I’ll have to admit that when I first bought the soundtrack to Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Rings and listened to it that I had not seen the movie. So when I listened to the LOTR soundtrack I was not impressed (it was good but I really didn’t “feel” anything). However, once I watched the movie and had the visuals in my mind and took another listen to the soundtrack, I was greatly impressed.
My familiarity of Superman Returns comes from the trailers that I’ve seen on the internet. I also had the pleasure of interviewing John Ottman for M&C and found him to be a very likable fellow. I only mention my Lord of the Rings experience to let you know how my appreciation of soundtracks usually grows after seeing the movie.
That said, I very much enjoyed the Superman Returns soundtrack. I felt that Ottman did a great job in the score and only think that my appreciation will grow after I have the visuals from the film to go along with them. The main title uses John Williams’ iconic theme to great effect.
I think the inclusion of Williams’ theme helped my enjoyment of the soundtrack since it felt like I HAD seen the movie in a way, unlike LOTR which was completely original to me. Two tracks that I particularly liked were “Rough Flight” and “So Long Superman.” I can’t wait to see what visuals these tracks go with. I assume that “Rough Flight” has to do with the flight towards the Fortress of Solitude by a certain bald villain (reference in Trailer 2 – see below).
“So Long Superman” “Saving the World” and others make use of choral voices that I found appealing. Ottman mentions in his liner notes that he had his work cut out for him in that he was trying to be new but also be faithful to Williams. I think that he did an admirable job in both his original scoring and in being faithful to Williams.
This CD also contains “enhanced content.” Place the CD in your PC drive and you can see three trailers and a behind the scenes documentary. The first is a teaser trailer methinks and the second is what I believe is the official trailer. The last trailer is for the documentary Look Up in the Sky: the Amazing Story of Superman.
Finally there is a five minute (or so) Behind the Scenes of the Superman Returns Score. It is narrated by Bryan Singer and has appearances by John Ottman, Brandon Routh, conductor Daman Intrabartolo, Don Williams (John William’s brother), and producer Gilbert Adler.
I very much enjoyed the soundtrack and cannot wait to see the movie and only think my admiration for the soundtrack will increase after seeing the movie.
'Superman Returns: Original Motion Picture Score’ is now available for pre-order at Amazon . Visit the soundtrack database for more information. Visit the film’s database for more information about the upcoming movie.
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