INTRADA
Announces:
RAMPAGE
Composed and Conducted by ELMER BERNSTEIN
INTRADA Special Collection Vol. 182
By the 1960s, hit songs like Harry Belafonte’s “Day-O (The Banana Boat Song)” and The Tokens’ “The Lion Sleeps Tonight”—not to mention Henry Mancini’s score for Hatari!—had transformed the exotic from something to be feared and avoided to something that could be comfortably enjoyed in the living room. For the 1963 Warner Bros. adventure Rampage, composer Elmer Bernstein's music follows that lead, quite unlike the emphatic King Kong-style symphonic music that had dominated the previous three decades of jungle adventure scores. The score to Rampage played against audience expectations to negotiate a film with competing agendas and some radical shifts in tone. A film with the title Rampage centering on a jungle hunt and climaxing with a deadly confrontation back in civilization might have inspired an aggressive score—but for a large part of the picture Bernstein’s music remains as laid back and confident as the film's protagonist Harry Stanton.
Bernstein’s expansive score was recorded at the tail end of Warner Bros.’ policy of retaining only monaural masters of its film scores. While the music was originally recorded in three-track stereo, the recordings were folded down to ¼’’ monaural 15 ips tape for archiving. Fortunately, every take of every cue survives, allowing for a complete presentation of the soundtrack.
The film is a dramatic adventure involving a romantic triangle set against a big-game hunt in the Malay jungle. Robert Mitchum plays Harry Stanton, a famed trapper hired by Germany’s Wilhelm Zoo to hunt down the Enchantress, a rare crossbreed of tiger and leopard. Arrogant big-game hunter Otto Abbot (Jack Hawkins), nearing the end of a storied career, accompanies Stanton, as does Abbot’s longtime mistress, Anna (Elsa Martinelli).
INTRADA Special Collection Vol. 182
Retail Price: $19.99
AVAILABLE NOW
For track listing and sound samples, please visit
http://store.intrada.com/s.nl/it.A/id.7185/.f