Mike Slott's live score for The Return: no returns

 

I bought some Edinburgh Fringe tickets last week and, in my excitement, have been looking back to last year's Festival. I reviewed this Mike Slott event for The Skinny and it was actually one of my highlights, if only because the film itself is so good. There was nothing wrong with the new score really, it was just completely unnecessary.

Mike Slott- The Return

Summerhall Main Hall

13/8/11

**

It's hardly rare for musicians to provide live accompaniment to feature films, but New York-based producer Mike Slott has taken a real risk in composing a soundtrack to 2003's Russian award winner The Return. Made 76 years after the death of silent cinema, it's fairly dialogue-heavy and already boasts a score courtesy of Andrei Dergachyov, a man whose work is so suited to director Andrei Zvyagintsev's vision that they would collaborate again on 2007's The Banishment.

The Return's original soundtrack is unobtrusive and chilling, its sense of gentle foreboding driving the picture toward its tragically inevitable climax. By contrast, Slott's composition seems painted by numbers. Underwater sequences elicit electronic new-age ambience from the Irish expatriate, while tensions between characters are highlighted by abrupt, thudding bass. When at his least heavy-handed, Slott simply calls Dergachyov's score to mind.

There are occasional moments when we witness a near perfect marriage between music and cinematography, particularly during scenes depicting childhood innocence. These instances, however, have no accumulative effect and amount to little more than an incoherent series of classy music videos. Though obviously a talented fellow, Slott has failed to see the bigger picture on this occasion.

Lewis Porteous