Though initially only had been edited a compilation of the songs that were appearing in the movie together with a theme of the score, the label Varese Sarabande has recaptured this magnificent score from one of the composers most in form of the current panorama: Patrick Doyle. Based on a real fact, in a beginning we could think about the similarity with a previous work of Doyle, Carlito´s Way (1993), both starring Al Pacino and developed in Mafia ambient of similar time; little or very little have to do one with the other. To begin with, the approach of the film is diametrically opposite, and this will impinge on the development of the music, since while Carlito´s Way is a film with more action and thrills (without undervalueing the human side of the history), on which is shown us the most bloodthirsty face of the mob, in Donnie Brasco the line of argument is inside out, much more rested, being centered in the human side of a mob-man that is grappled to the friendship of a policeman (without knowing it), and of this infiltrated policeman whose implication reaches such degree that arrives to doubt of whose part he is. Thus, being a film about friendship and feelings, Doyle opts to create a work basically intimate, branded by a main theme of sad tone (very influenced, by the way, by Bernard Herrmann) that it does not reach the level of the extraordinary adagio of Carlito´s Way; but while in this one, the theme appears at the beginning and end of the movie, in Donnie Brasco is present in nearly all the score. Doyle makes use of the them in an exemplary way, and even though in most of the occasions confers it with a bitter and sad tone, in other as Donnie´s Taken Out it changes and gives to it an epic nuance on which is emphasized the utilization of winds. There is, also, place for moments of intrigue with the unavoidable sound of his author (The Call is an example), deserving special mention the cue Mickey Mantle Arrives, very short, but the only one melodic of this gloomy work. A magnificent soundtrack for a magnificent movie. A.M.

/ VARESE SARABANDE VSD5834 / 37'