{"id":35488,"date":"2016-11-30T13:18:20","date_gmt":"2016-11-30T19:18:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.davidbordwell.net\/blog\/?p=35488"},"modified":"2020-08-01T16:46:41","modified_gmt":"2020-08-01T21:46:41","slug":"spies-face-the-music-jeff-smith-on-foreign-correspondent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.davidbordwell.net\/blog\/2016\/11\/30\/spies-face-the-music-jeff-smith-on-foreign-correspondent\/","title":{"rendered":"Spies face the music: Jeff Smith on FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT"},"content":{"rendered":"

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DB here: Here’s another guest contribution\u00a0from colleague, Film Art<\/strong> collaborator, and pal Jeff Smith. He inaugurates a series of entries tied to our monthly Observations on Film Art<\/strong>\u00a0videos on FilmStruck.<\/em><\/p>\n

About a month ago, a new streaming service for film lovers debuted. \u00a0Its name is FilmStruck<\/a> and it’s a\u00a0joint venture of Turner Classic Movies and the Criterion Collection.<\/p>\n

As regular readers of the blog already know, David, Kristin, and I have launched a series for FilmStruck<\/a>. \u00a0Every month, we\u2019ll be featured in short videos that offer appreciations of particular films and filmmakers. \u00a0In baseball lingo, I got the leadoff spot. \u00a0As the first up, I offered\u00a0an overview of the principal musical motifs<\/a> in Alfred Hitchcock\u2019s Foreign Correspondent<\/em>. \u00a0Below is a supplement to the video that goes into a little more depth regarding the way Alfred Newman\u2019s score for Foreign Correspondent<\/em> fits into the film\u2019s larger narrative strategies.<\/p>\n

Fair warning: there are some spoilers<\/strong> in what follows. \u00a0Some of you who are FilmStruck subscribers or owners of the Criterion disc<\/a> may want to watch this Hitchcock classic before proceeding.<\/p>\n

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Founding a Hollywood dynasty<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Alfred Newman.<\/em><\/p>\n

If you were looking for someone whose work epitomized the\u00a0qualities of the classical Hollywood score, Alfred Newman would be a pretty good candidate for the job.<\/p>\n

Newman\u2019s career in Hollywood began when Tin Pan Alley stalwart, Irving Berlin, recommended him for the 1930 musical, Reaching for the Moon<\/em>. \u00a0Having worked for years as a music director on Broadway, Newman planned to stay for only three months. \u00a0But the lure of the Silver Screen was too strong. \u00a0Newman spent the next forty years working in Hollywood.<\/p>\n

In 1931, Newman became the musical director at United Artists, working mostly for producer Samuel Goldwyn. \u00a0He also established himself as one of the industry\u2019s leading composers, contributing to nearly ninety films over the course of the 1930s and earning nine Oscar nominations in the process. \u00a0Newman\u2019s most memorable early scores included such titles as The Prisoner of Zenda, The Hurricane, The Hunchback of Notre Dame,<\/em> and Wuthering Heights<\/em>. \u00a0Eventually, he would leave Goldwyn to take over the music department at 20th Century-Fox, a position he held for more than twenty years.<\/p>\n

Alfred, however, would be just one of several Newmans who would make the name synonymous with the Hollywood sound. \u00a0Alfred would establish a film composing dynasty that would come to include his brothers Lionel and Emil; his sons, Thomas and David; and his nephew, Randy.<\/p>\n

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Overture, hit the lights\u2026.<\/strong><\/p>\n

If you asked most film music aficionados for their favorite Alfred Newman scores, I suspect Foreign Correspondent<\/em> would be pretty low on the list. \u00a0Most fans of the composer\u2019s work would likely opt for one of the later Fox classics he scored, such as How Green Was My Valley<\/em> (1941), A Tree Grows in Brooklyn<\/em> (1945), The Captain from Castile<\/em> (1947), or The Robe<\/em> (1953). Yet, if you want to get a handle on the basic features of the classical paradigm, Foreign Correspondent<\/em>\u2019s typicality makes it more useful as an exemplar. \u00a0Newman\u2019s music neatly illustrates several of the traits commonly associated with the classical Hollywood score\u2019s dramatic functions.<\/p>\n

One of these characteristic traits is Newman\u2019s use of leitmotif as an organizational principle. \u00a0Foreign Correspondent<\/em>\u2019s score is organized around five in all. \u00a0The first is a theme for the film\u2019s protagonist, Johnny Jones. \u00a0The second is a theme for Carol, Johnny\u2019s love interest in the film. \u00a0As is typical of studio-era scores, both themes are introduced in the film\u2019s Main Title.<\/p>\n