I recently had the good fortune to attend two of the recording sessions for Jerry Goldsmith's new score to the up coming film Looney Tunes: Back In Action. The film marks the ninth feature film collaboration between director Joe Dante and the composer. I attended a session in September, held at Warner Brothers Studios and a second one at the Todd-AO studios, at CBS in October. I've been a fan of Joe Dante's for many years and happened to be lucky enough to have a friend who worked on the film. It was an exciting day for me even though it looked like business as usual for the director and composer. The score is a huge amount of fun with Goldsmith mixing live action with animated scoring. It's wonderful to hear the composer occasionally score a scene with something that reminds one of Carl Stalling and his classic score's for the Looney Tunes shorts, but in Goldsmith's familiar style.

The music is energetic and exactly what one would expect for a film with the mad cap Looney Tunes characters as the stars. One of the highlights of the first day's recording was seeing the construction of one of the cues for an animated scene. A few involved on the production team were there with Joe Dante as they went over this cue with Jerry, discussing how to make it sound like classic Looney Tunes music with horn honks and slide whistle sounds, wondering if they should use a vibraphone hit on Wile E. Coyote freezing in mid-air or not. The best cue of the day was music for a chase scene with Yosemite Sam. Fans of Goldsmith's western scores will have a real treat to hear the composer revisit familiar sounds of guitars, brass, and strings playing out in the Las Vegas setting of the film. At one point I heard behind the scenes that this cue was to be replaced with a song but thankfully it was changed back. However, we will still have to wait and see if it's definately been included because of the changes that are made so often during a film's post production.

Not all of the music is without that exciting Goldsmith action feel and mixed-metered patterns. I listened closely and every now and then I could hear some familiar sounds that reminded me of Joe's other collaborations with Jerry. Essentially the score consists of a theme for the Looney Tunes, a short love theme, a fun low brass idea for the bad guys at the Acme Company and a 'James Bond' spy theme for the character Damian Drake (Timothy Dalton). The second day I attended had some cues recorded for a scene set on top of the Eiffel Tower. One of the hilarious moments, that made it into the film, contains a host of cheap robot monsters from classic B movies. Here Goldsmith provides a frenzied Gremlins 2 like piece for the mayhem on screen.

The score consists of many short cues, but the music is absolutely thrilling and I hope it all stays in the film. There are a few musical surprises for film buffs but I won't give them away. It was a real pleasure to see all the respect that the musicians and technicians have for the composer as well as the friendship Jerry Goldsmith and Joe Dante have for each other.