Search - Malle Babbe Women's Choir :: Paradise Road: Song of Survival

Gayle V. from CLARKSVILLE, TN
Reviewed on 5/31/2007...

Really neat choral arrangements of some familiar songs. Many of these are based on the original scores that some of the prisoners wrote. Great movie!

An amazing achievement

05/28/2001

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Technically speaking, this isn't the full soundtrack of the movie "Paradise Road" -- it omits a lot including the instrumental theme, repeated several times through the movie; "I vow to thee my country", played poignantly during the shipwreck; "Mad About the Boy" and other 1940s and British music. That said, it includes a number of "vocal orchestra" arrangements that should have appeared in the movie.The subtitle is "Song of Survival." The fact that two women transcribed from memory and arranged for female voices many piano and orchestral works while imprisoned in a jungle POW camp during WWII is simply amazing. Their original arrangements survived and were used for the movie and soundtrack. The singing here isn't perfect but it's very good and the Malle Babbe choir is particularly conscious to honor the memory of those who first sang these works. It's a moving performance."

A Haunting Soundtrack of Dignity

ipiuwi | 06/14/2000

(5 out of 5 stars)

"As prisoners of the Japanese during WWII, that such haunting beauty could emerge from their wretched existence is a true testament to the unimaginable strength these women found within themselves. This music is a reminder that overwhelming despair can't win against a glimmer of hope."