Michael Ware, Film Score Monthly, January 20, 2003

So far my favorite film score of 2002 has been the majestic one Basil Poledouris composed for the Michelle Yeoh adventure, The Touch. Exquisitely luminous and strong, it is Poledouris' best work since Starship Troopers, and despite the "non-appearance" of the pic's domestic release, the score CD is currently available on Hong Kong import (GoEastHK CD 064778-2). For those of us who've ever wanted to know what a Basil Poledouris Kung Fu score would be like, this is a huge gift.

It is a disappointing film directed by Peter Pau, who was acclaimed as a cinematographer for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, and clearly the success of that pic seems the motivation behind The Touch, assembling some of the same talent. Of course, packaging does not insure a good movie will emerge. The story is mostly odds and ends surrounding a treasure hunt for Buddhist relics and a legend of chosen protectors, played by Michelle Yeoh and Brandon Chang as a brother and sister acrobatic circus act, (which explains their Martial Arts training, sort of) who join up with an estranged partner (Ben Chaplin) in a race against bitchy evil guys (snotty Richard Roxburgh and a gang of inept thugs whose fighting skills are so laughable it is worrisome that they are killed off in the end instead of left as comic relief). The characters converge on the desert and an ancient temple and all live out their individual destinies in keeping with a Buddhist scripture. Romance and lackluster fight choreography ensue.

Poledouris structures all this together with aplomb. The Buddhist tenets are treated with gravity and beauty, as thematic material they are interwoven with the plot points and gradual deepening of the relationship between Yeoh and Chaplin. Simplicity is a virtue and the music creates a sinuous through-line as if the plot convolutions were part of a serene cosmic design. To describe the overall sound, it is big orchestra augmented with traditional Chinese instrumentation, and symphonic and traditional percussion. The design operates within an appropriate harmonic language without calling undue attention to the asian material -- it's simply a tight, contemporary score.

The central theme is also a song, "The Touch," adapted by Poledouris from a traditional melody by Yan Ke, with a lyric by Lin Xi. It is performed in a quiescently fine contemporary voice by Kelly Chen, and doesn't remotely recall Crouching Tiger: it has the languid feel of being from the source, authentically a traditional song in a classical style. Poledouris' arrangement grants it an understated, haunting sweep that is captivating for its intimacy, the lyrics in Mandarin describing a poetic archetype of the mountains, the stream, two villagers coming to a meeting of hearts. The underscore refers to the song as an important archetypal figure accenting the emotional highs. The most thrilling instance (Track 14 "I'll Never Leave You") is a swirling string figure building up to a full-on majestic statement of the theme that's so enveloping that you wish it could have been for something more substantial than a mundane CGI shot of Yeoh and Chaplin on horseback jumping over a CGI chasm, then riding across screen. Whatever, the timeless themes of fate, commitment, and an honest life fully-lived inform Mr. Poledouris' creativity in ways that seem one thousand times more personal than we are used to in film music these days. It's all delivered in waves of contemplation and soaring movement, often recalling the intimate focal point set against the expanding physical and emotional environment of Big Wednesday, sometimes snaking forward in understated expectation, sometimes pulsing into the foreground.

The fight choreography gets a blast of charging percussion with orchestra that is full-blooded and vital ("Trouble Under Blue Skies," "Destiny Awaits," "I Believe"), creating perhaps, in film score terms, one of very few instances in which the strength and life-affirming spirit of Chinese Martial Arts are given their due, gutsy and powered from within. That is to say, Mr. Poledouris doesn't just underline action scenes, he allows you to feel them. This is why I've always looked forward to a score of this kind from the composer of Conan The Barbarian and Farewell to the King; it is rare for composers not to intellectualize from the outside, but to dig into the meat of the warrior ethic and let it surge with power, unapologetic and true. An understanding. This score is that and also a meditation of the spirit. The performance is by Beijing's China Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Yang Yang recorded with depth and nuance by Tim Boyle, and like the music, the performance is exemplary in every way.

Basil Poledouris, Gong Xi! Hao ji le!

James Southall, MovieWave, 2003

Reports of his demise were clearly premature - after seemingly years in the wilderness, Basil Poledouris has finally delivered the kind of full-blooded symphonic score his fans have been craving ever since Starship Troopers in 1997. A string of low-key, mostly disappointing efforts followed suit, culminating in the pretty awful Crocodile Dundee in LA; the days of Conan and Farewell to the King seemed to have all-but-disappeared.

The Touch is pretty obviously an attempt at some kind of Crouching Tiger cash-in, directed by that film's cinematographer Peter Pau, but Poledouris's score has managed to take on a life of its own. Hints of Tan Dun obviously appear, but that is a somewhat inevitable consequence of writing Chinese-type music in a western symphonic idiom. Anyway, the album opens with a pleasant song, in Mandarin, "The Touch", sung by Kelly Chen. The score proper gets going with "Legend of the Touch" which introduces the strong main theme and then really catches fire with the brief, but exhilarating, "The Monkey King Enthrals" (who came up with that title!?).

As attractive as the more low-key music is, what will have people cheering from the rafters is the action music. Poledouris is one of the best in the business at writing it, and combined with the exotic flavours he infuses the material on offer here is top-notch. He includes various electronics, which on paper doesn't seem like too good an idea, but actually works very well. I especially like the percussion-driven "Trouble Under Blue Skies", which Poledouris manages to keep impressively far away from Crouching Tiger, even if it's obviously based on the same idea. I must admit that when the brass is added it begins to sound a bit like Lalo Schifrin's Rush Hour scores (and so would seem to be rather out of place here), but it's fantastic fun nonetheless. The piano theme in "Healing of Hearts" is really touching (forgive the pun); and "Through the Forest", which follows, is also very beautiful - first-class stuff. The thirteen-minute showpiece "Destiny Awaits" is the clear highlight of the album (and arguably, the composer's entire career) - a brilliant mix of the Chinese influences, the orchestra and a choir, it's genuinely thrilling stuff.

The Touch is a great score, not (yet) widely available in the West, but available from the usual mail order outlets. It's been far too long since Poledouris blessed us with a score like this, and I hope it won't be too long until he does so again.