Cinderella Man

Unlike A Beautiful Mind, the pairing of director Ron Howard and Russell Crowe for Cinderella Man has largely gone by unnoticed, despite generally good press. Unsurprisingly, it bypassed Guernsey completely (like so many things) but is evidently worth catching. Despite re-teaming with a past leading man, Howard has decided to take a break from working with James Horner for Cinderella Man, turning instead to Thomas Newman who is, of course, ideally suited to this kind of human drama. Although ostensibly a boxing movie, Cinderella Man is far removed from the tub thumping of Rocky in tone and substance, so too is Newman's score.

Cinderella Man is what might be deemed a prototypical Newman drama, mixing the intimate, with a handful of stirring passages, but with some of his typically quirky touches. The occasional Celtic lilt brings to mind Road to Perdition, but Newman wisely avoids overdoing the cliché and doesn't make it the score's sole focus. Having said that, some of the percussive sequences are a suitably low tech accompaniment boxing, especially of the more down and dirty sort featured in the film. Unsurprisingly, Newman's delicate string writing is what most are likely to take away from Cinderella Man. True, it doesn't feature anything radically new, nor indeed are there any knock out tunes, but the genuine, subtle emotion - enhanced by exquisite and delicate orchestration - is engrossing enough on its own.

Corn Griffin sends the score into a new direction and Newman's restraint gives way to some rather more heart on sleeve moments. While Fight Day, Big Right and the titular penultimate cue are unashamedly emotive, Newman still refuses to push the dramatic button for as long and hard as Horner might have done and Newman's dramatic punctuation is entirely earned. While it's tempting to conclude that Cinderella Man offers little new to the Newman filmography, that seems something of an injustice to a fine piece of work. Few composers these days approach this kind of material as effectively as Newman, balancing sensitivity with musical and dramatic momentum. Typically, the period songs are detrimental to the flow of the music on disc and should ideally be programmed out, but they leave behind another fine score.