Search - Leo Shuken, Jack Hayes :: The Great Escape: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack

Outstanding and Essential Soundtrack

gobirds2 | New England | 05/18/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This film contains one of Elmer Bernstein's most recognizable themes in cinema history: the main title or "The Great Escape March" as it is often referred to. To say that "The Great Escape" has such a distinction is an understatement. His main title theme is as much a tribute to the Allied prisoners in the film as it is to all men who must overcome the odds through their own perseverance and unwillingness to bend to defeat to whatever noble end they strive for. Bernstein's complex score complements the theme by giving us passages and statements on the diversity of the individuals as well as their singular overall objective. Once "on the road" the music reaches exhilarating proportions unlike that of traditional action Hollywood scoring. Bernstein wants to put the audience through the same suspense and anticipation that the escapees feel and then unleashes our pent up emotions in a crescendo of rousing orchestrations that has us cheering them on. That was the same brilliant technique he employed in "The Magnificent Seven." I don't think many people give Elmer Berstein the credit for being the musical innovator that he was back in this period of his prestigious career. Composer Bernstein was able to control our emotions giving us moments of reflective tranquility, then despair and in the next moment lifting our spirits again knowing that actions were not taken in vain and good will eventually prevail. It is so easy to indicate what was left off an album, but I choose not to do that. What is here is very representative of what Bernstein was stating in the film."