Search - Dimitri Tiomkin :: Thing From Another World & Take the High C

Finally, never before realeased 1951 movie soundtrack

Douglas Henderson | SW Montana | 07/16/2006

(4 out of 5 stars)

"The original Howard Hawks 1951 movie The Thing came to television some time in the late 1950's when I then saw it as a child. Oh, the horror of thinking back to that first viewing, realizing that electric blanket was melting the block of ice. Now, finally, the music that accompanied this terrifying movie, a score written by Dimitri Tiomkin, is available as a CD remastered from the only remaining acetate recording (from the composer's personal collection) preserved at the Cinema-Television Library of the University of Southern California.



The soundtrack is only some 28 minutes long, but runs in proper sequence to the movie. A brief history of the making of The Thing from Another World accompanied the CD and included so many interesting little details, that I played a tape I have of this movie acquired a decade or more ago to pick them out for myself--and I watched the movie before finally playing the new CD. The dramatic theme cords, the wandering wind instruments and subtle electronic component even to this day bring back the fear and dismay I remember as a child under the influence of masterful movie making. Certainly a choice for the music library at McMurdo Station.



It is interesting to note that Tiomkin's 1954 score to the movie The High and the Mighty, with its glorious theme accompanying the story of an airliner filled with many-storied passengers on a flight from Hawaii to San Francisco, also revisits the score from The Thing. I recently bought the digitally enhanced DVD of The High and the Mighty, a beautifully colored version which was fun to see after so long a spell absent from once common TV showings long ago.



Although everything about The High and the Mighty seemed especially familiar, I sat up in my chair when the first hints of problems to come with the plane announced themselves--accompanied by strange, dark cords and wandering wind passages, evoking fear and trepidation. As John Wayne looks out over his starboard engines after an odd tremor and the crew later searches the dark tail section with flash lights amid aluminum struts and control pulleys, the alarming and disquieting music first developed for the Thing now evokes some ill-defined, impending menace haunting the old DC-4.



A second, much longer Tiomkin score recording to the movie Take the High Ground is included--interesting period piece. The CD case mentions "This pressing is limited to 3000 copies"--probably accounts for the somewhat high price of the recording."

Soundtrack from "The Thing From Another World" finally avail

Charles R. Hoynowski | Redwood City, CA | 11/04/2005

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Watching this film I've always been impressed with the quality

of the music and how important it is to each scene. I've always

wanted to own the soundtrack but until now found it be unavailable.

With this release we finally have this eerie and exciting film

music available on CD. If you've seen the film I'm sure you know

what to expect from this soundtrack, it's seminal '50 sci-fi stuff.

The quality of the transfer is excellent, I assume it's exactly as

recorded for the film and not a recent re-recording of an old score.

Now the problem. It was taken from a record. With headphones on

you can hear the needle going around ever so faintly. I'm assuming

that this was the only available source and that would explain why

it was never released before. Don't be put off by the source -

they did an exceptional job reproducing this recording on CD -

it really is as sharp and dynamic as you'd expect from any 50 year

old original source - in fact I'd expect you'd never even be aware

of the source unless you listen really carefully with headphones.

The soundtrack for "The Thing From Another World" as has been

a long time coming and well worth owning, I'm very picky about

sound quality and this is quickly becoming one of my most played

soundtracks. Fans of the Theremin shouldn't miss this one, the

unusual sounds of that instrument are used to great effect, to be

compared with "Forbidden Planet" and "The Day the Earth Stool Still".

Unfortunate that it only runs about 26 minutes.



Twice as long at 51 minutes is "Take the High Ground!", the second

recording on the same disk as "The Thing From Another World". In a

lot of way this is a much more ambitious effort than The Thing and

is well worth owning by itself. The producers really pack as much

as possible into this package - Total playing time for the disk is

78:42 and it comes with a 24 page booklet full of history, photos,

some rare production stills about both films.

"