Amazon.com: While Hollywood franchises often stick to one composer as a way to establish continuity, the three X-Men movies have gone to three different musicians. And yet, the sound has remained remarkably homogenous; in other words, if you enjoyed Michael Kamen and John Ottway's scores for the first and second installments, respectively, you'll get a kick out of what John Powell has come up with for the third. Though he adopted a more contemporary, electronic-inflected sound on actioners The Bourne Identity and The Bourne Supremacy, here Powell goes for the full symphonic treatment. What's most interesting is his use of a 45-member chorus, which is surprisingly varied. On "Jean and Logan," the choir delicately hovers above the strings, almost out of reach, but on "Rejection Is Never Easy," it weaves in and out in a rather spooky manner, and it unleashes at full blast on the CD's climax, "Phoenix Rises," a six-minute-plus opus that at times sounds like a weird cross between sacred music and Philip Glass. This is one of the best big-budget scores of the year. --Elisabeth Vincentelli
X-travagant Score to the Third Installment As Michael Kamen provided a rushed, unfocused score to the first X-Men film and John Ottman provided a much better and more thematic score to the second installment, John Powell continues along the same lines as Ottman did, only much larger in scope. For X3, Powell beefed up the brass and percussion sections, providing a dynamic, heroic sound. This album neatly divides into 2 halves, with the first half consisting mostly of suspense and ominous music with some outstanding orchestral and choral outbursts and the second half consisting of non-stop action music that never lets up until the final note. The first two scores provided a main theme for the X-Men that sounded consistent throughout both scores, even though the themes were different and from different composers. Powell manages to do the same here, providing a powerful march, complete with your typical brass fanfares you would expect and can be found in "Bathroom Titles", "St. Lupus Day", "Attack on Alcatraz", and "The Last Stand." The percussion section is very reminiscent of John Williams' Superman theme here. Dark Phoenix has a theme, performed mainly on the strings, which can be found in "Dark Phoenix's Tragedy", "The Battle of the Cure", and "Phoenix Rises". Angel has a theme too, which is found in a few sections in the score and is a heroic, uplifting motif for brass. The action music, which begins in "Cure Wars" and finishes out the album is an all-out, pounding, orchestral and choral battle. Here, the various sections of the orchestra compete with each other with several different motifs going on all at once, most likely draining the musicians' stamina, while the chorus wails throughout the orchestral frenzy. It is music that will definitely wear you out after a while. All in all, a powerful score that in my opinion, is the best score of the X-Men franchise.
A good way to send off a great franchise!! I've been a huge fan of the X-Men movies and their soundtracks ever since I saw the first movie. When I saw X-Men: The Last Stand I have to admit that I didn't like the music. I found it to be too loud. When I went to see the movie a second time I was able to appreciate it a bit more and I found some themes very good. Once I bought the CD I fell in love with it. I still find some parts a bit too loud but overall it's good. My favorite theme in the entier CD is the Phoenix theme. (Played best in #14. Dark Phoenix's Tragedy and #26. Phoenix Rises) It is one of the best themes I've heard in a long time. I still hold the soundtrack to X2: X-Men United as the best of the three films but this one is one of my favorite soundtracks I have.
"Powell versus K-Men": The Last Stand ! What else is left to say about this big great soundtrack album? An outstanding emotional score composed by one of the biggest in this business - John Powell. I agree with an earlier reviewer who said that all the action and emotion of the third movie installment of this Marvel series has been captured marvellous good in this play of violins and other great instruments on CD. The orchestral arrangements are the most powerful on this third score. While Michael Kamen still made a very good job and owns all of my respect as my favorite composer, this third release still has its very own big ones: "The Funeral" track is my favorite on this whole album, not to mention the main theme "The Last Stand", which both play very well eventhough they ain't as much dramatic as the score tracks for the high action sequences. Also I think we all loved the "Jean and Logan" part that reminded me personally a lot of K-Men's last track for X-Men "Logan and Rogue", which still is the most loved and most harmonic arrangement of violins I've ever heard yet! And no, I'm not kidding! Powell still made a good job though (watch my rating for this album), and yet it doesn't ecstasize me as much as the K-Men score did with its last track "Logan & Rogue"! Some scores go well with the film, but completely fail at listening when heard by themselves. I think at K-Men's position we had the perfect precedent for exactly the other way around: K-Men's score flew over the top as it was too good for X-Men 1 or in other words: X-Men 1 wasn't worth a score like the one K-Men finally delivered it! The problem with the first installment of the X-Men series was that most of the budget has been focussed at effects and characters only. The filmmakers spared a lot at the script conception and focussed only on the events that lead up to the romance or to what we call a father-daughter-relationship between Logan/Wolverine and Marie/Rogue. That's exactly where K-Men marched in with a whole orchestra and dramatized the emotional scenes which even the actors could not do better; e.g. when Wolverine rescues Rogue on the top of the Statue of Liberty and saves her life. I know it must be scathing for a director to hear that the only thing useful in his movie was the soundtrack, but it's possibly more ecstatic for the very composer to hear that his score pushes the action back into background and takes on the actual leading role of the movie! With X-Men 3: The Last Stand all that has changed: We have action sequences as big as the expenditure for making the score. That's also the reason why Powell's work fits so well at this point. I'm glad he signed in to made this score, as much as I am excited to hear some more from this great composer. For me it truly is a work of art, flawless...but never as sublime as K-Men's masterpiece for the first installment, that one was a gift!!! At this point I should depart with the words: Sometimes the fine nuance that makes the difference "between as..." better or "not better as..." is bound to ones taste. And that is what makes us humane, isn't it?! At least the mutants of the X-Men circle will know what I mean. ;)
One of the Best Superhero Scores of All Time! I am ecstatic about this score. Powell has done some good ones, but this is his forte, (no pun intended.) I listen to this while I'm working out, while I'm reading, while I'm playing video games, while I'm in the car... It truly is a masterpiece. I place this on the same level as the Elfman hero scores, and ABOVE Ottman's recent efforts, (Which were actually quite impressive as well.) I cannot really compare it to Batman Begins, as the genres are very different.
Buy this today! you will be amazed.
A music to think about Chris Claremont stories Better than the film itself, this soundtrack is a good performance with several and different theme. "The last stand" theme, seems to transport you in the Chris Claremont Comics: yous are in the middle of the battle, with Cyclops shouting out "X-men, Go on !".
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