Chinatown (1974)

Composer(s):
Jerry Goldsmith, Phillip Lambro (score rejected)

Released in:
1974

Reviews

Jerry Goldsmith's Finest Film Score - And That's Quite An Achievement!
by filmfactsman (August 22, 2005)
A tremendous asset for the masterpiece film is the eclectic, romantic score by the great Jerry Goldsmith, one of the most haunting film scores ever written. It's hard to imagine that Goldsmith actually composed this score in ten days. Producer Robert Evans was so dissatisfied with the film's original composer Phillip Lambro's score that he scrapped it and hired Goldsmith to write a new one on the eve of the film's scheduled release. In my opinion, this was Goldsmith's finest score in a stunning career that spanned six decades.

Like Herrmann's "Citizen Kane," Rozsa's "Ben Hur" and Bernstien's "To Kill a Mockingbird," this is one of the most influential scores in cinema history. Goldsmith should have won an Oscar for it (Nino Rota won that year for The Godfather, Part II -- the film's major rival). His "Chinatown" score would later provide the inspiration for Goldsmith's superb 1997 score to "L.A. Confidential."

Reviews on other sites:

movie wave

Film Music: A Neglected Art

suggested by:
Thomas Kiefner

Bigbeaks Blog

suggested by:
Jeffrey Graebner

Scorereviews

suggested by:
Alan Rogers

jerrygoldsmithonline

Submit a link