Customer Reviews

Crime of Passion - O.S.T.

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Rick Wakeman seems like he might be an ideal composer for movie scores. Why then, I wonder, are so many of the films he has done music for either extremely obscure, off the beaten path, or just plain weird? CRIMES OF PASSION (1984) certainly fits the film-- a sordid, nasty tale in which a disturbed woman works out her demons by posing as a high-class call girl-- and winds up meeting both a man whose marriage is on the rocks, AND an even more disturbed character posing as a street preacher! As with most of his films (including LISZTOMANIA) Ken Russell tends to go too far over the edge of bad taste and lunacy. In this case, the end result is a truly heart-rending story of lust, depravity, love & redemption-- but to get there you have to wade through some really disturbing stuff (especially if you see the "unrated" version!).

Wakeman's score ranges from the sadly beautiful (including "Web Of Love" which features an excerpt of Dvorak's "Going Home") to the in-your-face nasty ("It's A Lovely Life", an ironic main title for such a UGLY song, with vocals by Maggie Bell). As on THE BURNING, there are spots where Rick seems to be on auto-- I'd swear he's simply lifting certain passages from earlier, and better, of his own albums. Both the film and the soundtrack are hard on your nerves-- but on its own, the film works, while I rank this album near the bottom of Rick's output.

By adapting Dvorak's New World symphony into this wicked and erotic soundtrack consisted of saxophone and synthesizer, Rick Wakeman gives this movie the perfect touch to this satire both of the American dream and of the world of prostitution, showing both the strangeness and scary atmosphere in this kind of business.

Although I loved all those tracks, I have to say that my three favorites were the It's a lovely life with Maggie Bell - for its craziness and its excellent musical rhythm - the romantic Stax -with its excellent saxophone and erotic vocals - and also the Box - a very violent instrumental track - which involves a very controversial but crucial scene that was only shown in the unrated DVD release of this movie. Though I wished they could have put more tracks such as the funny song that Anthony Perkins character sings to Joanne Crane in her apartment or the erotic track played while Bobby sees China Blue in her waitress outfit, I was very pleased by this purchase which also allowed me to discover more of Rick Wakeman's work.