenie varese club ma tylko pudełko-box z 4cd.. pudełko z wariacjami love theme i z dvd mają numer seryjny jak standardowe edycje varese, choć brzeg mają czarny jak edycje klubowe..

NO CD = NO SALE
- Bucholc Krok
- Jean-Baptiste Lully
- Posty: 17506
- Rejestracja: wt wrz 16, 2008 20:21 pm
- Lokalizacja: Golden Age