Legend (Original Soundtrack Recording)

List Price: $16.98
Our Price: $11.22
You Save: $5.76 (34%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $9.98 (click here)
Category: Music CD
See more CD details

CD Details

Music reviews of Legend (Original Soundtrack Recording)

Music Review: Horribly disappointing after all these years.
Rating: 2 Stars

Despite claims that this movie supposedly "didn't do well", according to "America's Top 10" it was the number one hit movie in America for at least a month, but still purists love to claim that this film supposedly "flopped", and that this was supposedly because its soundtrack was tampered with.

I thought to myself, "Hey, the original music must be breathtaking, then. Better than the already-wonderful Tangerine Dream score? WHAT AN ACCOMPLISHMENT!" So I rushed to the store to purchase this CD once I learned it was out, expecting it to be a knockout.

And now...after all these years...THIS is the "glorious score" I've heard so much about???

Instead of a wonderful fantasy atmosphere, I got a "Secret of NIMH" clone (it's all too obvious that Goldsmith composed both soundtracks closely together--they sound virtually identical). While I love studied fairy tale music and "E.T./A.I." style scores, Harry Potter's and the like, this score sounds incidental to the director's cut of the film, completely devoid of any dramatic tension or sense of wonder and actually succeeds in slowing the film down to the point where the director's cut seems to drag in comparison to the American version.

What passages try to go for anything else other than out-of-place cutsiness (and when I say that, I mean "cutesy" in the sense of sounding pretentious and completely unrelated to the material--there's a difference between a score that *is* precious and a score that *acts* precious, if you know what I mean), they instead go for the overblown use-every-instrument-in-the-orchestra-as-loud-as-possible garish approach of Bakshi's horrible soundtrack to his equally horrible version of "The Lord of The Rings".

Simply put, this soundtrack has no subtlety and no heart. It sounds calculated and flat and only seems to pretend to care instead of drawing us into the story. The few good passages are nice, but if you make the mistake of buying this thing just listen to them separately from the movie without thinking about it and you can at least make up for your disappointment.

I can name dozens of gorgeous soundtracks which interest me far better than this one. I was swept away by "The Princess Bride" music, loved "E.T.", adored "A.I.", admired "Ladyhawke" and was heartwarmed by "Dragonheart". Heck, even movies I hated had better and more emotionally moving soundtracks than this one. Call me unfair to Ridley Scott's vision, but I would even prefer to listen to the wanna-be-sweeping-score of the movie "Lost in Space" than this dreck.

An excellent example: in the original American version, the scene in which Lily encounters the unicorn is done in a tense, awe-inspiring, chilling manner that makes excellent use of Tangerine Dream's hypnotic psychedelic music. In sharp contrast, both the way the scene is done in the director's cut and the music that goes with it here is all flat and uninvolving (you get the impression that the unicorn running mindlessly around Lily was merely a fluke instead of the Unicorn being lured by innocence). TD's original music in that scene suggested wonder and incoming heartbreak at the same time, showing how such an innocent heart had no idea that she was doing anything seriously wrong while we in the audience do, so we all held our breath and stared in both relation understanding and fear. Goldsmith's twaddle sounds like it's just pretentiously showing off by comparison. (Actually, Lily herself comes across as having a bit of selfishness and conceit in her in the director's cut, but that's by the by.)

I'd rather hear the original Tangerine Dream disc ANY day, and it really angers me that this new disc is apparently meant to make the TD soundtrack CD out of print here. Whatever happened to buyer's choice?

Get the other one. It's emotional stirring, hypnotic, genuinely uncommercial and fits the mood of the film far better than this one. I usually disagree when a studio selects new music over the director's choice, but in this case... sorry, I have to say that Universal made the correct decision all the way.

Description of Legend (Original Soundtrack Recording)

Pop CDs

• Music > Styles
• Soundtracks