Ladyhawke Music Lovers Anonymous.

I think that's what movie music SHOULD be like. I like how it dares to take risks, and HUGE risks. Synthesizer can sound god-awful, but taken to the proper extremes (like with Vangelis, Goblin, and Tangerine Dream) it soars! This film made The Alan Parsons Project one of my favorite groups for a while, and listening to "Apollo" and "Tales of Mystery and Imagination" I found to be a similar experience to listening to this movie.

I think the opposite of a lot of people, I think the movie is totally lame, but the MUSIC is EXCELLENT. The only other things worthwhile are all the great cameos by Italian stalwarts like Giancarlo Prete, Venantino Venantini, etc. Hauer is boring, Broderick is annoyingly anachronistic, Ian McKern hams, and Michelle Pfeiffer is not all that. She still leaves a bad taste in my mouth as that unemotional opportunist she played in SCARFACE.

Hello, my name is Allie and I am a lover of the Ladyhawke music.

Ahhh, I feel as though I've come home. *Teehee*

I know! I did a search for it on Amazon (on Vinyl though, not CD), and it was going for like $50-69.99!!
http://www.amazon.com/shops/AYDW214JE6WE6

I was stumbling down the road with the Ladyhawke soundtrack in my mind when I saw the sign LMLA meeting tonight 9pm when curiosity impelled me into this room.

Well my name isGoIndy Blue and I too love this soundtrack. I love just about anything by Alan Parsons and am thrilled they might be getting back together (sans Eric Woofson, sadly.) Great movie, great music.


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Is that a rumor or did you just make that up? -Mom

Hi all. Great to see I'm not alone in liking the music then, thanks! I understand that some don't like it, but I love it. I can't imagine this film with a different score now.

Frank here,

Nothing wrong with the music. It's fine. I'm old enough to have seen this in the movies. I can't speak for the director, but I'm sure the attempt to use a synth based score was probably to buck the trend.

A lot of people forget how much synth was used to score films in the 70s because it was different and crazy. People were generally a lot more experimental back then than they are today. Once George Lucas re-ignited the whole orchestral score for film thing again - I can't find it now but it is documented that using a sweeping orchestral score for a film was considered dated when Lucas did it for Star Wars and in fact that was one of the biggest things in reviving the giant orchestral score for films - most films have gone that route.

It's not the first time that a medieval film tried something different with the score (First Knight anyone?) or that synths and orchestra have been used (no one bitches about the score to Outland but I guess it's OK to have synths and orchestra since it takes place in space.) but for some reason this seems to bother people. I mean, do people bitch about the score to Chariots of Fire this badly? Oh yeah, I forgot, Vangelis did that score and ever since Blade Runner he's been every "born in the 90s but wish more than anything I could have been from the 80s" synth kid's God so whatever he does is ok.

I'm kind of surprised since every music act today seems to be a kid who's not from the 80s, uber-obsessed with the 80s and trying to rip off the music. I mean every song on the radio today sounds like it was made with someone obsessed with my childhood but seen through the lens of someone who wasn't there. You'd think the score from Ladyhawke would be considered cool.

Anyway, the score is not offensive and never sticks out above what's going on on the screen so really if people nitpick the music, then they really couldn't care about the story. Maybe those people should go watch DragonSlayer instead. There's plenty of fantasy films from the early 80s (since that was the big trend back then) that have orchestral scores. Anyone wanting to re-score this with an orchestra just comes off as conformist and very unimaginative to me anyway. Yeah, make this like every single other fantasy film out there.

Anyway, I haven't seen this in years and re-watched it recently. Love the music, love the film, love the story! Rutger Hauer always makes an impressive medieval knight (make sure to see Flesh+Blood if you haven't!) and I love his character. Matthew Broderick, ahh, I can take or leave him. His comments in the film border on inane and he always plays his roles like he has no idea how he ended up in a film. If anything I find him more offensive than the music!

As an aside, LalaLand records just released (Feb 2015!) A 2 cd limited release (3000 copies) of this soundtrack loaded with a bunch of extras like earlier scores and music that wasn't used to I just picked that up and I'm looking forward to digging in deeper into the music when it arrives.

Sorry for the long post. I haven't watched this in a seriously long time and decided to watch it the other night and then came here today to look up trivia about this and saw people complaining endlessly about the score in the comments section. That kind of caught me by surprise since when I watched it the other night my first thought was, "Oh yeah, I forgot about the music to this! Kinda cool that they tried something different than other fantasy films". I felt like it just added to the overall fun and funkiness of this film.

Peace,
Frank


...For every man who has ever lived, in this universe, there shines a star.
-Arthur C. Clarke