BOOK REVIEW by CHRIS MICH: KATHRYN KALINAK's FILM MUSIC – A VERY SHORT INTRODUCTION

A MINOR SPOILER BOOK REVIEW

Recently, I was having dinner with my friend and previous Digging Star Wars guest Peter Fey. I shared with him how much I was enjoying this book he gave me: Film Music – A Very Short Introduction by Kathryn Kalinak. He commented how he didn’t like it when he read it since it was "too academic." He then shared with me that as he read Film Music, he also thought, “Man, Chris Mich is gonna love this.”

He was right. Although Kalinak's compression of film music’s 100+ year history amplifies academics' stereotypical overpraising of Bernard Hermann, the book does a great job flowing the development of film music in a logical way. She also takes great strides to include music throughout the world from the early twentieth century to today in her conversation on scores and soundtracks. Music from India, Iran, Japan, and other countries accompany the study of film scores crafted in Hollywood, Ca.

Film Music also has one of (if not THE) best explanations of why theory is important. After several rhetorical questions revolving around the purpose of this book, Kalinak writes on page 22:

“…we are going to need theory, a body of thought devoted to analyzing the deep and complex issues that underlie the framework of discipline. Theory delves beneath the surface to get at what is neither obvious nor easily answered. Theory is always open to debate: it can be controversial and contradictory, obfuscating and illuminating, sometimes all at once. But without theory we risk becoming locked into unexamined patterns of thinking, and we cannot come to terms with those fundamental questions…”

The amount of classic and foreign films in this book is almost too numerous to list. I did see a good number of films we have covered on Digging Star Wars including:

• Nosferatu (1922)

• Sherlock Jr (1924)

• Metropolis (1927)

• King Kong (1933)

• The Searchers (1956)

•  The Hidden Fortress (1958)

•  Touch of Evil (1958)

• Ben-Hur (1959)

•  Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

• Blade Runner (1982)

The author’s behind-the-score stories of various film composers on these films and many more make this breezy but smart read well worth the $11.95 US cover price.

Kalinak won my heart when she gave Mancini his due credit for wedding popular music with film soundtracks once and for all. On page 85…

“…But it was the 1960s that saw the proliferation of popular songs in the background score. Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961) played no small part in this development. Henry Mancini’s ‘Moon River’ was performed by Audrey Hepburn in the film and threaded instrumentally through the background score. ‘Moon River’ won the Academy Award for ‘Best Song’ and a Grammy for ‘Song of the Year’ in 1961. The soundtrack album was on Billboard’s charts for more than ninety-six weeks.”

To see my own Top 40 of Henry Mancini’s Feature Film Soundtracks on Letterboxd, click on the Letterboxd logo below.

To dive deep into film music history in 116 pages, pick up a copy of Kathryn Kalinak’s Film Music – A Very Short Introduction (2010) from Oxford University Press.

Special thanks to Out of the Past blogger Raquel Stecher for hosting the 2023 Classic Film Reading Challenge. This post is an official entry. To join us in this fun summer endeavor, visit her blog for more details.

#classicfilmreading