John Scott: King Kong Lives (1986) / Munich Symphony Orchestra

ABOUT THE SCORE: For the much-maligned 1986 sequel to the Dino DeLaurentiis-produced '76 remake, John Scott had impressed the filmmakers with a previous primate-themed effort, 1984's "Greystoke", and found himself commissioned to pen one of the most immense, operatic scores of his career to that point - a towering achievement amidst an otherwise dire and ill-advised production. Indeed Scott's music here is quintessentially bombastic "monster movie music" of the most gloriously unsubtle kind, though it also lends the film a false (if much needed) sense of heart and ethos as Kong searches for, and eventually finds, a female companion (cringes) while marauding about the North Carolina countryside, evading and eventually facing off against an evil army colonel.

The film's director insisted on a singular theme for the film devised of only four notes, but Scott is the type of composer to turn arbitrary handicaps like this into a means by which creative modulation and melodic distinction rise to the fore. His central theme for the titular great ape, intoned immediately at the onset of this suite on spacious horns, casts the famed monster not as a villainous beast but rather a big-hearted gentle giant. This theme is allowed a dark minor-key variation for moments of destruction and mayhem, which are not infrequent in a film of this sort; elsewhere a secondary motif for the evil military presence avails itself before the great ape's family is returned to their native Borneo in the end, allowing the composer to write stunning resolution music so good unto itself that it almost feels like parody against the trite visuals. The score is not as thematically varied as the composer's work tends to beggar per the director's briefing, but the sheer massiveness and enthusiasm of the Munich Symphony's (credited in the film under its older Graunke Symphony moniker) playing is truly commendable, and the winning theme is quintessential adventure music of the highest order. George Korngold, the son of original 1933 King Kong composer Wolfgang Korngold, supervised the 1986 recording at Bavaria Music Studios under engineer Peter Kramper.

This one's a real barnstormer of a score - but one with heart and ethos the accompanying film surely didn't warrant. Glorious music all around!

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