Customer Reviews

Shadow of the Vampire (2001 Film)

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is more than film music, this is great music - dark and beautiful. You will enjoy it whether or not you have seen the film!

Going into Shadow of the Vampire, I anticipated some nice visuals. But I was floored by the effectiveness of Dan Jones' score, and knew from the film's opening that I had to have a copy of the soundtrack CD. It reintroduced an element to film soundtracks a quality missing in nearly every new picture of recent times: subtle effectiveness. Never overwhelming, but darkly beautiful and reminiscent of both Murnau's and Orlock's characters, it was a perfect match. In this CD you not only get the superb main title theme, you also get extra tracks not heard with the film--the vocal "Herr Doktor" is a nicely over-the-top tribute to Kurt Weill at his most decadent, and flesh-crawling Stravinsky-ish atmosphere is piled on elsewhere, evoking the shrouded, lonely history of the Vampire's character. I love putting this on as both back- and foreground listening, and if the spell of the film pulled you in, chances are you will too. Crack open a 100-year-old bottle of Cognac, get out that cigarette holder, and you might just want to keep the Laudinum handy...

This is one of my new favorite CDs. It is not only a fabulous score, but a good listen in terms of the album construction. It has little snippets of distant dialogue, sound effects, and source music...just enough to add to the ambiance of the album without distracting from Dan Jones' very evocative music, which brings to mind the best of Danny Elfman without imitating him. The selections have been rearranged from the order of the film in order to provide the best listening experience; this sort of rearrangement often bugs me but worked very well on this album. The title music (which is the only music I remembered from seeing the film but was what attracted me to the score) is actually the next to last selection, but the rest of the score builds very nicely to it. My only beef: a few track listings seem to be out of order; for example the Tango comes a little later than indicated. Sound quality is amazing on my surround system. All in all, this CD is even better than I expected.

I had looked for this soundtrack because I enjoyed the music in the film a great deal, so I was a little disappointed to find that a lot of the soundtrack was material I hadn't heard before. However, after two listens, I decided it didn't matter. At its worst, this soundtrack is mildly interesting. At its best, it is haunting and sublime.

Excellent soundtrack, loved it immediately. Too bad I lost it before I accidentally deleted it from my iPod!

I rarely purchase soundtracks; often film music too closely relates to the film emotionally, or to it's narrative cues.
In this case the music works with the film very well, but as other reviewers have noted, the music itself is simply superb.
I regularly listen to it on it's own.

After hearing it during the open titles, I found myself drawn to it's overwhelming sensual accessibility.
The brooding, haunting quality evokes a dark, subtle fairytale atmosphere, often beautifully sad, but wise. There are touches of Wiemar Germany, overt as well as within the orchestral swirling. Hints can be heard of deep, folk-waltzes, nursery rhymes, steam trains, heartbeats building, nerves straining, and all with a growing dread of chaos enveloping all. In many respects the music is as ambitious as the film set out to be.
It succeeds as well as the film does, on it's own terms.
I highly recommend this soundtrack.

I recently attended a lecture given by the composer of this score, Dan Jones, at Weston College. During which he showed the film without the music and then with. I had never seen the film before this, but the music cue he showed was The Journey and the Vision speech.

I felt that this music was simply beautiful. Needless to say I bought the CD and enjoy it emensely. And I'm glad I had the chance to listen to the composer talk about his work and at the end to shake his hand.

A brilliant score made by a down to earth guy with a real talent for score. And you can tell him I said so.

This CD is good for people who like classical/Dark/ eerie tunes. All the songs are performed by orchestra's and occaisionally you'll get an earfull of the movie's characters talking. The best tracks on the CD I think are "The Bunker - Reprise" and "A Street In Wismar". So if you're having a halloween party, or if you just like dark and classical music, get this CD.