"Lost" Music from Outer Limits "The Borderland" Composed by Dominic Frontiere

As a retired sound editor, I got to work once with Dominic Frontiere, and always respected his film music, especially OUTER LIMITS and THE INVADERS. I had heard about a legendary cue he wrote for "The Borderland" episode of OUTER LIMITS--I worked at 20th Century Fox just steps away from the scoring stage, and had become friends with many of the musicians, who still marveled at this cue TWENTY YEARS LATER!!!! But, as is so often the case, some brilliant music got completely buried under the sound effects and dialogue, and you can barely hear a note of this wonderful cue. So what does a good retired sound editor do? He re-mixes the scene, of course, and restores the music! (I own neither the audio or video--I'm just presenting it here for educational purposed.)

I suspect the music was "buried" in the original mix due to the extreme dynamic range and requirements for the scene. Remember, this was 1964 and broadcast television had strict standards for audio transmission, and everything had to be "squashed" for network broadcast. And it could also be the picture was re-edited just before dubbing and the producers decided the music no longer fit exactly and was "overkill." Or it's entirely possible that ABC said the scene was too frightening with the music, and to take it out! (This happens!) All I did was some relatively small edits to get the extant music track to line up correctly (I eliminated the subplot of the fake mediums and the "laughing mouths" opticals) but otherwise the original audio mix is there intact--with the music mixed over it.

The cue itself is both deceptively simple and yet quite a challenge. How do you sustain an instrumental AND an emotional crescendo for 4.5 minutes?? Especially with a 28 piece orchestra and a tight budget? The music starts when the huge circuit breakers are pulled. Frontiere establishes a C natural pedal point in the basses, and then starts layering in block chords on top of that. Essentially the orchestra walks up the scale, using triad and 7th chords and many other odd harmonies. But the end result is brilliant! A low C octave, and then a C# chord, a D chord, a D# chord, an E chord, an F chord, an F# chord, etc.

Frontiere clearly thought that the scene warranted such intense scoring. It is established earlier that the electromagnetic "doorway" to a 4th dimension could also be the gateway to the afterlife. Frontiere provides a huge orchestral "sting" at the first visual of what Ian Frasier actually sees--a barren landscape of--another planet? Earth in an earlier time? Or Hell?? And later his visual is of sweeping clouds--Heaven? The music backs down a bit and becomes more positive as Eva Frasier tries to save her husband's life, but the crescendo starts again as Ian spins more and more out of control.

Having worked with Frontiere, I'm sure he would approve of my remix!