The Big Gundown: Ennio Morricone Returns From Illness
“Unwatchable, extremely disturbing, and often literally nauseous” was how TV guide discussed one of the most controversial films of all time. However, amid of the disgust and anger, the soundtrack is often overlooked. The opening of Salò or the 120 Days of Sodom is scored in a sweet, almost parochial manner. Despite this, the images that follow explore the depravity of man and have become an infamous indictment of cinema’s ability to shake and disgust. For those first three minutes, however, the audience is lulled by the clandestine innocence of Ennio Morricone’s score.
The composer creates a floating cloud of European nostalgia, a homesick and wistful sound which lays a foundation for Pasolini’s corrupt retelling of the fascist libertines cavorting through every sin imaginable.
Confidently perverted and proudly sadistic, the film is encouraged and embellished by the score. With the first few minutes being so evocative and reminiscent, Morricone demonstrates his position as cinema’s greatest enabler. It is his ability to elicit entirely the opposite emotions from the audience which permits the images to be so depraved and indulgent.
However, this is not unfamiliar territory for the Italian composer. He balances Terrance Mallick’s lingering pastoral shots of past times with a sinking melancholy in Days of Heaven. He jolts the quiet terror of The Thing to life with jagged and jarring electronica.
Between arctic synths and corn ear strings, Morricone enables a wide portfolio of directors to humour themselves. It is no coincidence that so many filmmakers have managed to shoot their signature flicks when back dropped by one of the Ennio’s creations.
With such as huge catalogue of compositions, audiences could be forgiven for assuming that the Roman would sit up in an airy loft, with an ink stained piano and piles of mangled manuscripts. Instead, Morricone is an enthusiastic performer. To see him at the head of an orchestra is an entirely alternate way in which to enjoy his work.
Without the moving images and or the album artwork, which one would normally associate with many of his creations, his role as the conductor drives his orchestra forward and creates a new world in which his music is finally allowed to break free of the confines of the cinema. Unleashed, Ennio Morricone is allowed to direct his own music; he becomes his own enabler and as such, even the most familiar of his music becomes entirely new.
Unfortunately, these days Morricone has been side lined with health concerns, forcing the cancellation of several concerts. For a man born before the advent of Technicolour, and one who has held so much sway over the way cinema has sounded, his return to the stage is incredibly welcome.
For a man whose most familiar scores are filled with bombast and scale, the delicacy and the frailty of the full body of his work is often only apparent when he is charged with his own creations. To witness the big gun-down in all its glory, visit the O2 arena on the 5th of February.
This post was categorised in Archive.