Another Silver Bullet For 'The Wolfman'
11.10.09 By: Brian Salisbury
As if a massively disappointing delay in release date wasn't bad enough, the upcoming Wolfman remake has suffered yet another setback. Dread Central, by way of Cinemusic, is reporting that legendary film composer Danny Elfman is off the project and Paul Haslinger will be taking his place. Technically the word is that "scheduling conflicts" are to blame, but if you buy that nonsense I have a case of werewolf repellent I would love to sell to you. The film opens in February and I am honestly supposed to believe that Elfman plumb forgot he had a previous engagement? Or that he wouldn't be in the final stages of putting the music together anyway? The damn thing was supposed to come out this week. No, this reeks of studio politics and publicity malarkey.
How can you replace Danny Elfman with a guy whose biggest score credit to date is Crank?! Wait, Crank? There was music in Crank? Here's a little tip for Universal, if you are aiming for an old-school horror flick to bring class and glamor back to both the genre and your studio, bailing on Danny Elfman in favor of a guy whose credits include Vacancy and Death Race is not the right move. If I hear one more person bitch about Elfman's scores all sounding the same I may bite their jugular. It's not like John Williams went through a freaking experimental techno phase, but that doesn't mean he isn't a great composer. Elfman understands how to create an exciting, gothic landscape with music that perfectly heralds a classic horror atmosphere. His dismissal from this project, if that is in fact what happened, effectively downgrades this film from something I was highly anticipating to something about which I feel tremendous consternation. But that's just me.
Full story at Dread Central
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Reader Comments (1 of 1)
MLat 11-10-2009
If you read between the lines, my take is the score wasn't working out the way they wanted, but that doesn't look good in print, does it? Sometimes that happens in a collaborative environment & it doesn't mean that any of the people suck, just that the combination isn't working for some reason (remember King Kong?). Sometimes you just have to start over rather than stubbornly try to make something work and end up with something that doesn't satisfy anyone (composer, director or producers). Yeah, Crank isn't the most encouraging credit, but they need a replacement on short notice - and who knows, he might just not have had the opportunity to show his stuff yet. I'm going to hope for the best.