“Titane”
When a movie bleeds abandon and throws every ounce of the director’s crazy on screen for as long as the crazy is sustainable, the soundtrack risks superfluity. Jim Williams did not come to “Titane” to make superfluous work. A film about a part-time showgirl and full-time serial killer with a literal Cadillac for a baby daddy, “Titane” revs into fifth gear from the opening sequence and stays there for around forty five minutes; Julia Ducournau takes a bold step by putting the most transgressive and shocking material up front before gradually narrowing her movie’s emotional scale into an intimate, poignant register. Williams has the difficult job of matching her balls. Making his own interpretation of Handel’s “Sarabande,” as common an aural motif in film as any, is probably the ballsiest move he could’ve made, except his interpretation is layered with grinding industrial chords, dreamy organs, and a wailing chorus of the damned. It’s a disturbing take on a classic, and that’s just one song off of the soundtrack. Consider this: Williams’ work doesn’t get less unsettling from there. – AC
“Bo Burnham: Inside”
As Wario is to Mario, so is Bo Burnham to Weird Al Yankovic. This is not a hard reach to make; in his new comedy special-cum-one-man-show-cum-avant-garde-pandemic cinema, the Hamilton, Massachusetts YouTube star references Yankovic himself, early and directly, as if to kneecap critics ready and eager to make the comparison in their yet-to-be-written reviews. But, counterpoint: So what? It’s a proper analogy, best expressed in the movie’s darkest track, “Welcome to the Internet,” a tune fit for a seedy carnival fairground that houses humanity’s darkest impulses; scroll through galleries of disgusting neoplasms, tumble down a violent right-wing extremist rabbit hole, and bookmark that homemade granola recipe you happened upon before you’re done. Maybe it’s unsurprising that Burnham, born at the younger end of the millennial generation, understands how the Internet functions with grim, intimate familiarity; that’s his cultural hub, and “Inside” is his attempt at breaking that hub down to its component parts. The result is scarier than most horror movies you’ll see in 2021, and infinitely more heartbreaking than almost anything else thanks to his clever, inventive songwriting. – AC
“The Harder They Fall”
Barrington Levy. Koffee. Lauryn Hill. Alice Smith. CeeLo Green. Fatoumata Diawara. Kid Cudi. Jay-Z. Put all these names together on a movie’s soundtrack, buttress their contributions with tracks written by the director, then weave each song into the script, literally, with music notes, and presto: You have hot fire on your hands. Hot fire is what we should expect from Jeymes Samuel, of course, as both an accomplished singer, songwriter, and producer, fluent in genres ranging from R&B to pop to alt-rock, and as the brother of Seal. No roses are kissed on “The Harder They Fall’s” soundtrack, but Samuel, simpatico with his collaborators, inserts one banger after another in his revisionist take on the American Western, where Nat Love, Rufus Buck, Stagecoach Mary, Bass Reeves, Cherokee Bill, and other Black cowboys, lawmen, and lawbreakers collide over the muscular sounds of drum, bass, and verse. – AC
“The Last Duel”
Sixteen years after the fact, “Kingdom of Heaven” composer Harry Gregson-Williams and Ridley Scott have reunited for Scott’s best film in an age, “The Last Duel.” Coincidence? Possibly. Probably. It’s not like Scott hasn’t made any good films in the last decade and a half. But “Kingdom of Heaven” is a standout in a standout career, and Gregson-Williams’ score is one driver among many behind its success, so there’s a degree of kismet to “The Last Duel’s” artistic success given his involvement. In shallow terms, the scores feel of a piece through an emphasis on religious period influences, but “The Last Duel” rings with a foreboding, ancient evocation of worship; choral arrangements in particular dominate, which winds up having the very unexpected effect of feeling Greek. Chalk it up to both the subject matter and Scott’s tri-perspective presentation.. – AC
“Licorice Pizza”
“You gave me something, I understand. You gave me lovin’ in the palm of my hand.” “Boogie Nights” is justifiably heralded as having one of the finest throwback soundtracks of all time. Returning to his sun-drenched, valley boy roots, Paul Thomas Anderson could have gone for broke a second time (especially considering his film is named after a literal record store forgotten by the past, waves at Neil Young, and “American Graffiti” was a primary influence) but most of “Licorice Pizza’s” needle drops are less immediately recognizable radio smashes than they are chill fuckin’ deep cuts. Settling into a laxed groove post-“Inherent Vice,” (which often similarly refrained from excessively using on the nose, billboard chart singles) the soundtrack to Alana and Gary Valentine’s possibly, inevitably doomed, pinball romance is like a stoner mixed-tape you pop in when lighting a joint for a leisurely cruise along the L.A. River (if you’ve got gas in your car). Paul McCartney/The Wings “Let Me Roll It” doesn’t feel like a creative decision PTA had to make, it’s as if the song was the only right choice, plucked straight out of an intimate, personal history, meaning, and pavement intertwined. Love doesn’t always last but the lyrics that play our juvenile heartstrings sure do. – Andrew Bundy