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In
1983, one decade after
The Enforcer,
Clint Eastwood decided to revisit Harry Callaham – the San
Francisco police detective nicknamed Dirty Harry. So in
Sudden Impact we meet again the tough officer, this time older and
having to figh not psychos, death squads or
terrorists, but a young lady who is murdering one by one the
men that raped her years ago. The big differential here is
that Eastwood made his directorial debut in the series, and
the newly star/director called back the veteran composer
Lalo Schifrin
to write the original score.
For the former film Jerry Fielding wrote an interesting score, but Eastwood did notice that the composer
didn't manage to create the musical
mood typical of the series. For this reason the Argentinian once more took
over the duties exercised with excellence in
Dirty
Harry and Magnum
Force. This work, previously released properly only in
vynil, arrives to CD in an another album from Schifrin's
Aleph catalogue, which already had included a Dirty Harry
soundtrack anthology and the complete scores from the first
three movies.
The Dirty Harry scores, like the own movies, were gradually
becoming weaker. Schifrin is a musician that, in this kind
of urban cop film, always blended jazz with contemporary
pop rhythms, and in the particular case of Sudden
Impact this method caused
some serious damage because the '80s groove quickly became
dated. A fine example of this problem already arrives at the
initial track, "Main Title", a mix of dance music,
slap bass and scratch effects used
ad nauseam
by every DJ since then, while in the background we hear some
radio police chat. An indigest combination, which
fortunately is not repeated throughout the score. From there,
Schifrin shows why is a distinguished composer, adding
creative orchestral colors and even making reference to
themes that he created for the previous films, even if so in
a discreet way (for instance the melancholic Harry's theme
receives an exquisite development with Ernie Watt's tenor
sax in "San Francisco After Dark").
Compared with his music for
Dirty
Harry or
Magnum Force, here Lalo expanded the use of orchestra,
creating more symphonic and acoustic pieces emphasizing
woodwinds, horns and a large string section. But to save the
series musical mood, eventually we'll listen the rhythmic
percussion and the fender bass that is a kind of trademark
instrument for Harry.
When the cop takes some forced vacations we follow his trip
with the more than adequate "The Road to San Paolo",
where the trumpet assumes the front position of the
orchestra. Agitated tracks like "Cocktails of Fire" and "Robbery Suspect"
remember the
jazz/pop/orchestra that made the composer's reputation,
while others like "Remembering Terror" and "Unicorn's Head" blending carnival music, orchestral suspense and even rock
music, may even surprise some listeners. Also, Schifrin
creates an interesting theme for the murderer evoking the innocence lost with her rape, which contrasts
with the harsh, dissonant strings that recreate the brutal
murders perpetrated by her.
By all means this is a typical action score from Schifrin,
made in a time when the music wasn't ashamed to sound
sometimes exaggerated – today we listen music during every
second of a movie, but rarely something manages to
catch our attention. Sadly, unlike the previous releases of
the label, this one (which as usual features extensive and
detailed notes from Nick Redman) can't be considered as a
complete soundtrack album. Even containing all source music
and even a bonus track (an alternative
version of "Main
Titles"
with slight orchestration changes and the addition of a
wah wah guitar), the disc misses "This Side of
Forever", the same melody of "San Francisco After Dark" sung
by Aretha Franklin - this is the song that we listen at film's
end credits. However really odd is the omission of the
first (and better) half of "A Ray of Light", which is
available in integral form at the
Dirty Harry Anthology CD. The omission of this segment
in a song that originally is already short (it lasts just
over two minutes) can only have been caused by a mistake in
the track's editing. Even so this is a highly recommended
release for all action score fans. |
