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SUPERMAN IV Translator's note: The comments and
opinions in this analysis are solely those of the original writer and
not those of the translator or the webmaster of this site. In some cases
I have had to clarify a few points of information for factual reference. Written by Hugo Moya Arancibia Translated by Bill Williams Designed by Dharmesh
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In "Superman II" and "Superman III", the music was not an aspect of the production that was given a lot of importance; only enough for necessity in "Superman II" and much less than what was needed in "Superman III". The fact that moved this confirmation forward was that not a whole lot of work went into the release of the soundtracks. In this fourth film the music made a positive turn befitting the usage of more structured and identifiable orchestras (The Symphony Orchestra Braunke of Munich and the National Philharmonic Orchestra of London) and the return to the original music composed for the first film. In spite of this, an original soundtrack with the music of this film was never released. The main titles stated "Music by John Williams"; however, specifically for this soundtrack it is almost absolutely the responsibility of Alexander Courage, who in the same titles appear credited with the following description: "Music Adapted and Conducted by Alexander Courage" (the music for "Superman II" had a title credit in a similar form). According to official information John Williams accepted the responsibility of composing the music for this film; however, his contribution was only reduced to the composition of a pair of new themes for the sequel ("Lacy's Theme" and "Nuclear Man's Theme"), while the rest of the work had been delegated to Alexander Courage, who prepared the cues and orchestrations, based obviously on the original compositions from Williams. In a interview with Jeff Bond published in "The Music of Star Trek", and later in an online interview in 1999, Courage stated that according to him it did not seem necessary to have an original soundtrack to "Superman IV" release, in that a large part of said music had been released on the original soundtrack. The media was divided in Courage's opinion; however, in particular the arrangements for this film make it worthy of an original release. These arrangements, if well adjusted to the original music of the sequel, on various occasions lacked a basic characteristic in film music: to provoke emotion. During the film there are not many moments in which the music contributed to produce great emotions. The problem is that an important part of this music was based on Williams' original compositions, which signified that the tremendous prestige of Courage was not regulating musical function in this film. Certainly there are several moments in which the music effectively complemented the sequences in appropriate form, particularly when it sustained the original sequences; however on various occasions when Courage contributed an original arrangement, the scenes lost emotion. Possibly the die hard fans of John Williams' music felt that this sound track had been reclaimed; however, according to my personal opinion, it is preferable to criticize a sound track for its lack of merit than by being a weak arrangement of the original. The music for "Superman II" was saved because Thorne, in some manner, sustained the original arrangements and did not have to largely innovate with a lot of original arrangements. However, for "Superman III" the work was considered fundamentally deficient because of his original compositions. The music for "Superman II" was preserved in some effective manner because Thorne sustained the original arrangements and did not have to largely innovate with the arrangements. However, in "Superman III", the work was considered fundamentally deficient because of his original compositions that did not contribute to the film; on the contrary, it only worsened.
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