Monday, November 30, 2009

Return of the Secaucus 7 (1979)

6 comments:

mikeovswinton said...

Was that the one with all the killer soul tracks on the OST? Or am I thinking of another film that ripped the plot of this one off?

Imposs1904 said...

This one doesn't have the killer soul tracks, and Lawrence Kasdan will have you believe that he hadn't seen or heard of Sayles's film before making The Big Chill.

Who's to know?

mikeovswinton said...

That's it. The Big Chill. Percy Sledge, Wicked Wilson Pickett, etc etc. Sod the film, listen to the music. Incidentally, the world's greatest film ever - the original Taking of Pelham 1,2,3 which I believe got a staggering 27.5 thumbs up - had a superb jazz soundtrack (I have it on vinyl). You can therefore watch the film once with your eyes open, and then again with your eyes shut and get just as much enjoyment. Thanks to the wonders of capitalism and DVD, I've done so.

Imposs1904 said...

Big Chill's actually on Netflix Instant. I might check it out. It has been years since I've seen it and I'm sure I enjoyed it first time round.

The original Pelham film? Great film but I can't remember the soundtrack. They filmed parts of the remake around our way.

mikeovswinton said...

The soundtrack was by David Shire. For years I thought it was Lalo Shifrin. According to the blurb on Amazon, where you can now get it on CD, Shire wanted a funk sound that wasn't light. So he used Schoenbergian 12 tone composition theory. This raises the interesting question; is this film music/jazz that Theodor Adorno might have approved of - in theory, of course. Probably too funky for the old man anyway. One of the reviews of the remake of Pelham said that if you liked the original you'd want to kill yourself if saw the remake. So I didn't - got the original DVD instead. Can't see John Travolta as filling the shoes of Robert Shaw. He (Shaw not Travolta) came from near Bolton and wrote a cracking novel about Red Vicar Conrad Noel. Well worth a read.

mikeovswinton said...

Just put David Shire Taking of Pelham 123 into your local youtube and check the one done by Zerokomma. Excllent.