CD Review: War of the Worlds

In their billionth collaboration, John Williams composed the music for Steve Spielberg's latest movie, War of the Worlds, and for better or worst, it's nothing like you've heard before from Williams.

For one thing, there is no main theme, hardly any new thematic material at all. There are no hallmark sentimental/lighthearted/heroic themes found in most of Williams' scores for Spielberg. Instead, most of the music is very abstract and atmospheric. In fact, all of the music (at least on this soundtrack) is very dissonant, mournful, and tense. Even the optimistic sounding horns in the Reunion soon succumb to the reserved and tragic sounding Epilogue. Making this one of Williams' darkest score to date.

Not to mention his most modern. Here, he has strayed from most, if not all, of his traditional formulas. Like my remarks on Episode 3, Williams takes the path less traveled with creating complex orchestra sounds to create fear and panic instead of just throwing together a theme that could create the same effect.

Williams is also very inventive with his orchestrations. Instead of using a theremin, he uses a choir ( or is it the string section?) to sustain this very high pitch sound that can be heard at the end of The Intersection Scene and the beginning of Confrontation of Ogilvy. I really enjoyed his use of brass, the somber horns at the end of Reaching the Country and Epilogue. The Ferry Scene is the stand out action piece, while Escape from the City sounds more like typical Prequel action music. There are a few tracks that have more of a traditional Williams feel to it, like Attack on the Car, and the brass build up in Return to Boston. The dissonant horns towards the end of Reaching the Country remind me of Boba Fett's Departure.

My only real problem with the soundtrack is the narration. You see, the point of buying a soundtrack is to hear the music that everyone's talking over in the movie, so having someone talk over it in the album defeats the purpose of buying it, doesn't it? Luckily, the narration is only two tracks, and the voiceover for the Prologue works well with the music, thanks to Morgan Freeman's smooth voice, but I don't like it during the Reunion, when after an hour of music, Freeman pops up again and ruins the mood, not to mention the end of the movie.

This score sounds like a mix between Minority Report and Episode 3. It's one of the best examples of Williams' "modern" style and like most of his modern works, rewards repeat listenings. At first, I'd have given this score a B tops, but every time I listen to it I find more that I like about it. B+

Favorite Tracks:
2.The Ferry Scene
3. Reaching the Country
4. Intersection Scene
10. Separation of Family
11. Confrontation with Ogilvy
12. Return to Boston
15. Epilogue