Customer Reviews

Cinema Paradiso: Original Soundtrack Recording (1989 Film)

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I recently got a copy of Ennio Morricone's score for Cinema Paradiso. However, I was a bit reluctant about getting it, as I had listened to some sample tracks and thought it was very boring fluff. Yet being normally curious, I came here and was surprised to find people commenting on it with phrases like "masterpiece!", "most beautiful and incredible music I've ever heard" or "internationally beloved." I was surprised as none of these words popped into my head when I listened to the few snippets that I heard. But you don't read such stunning, positive reviews everyday.

At first, I had to force myself to listen all the way through. Yes, it was very melodic and orchestrated very well, but I just kept thinking how it seemed like stuff I'd heard a thousand times before. Then as I payed more attention to it, it hit me. Joe Hisaishi! It sounded almost exactly like the hyptonic melodies (the utterly simple and attractive melodies only great composers can write) of Joe Hisaishi (Princess Mononoke, My Neighbor Totoro, Nausicaa). Who would have thought? An Italian and a Japanese composer having very similar styles. Though Ennio Morricone is known for a lot more stuff than this film--most famous is his scores for the Sergio Leone spaghetti westerns--for this particular score, he eerily matches Joe Hisaishi in thought and form, especially in comparison to the score for My Neighbor Totoro. The two films have similar attitudes as well. Cinema Paradiso is about a little boy who grows up loving movies and My Neighbor Totoro is about two little girls who grow up knowing about magical monsters in a forest. They both have very happy as well as achingly sad moments, and the musical demands are very similar as a result.

I think the reason Morricone's score didn't catch my ears at first listen was the fact that it doesn't use any synthetic instruments. Joe Hisaishi uses a lot of it for My Neighbor Totoro--the melodies come through a lot more memorabley as a result. I also have the symphonic version of the Totoro score, but I find it loses a lot of personality in this form. Maybe it's something about these simple melodies that takes a bit to listen for it. It really will glide over your senses if you're not receptive to it on the first listen, and the synthetic instruments was this ear-catcher for Totoro, however, the recording for Cinema Paradiso is more subtle.

I seem to have this problem a lot. I've had this experience more than once--listening to a piece of music that I didn't really care for on first listen, then over time, if I keep hearing it, I keep hearing more and more that I like. Most of the music that are my favorites are this type of music. Stuff I didn't like on first listen yet eventually realized is better than all those other readily-liked tunes. There's a certain amount of thought and receptiveness you have to bring to a great piece of music. Most pop tunes are composed so that you'll like it even with your brain turned off.

A great piece of music to have in your collection. You won't regret it. (oh, and check out some of Joe Hisaishi's works as well)

The soundtrack of Cinema Paradiso was practically a co-star in the wonderful film. Listening to the music brings back every frame of the film. I believe it is essential to own the soundtrack. There are times when I am viewing my video of the film, and I just want to enjoy the music. With this CD, I can do that. It is incredibly beautiful, unique, uplifting and heart-breaking music by the genius Ennio Morricone.

Ennio Morricone touches everyone's soul with this beautiful music he composed to go with the masterpiece of Italian director, Giuseppe Tornatore, Cinema Paradiso.

The music goes with the story perfectly as a result of the scheme Tornatore and Morricone follow with the soundtracks to Tornatore's movies: the composer becomes involved very early in the process, almost as the script is being taken into the screenplay process, so as to make the music of the movie an integral component of it. And Cinema Paradiso is no exception to this: you can almost follow the story throughout the soundtrack... The love, the sadness, the desperation. It's one of those musical pieces that will last forever.

The genius of the film "Cinema Paradiso" is that its images are gritty looking with beuatiful realism that contrast with Cinema Paradiso's beautiful music. The film's images are like the father, they show you the reality of life's harshness, trying to teach you about its many lessons. The melodies on the other hand are like the beauty of a wise and tender mother. It's sooths the audience making them feel that it is ok to cry, it is ok to laugh, it is ok to ache for love, it is ok to feel the depths of human emotion. I come from a small town in the state of Zacatecas Mexico that reminds me a lot of Toto's town Giancaldo and the film like it's music remind me of my fortune to have come from such a small, itimate and beautiful place like Giancaldo also, Juchipila.

This is one of the most beautiful, if not the most beautiful soundtrack I've ever heard. It made me want to be a filmmaker. The movie wouldn't have been half of what it was without this music. It is so nostalgic, it brings me back to when I first saw the movie. I had the CD years ago, someone accidentally threw it away, and after years, I still remember and miss it enough to come look for it again!

'Cinema paradiso' won't be the same movie without the great score. However, I do believe that Ennio Morricone's best score is 'once upon a time in america'. These two, along with 'once upon a time in the west' and 'the mission' are his top four, and are must have for music lovers.

IMHO, Ennio Morricone is the BEST movie composer of all time. If he were not an Italian, he would have garnered Oscars multiple times. It was really a joke that the Academy failed to nominate 'cinema paradio' for the best music score and honored it a win. Meanwhile, does anyone seriously believe that the music score for 'a passage to india' is better than that of 'once upon a time in america'? I don't think so!

i love the movie and buying its soundtrack is a smart move. spending a quiet afternoon listening to the cd makes me rekindle the memory of toto, his friendship with salvatore, and his heartaches. even if you haven't seen the movie, the music is moving so i highly recommend this album.

Ennio Morricone scored the sublime, warm and wonderful movie here in ways that take everything, movie and score, to a magical place. This score goes in your ears and invades you down to your toes with deceptively simple melodies and a perfect musical evocation of childhood, loss, first love, sadness and most of all, of the power of memory. Let it wash over you; like all great art, it has the power to transform you too, and stir the heart in ways that surprise, uplift and, most of all, make you FEEL.

Great score! Ennio Morricone has done it again. The only other score of his that I like better is "The Mission." I have yet to buy the movie - another must have.

I first heard this score on a compilation of Miramax's film music (a great buy also). After that, I watched the movie, and then purchased the score in about five days thereafter.

If you like great movie music, you have to purchase this CD.

When the Italian film made waves I was still a schoolgirl but it did make me want Toto and Elena to be together back then and now. This soundtrack is haunting and draws out the intense longing and yearning for a love long lost ... and the marks of our youth that propell our creative destinies.