Tron Legacy

[Mrbloodworth]

Re-read what I wrote. None of those songs was instantly connectable until the movies themselves became iconic. Either you missed that point or you be trollin'

I'm not defending Daft Punk or their score, I actually kind of agree with you on the fact that it's not going to be memorable. The reason it's not going to be memorable is because the movie will probably not stand the test of time the way every one of those movies you named did.

I believe thats part of the criteria of the awards.

BW is arguing that tron was an awful soundtrack because it didn't have a memorable theme, yet most of the tracks which won best original song came from soundtracks that were utterly dire.

I did not say awful. The entire score was kind of "there".

[K9]

Yeah, but then you said it was trounced by the Spice World soundtrack 

[Mrbloodworth]

Yeah, but then you said it was trounced by the Spice World soundtrack 

Wasn't it? 

[DraconianOne]

I will maintain my point that there is a significant and important difference between a great soundtrack and a great (theme) song. BW is arguing that tron was an awful soundtrack because it didn't have a memorable theme, yet most of the tracks which won best original song came from soundtracks that were utterly dire.

I also disagree with you about CTHD vs Gladiator, but that's really just a matter of taste.

Taste? What's taste got to do with it? You can't bring "matter of taste" into this debate - this is F13!  

[Mrbloodworth]

Who needs taste when you have awards shows.

[Furiously]

How can you have ignored queen's highlander and Flash Gordon soundtracks?

[stu]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d2yD4yDsiP4

 

[Samwise]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d2yD4yDsiP4

 

Oh man, thanks for quoting that.  I'd entirely missed it in the midst of that last page or two of hurf blurf. 

Thread redeemed.

[Sand]

Yeah, but then you said it was trounced by the Spice World soundtrack  

It was.  

[Surlyboi]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d2yD4yDsiP4

 

Oh man, thanks for quoting that.  I'd entirely missed it in the midst of that last page or two of hurf blurf. 

Thread redeemed.

I contribute when I can...

[Khaldun]

Re-read what I wrote. None of those songs was instantly connectable until the movies themselves became iconic. Either you missed that point or you be trollin'

I'm not defending Daft Punk or their score, I actually kind of agree with you on the fact that it's not going to be memorable. The reason it's not going to be memorable is because the movie will probably not stand the test of time the way every one of those movies you named did.

If for some reason Tron: Legacy becomes iconic as a film, I believe that some of the tracks will be instantly recognizable as that process takes hold. So I agree with Surlyboi. The Star Wars theme becomes memorable when you've seen the film 15 times in the summer of 1977, because how could it not be memorable? The really rare thing is that film which you have seen repeatedly has a score so forgettable that it doesn't stick with you.

There are other logics by which you might award something--some idea of intrinsic originality and craftsmanship, for example. But by that measure, most film scores wouldn't really qualify, or we'd only be awarding more obscure films. If the criteria is "powerful accompaniment to and match with a film, a score which is memorable as the film become memorable", the Tron score is at least equal to the films nominated for this year. And equal, I think, to recent nominations--that list of the last six years is a pretty serious kick in the crotch to the Bloodworth "It has to be instantly iconic!" theory of nominations.

[Typhon]

I only saw Star Wars once in 1976 and the theme and the bar music were instantly memorable to me.

I would put the Indiana Jones music in the same category.  Probably "over the rainbow" as well, but not in a good way.  "Live and Let Die" is more of a case of a great tune making a under-performing bond flick memorable (and I love Bond). 

I'd say Goldfinger probably proves the point that you are trying to make.  It is a crappy song, but it's instantly memorable anyway and you (me) end up liking it because the film is so good... wait, that's not your point.

Ok, I'm lost, I just wanted to say you were wrong about the Star Wars theme (and Indian Jones).

[Ironwood]

Die Another Day was the worst Bond theme ever.

I know, this has nothng to do with nothing, but hey, it's me.

[ghost]

This is largely a chicken/egg argument.  Was the music iconic because of the film or did it contribute to the overall iconic nature.  Regardless, shit music is shit music, regardless of how recognizable it is. 

[K9]

Ride of the Valkyries was iconic well before Apocalypse now, although it was appropriately paired with that film.

With respect to scores, I'm not sure.

[Khaldun]

Neckbeards like me sometimes talk about paratext, basically meaning that we all end up knowing a lot about commercially-produced culture we haven't seen or read because we get all sorts of incidental, ubiquitious exposure to it through other media. If you were a kid or a teen in 1977 when Star Wars came out and you somehow managed to never see it, you would nevertheless have to live in a cave not to "know" it through paratext. You'd still almost certainly know when you saw his picture who Darth Vader was and what his name was: think of the thousands of editorial cartoons he's been in, the Halloween costumes you'd have seen at your door, the posters, the ads on TV, the critics reviewing the film, the times that someone was compared to Darth Vader in the newspaper, and so on. You wouldn't know about his real name or the scene where he chokes a guy or that he looked like Humpty Dumpty when his helmet came off, but you'd know the picture and the name and something of what he "meant" without ever seeing the film.

The music is like that as well: it's been fucking everywhere. The Indiana Jones theme is another one: it's been used in trailers for other films on occasion (so has Zimmer's Pirates of the Caribbean score), it's often used as a musical flourish for little satiric or amusing bits on local evening news, it pops up in all sorts of small paratextual places. Now I'm not saying that's got nothing to do with the music itself: Williams genuinely writes memorable riffs and bits, no matter what classical pieces he's ransacked to find them. He's a great remixer in an age of cultural remixing, and by such means, achieves lasting originality. But the thing is, some of the things we all remember, including music, we remember in a way whether we've seen the film or not, because they're repeated constantly across a broad cultural space. You couldn't not know them, really. That's what "iconic" is: it's not instant greatness. You can see a film that totally blows you away with its greatness and find ten years later that it's not at all iconic, because even if everyone thought it was great, they don't constantly repeat or reprise anything about it in the rest of the culture.

[shiznitz]

If for some reason Tron: Legacy becomes iconic as a film

We already know it won't.  The movie left theaters and people's minds the same day.  I am talking about real people, not us.  We do not define iconic.  This argument is message board masturbation.  I expect there would be very little disagreement about what movies in the last 20 years are iconic if you polled random people in the street who are old enough to know the movies.

[DraconianOne]

There are other logics by which you might award something--some idea of intrinsic originality and craftsmanship, for example. But by that measure, most film scores wouldn't really qualify, or we'd only be awarding more obscure films. If the criteria is "powerful accompaniment to and match with a film, a score which is memorable as the film become memorable", the Tron score is at least equal to the films nominated for this year. And equal, I think, to recent nominations--that list of the last six years is a pretty serious kick in the crotch to the Bloodworth "It has to be instantly iconic!" theory of nominations.

The nearest thing to guidelines for an original score are: "The work’s eligibility shall be evaluated on its effectiveness, craftsmanship, creative substance and relevance to the dramatic whole."

This year, there were 77 scores that were eligible for in the Best Original Score soundtrack. That doesn't include Black Swan, True Grit, The Fighter, The Kids Are Alright, Toy Story 3 or Tangled (first 4 were disqualified, latter 2 weren't entered). Of those 77, only 5 maximum can get nominated. Tron's soundtrack may have been the 6th and lost out on a nomination by half a point (votings based on an average point system). The difference is between whether the voters were like Bloodworth or like Khaldun.

[ghost]

To be fair to the nominations, I haven't heard any of them.  They may be truly better than Tron Legacy's soundtrack, but I was quite impressed with the music that Daft Punk put together.  You're right though, if the folks that picked think it didn't deserve the nomination, then it didn't deserve it. 

[Slyfeind]

Well, there aren't very strong themes to the music. It's like the music from Dark Knight. They composed it specifically so it didn't have a melody. There's four notes that play when Batman is on the BatBike, but that's it. Four notes.

Tron Legacy, there's the tune that plays during the light cycle match, when the lightcycles group up and turn around in formation. And...that's it. Even the club fight, which you'd think would have a strong theme, is just a backbeat. There's literally no melody. They go nn-tse nn-tse nn-tse for a few minutes.

[01101010]

Well, there aren't very strong themes to the music. It's like the music from Dark Knight. They composed it specifically so it didn't have a melody. There's four notes that play when Batman is on the BatBike, but that's it. Four notes.

Tron Legacy, there's the tune that plays during the light cycle match, when the lightcycles group up and turn around in formation. And...that's it. Even the club fight, which you'd think would have a strong theme, is just a backbeat. There's literally no melody. They go nn-tse nn-tse nn-tse for a few minutes.

The opening music in the Dark Knight right before the bank heist is pretty iconic if you liked the Dark Knight. Good points though.

[Riggswolfe]

Well, there aren't very strong themes to the music. It's like the music from Dark Knight. They composed it specifically so it didn't have a melody. There's four notes that play when Batman is on the BatBike, but that's it. Four notes.

Tron Legacy, there's the tune that plays during the light cycle match, when the lightcycles group up and turn around in formation. And...that's it. Even the club fight, which you'd think would have a strong theme, is just a backbeat. There's literally no melody. They go nn-tse nn-tse nn-tse for a few minutes.

This is quite true. To go back to Star Wars, you could walk out of a theater humming that music because it has a strong melody. With Tron Legacy you might sort of be slapping your thigh to the beat as you walked out but it doesn't have the same oomph that other orchestral scores have. I liked it but can totally see why it got skipped by the Academy. Though, really, the Academy Awards are bullshit anyway so why does anyone care?

[Mattemeo]

Tron Legacy, there's the tune that plays during the light cycle match, when the lightcycles group up and turn around in formation. And...that's it. Even the club fight, which you'd think would have a strong theme, is just a backbeat. There's literally no melody. They go nn-tse nn-tse nn-tse for a few minutes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0FwEmUycYI

If you don't think this is strongly thematic, your fucking ears are wrong. I'm sorry. The main theme is a recurring leitmotif throughout the movie. Deftly picking heavy techno action scenes to make your point is misleading and disingenuous.

[Slyfeind]

What "main theme"? That sounds like a bunch of random notes. There are much stronger themes in the heavy action scenes I cited than there are in that dudududududududududududududududu you linked to.

NOTE THAT I AM NOT SAYING IT IS BAD AND IN FACT IF I COULD MAKE MANBABIES WITH DAFT PUNK I WOULD.

[Surlyboi]

Look at what won best score last night. The Social Network. Elevator music for the angsty.

[Slyfeind]

 

Someone needs to make a Tron grid ffffuuuu guy....

 

[Trippy]

I actually think it's pretty cool that Trent Reznor won. He's come a long way from writing the music for Quake

[Merusk]

He's also got tons of connections after years of working the Hollywood scene.

[Chimpy]

Just to make a comment to the little slapfight:

Soundtrack (the CD everyone is buying) and Score (the background music for the entire film) are not the same thing. Some times the soundtrack album you buy does contain large parts of the score, but most times not.

There are 2 oscar categories: Best Song (single song, usually the iconic Celine Dion Titanic crap) and Best Score (the traditionally classical stuff that plays to enhance and emphasize action on screen).

Everyone seems to be talking about iconic songs while comparing that to an entire score.

That being said, I agree with Ironwood about that piece of shit Madonna Bond theme.

[01101010]

I actually think it's pretty cool that Trent Reznor won. He's come a long way from writing the music for Quake

I was shocked to see his Oscar photo. I mean wtf happened to this sell out?!?  I still remember his first PHM tour I saw the show in Cleveland and he had punked hair and was in a fucking cage spitting on us. *sigh* Life was so much different then 

[Mattemeo]

I was shocked to see his Oscar photo. I mean wtf happened to this sell out?!?  I still remember his first PHM tour I saw the show in Cleveland and he had punked hair and was in a fucking cage spitting on us. *sigh* Life was so much different then 

1: He's not gigging. Not gigging = Trent gets chubby
2: He's happily married. Happily married = Trent gets chubby

He was bullnecked and brawny a couple of years ago when I saw NIN's last gig in the UK.

[taleril]

Shamelessly stolen from reddit.

[Surlyboi]

Fucking brilliant.

[Slyfeind]

http://www.traileraddict.com/trailer/tron-3/teaser-trailer

Being described as a "teaser trailer" but it's really a viral featurette like the ones leading up to Legacy. Interesting to see what's become of RAM....

[01101010]

Shamelessly stolen from reddit.

That makes me feel conflicted considering I saw him on the first tour after PHM was released, and then again when Downward came out. Amazed that man is standing there in a tux receiving an Oscar so good on him, but really wonder what his younger self would think of it all.