I considered Brian de Palma as a director that takes enough care of the music that accompanies his movies, and that in general lines it usually guesses right with the composer's election. For his last work he has chosen Ryuichi Sakamoto, author that doesn't excessively shows in the cinema -even with interesting works as The Last Emperor (1987) for which he won an Oscar for best score-, so he hasn't completely settled in the film music business. For me, with this work he has already made it, creating a score that is rich in variety of themes besides working in the movie; to highlight some I will mention the Main Theme, of which he makes kind of an adagio frankly exquisite, or Tyler and Serena that illustrates a flashback and where Sakamoto introduces a superb saxo (an ideal instrument for any scene of cinema noir) that he won't use again in the rest of the work. He also mixes a little bit hazy sounds at random, to enhance the backwards march in real time of the scene. Very well. Outstanding mention deserves the theme The Hunt, for me one of the best themes written for the cinema in 1998, in which contributes with its music to add and to create more tension to a terrific scene, fantastically filmed by De Palma with some sustained and memorable violins. Another outstanding cue is The Storm that corresponds to the climax of the film, and which is a variation of the main theme that no longer has that adagio tone, but rather it is much more agile and tenser, to which Sakamoto confers an almost vertiginous rhythm. The score closes with a long version of the main theme, Snake Eyes (Long Version), which I feel that it should have been the music that accompanied the final credits, occupied by a song (that the CD also includes) that is not bad, but that it doesn't reach the level of the Sakamoto cue. Without a doubt a magnificent work that deserves to be among the most excellent in 1998. A.M.

/ HOLLYWOOD RECORDS 162155-2 / 48'

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