Angelo Badalamenti -- Arlington Road: Soundtrack from the Motion Picture

8/10

Arlington Road is a grossly underrated thriller, but this is a review of the soundtrack, not the film. With that said, one of Arlington Road's best attributes is a soundtrack which also works quite wonderfully on its own. Composer, Angelo Badalamenti, has been David Lynch's righthand man for the past twenty-five years, so he has experience with creating creepy soundscapes. Arlington Road, while firmly rooted in the environment of the late 90's, also takes cues from 1970's paranoia thrillers, and 40's and 50's noir films, and the soundtack follows suit with a huge electronic twist. While horns from the former decades are used, and erratic strings and piano from the latter make an appearance, creepy electronica is the most dominant element. When I say creepy, I really mean creepy. The Arlington Road score could make a great soundtrack for your next Halloween party. It's that unsettling. Turn out the lights and check out the opening track, "Bloody Boy/Neon Reprise."

Now go lock your door because, yes, they are coming to get you.
Really great stuff throughout, with some good contributions by electronic duo, Tomandandy, as well as film director, Mark Pellington.

AND NOW A NOTE ON CINEMA:
Remember when movie summers where so chock-full of goodness that a great little gem like Arlington Road could fall through the cracks? 1999, the year Arlington Road was released, was in particular a banner summer: The Matrix, The Sixth Sense, American Beauty, Fight Club, so many great, original films(throughout that whole year, really), and so few sequels. The only three that come to mind are Star Wars: Episode One, Toy Story 2 (arguably better than the first), and Austin Powers 2. And on top of that, no 3-D! Now we've got almost nothing but stinker sequels, and brainless, badly edited 3-D blockbusters. Much was said about Inception last year, and how it was, finally, an intelligent, original, big-budget film, but imagine an entire summer (or year!) full of them. We used to have that. Maybe I am being unfair in highlighting 1999--after all, Entertainment Weekly only called it "The Year that Changed Cinema," but still...

1999 Will Records
1. Bloody Boy/Neon Reprise 5:50
2. Old Newspapers 1:44
3. Lament for Leah 3:50
4. It's Something Personal 2:06
5. The Party 4:45
6. He Repeats, He Repeats 1:57
7. Discover Troops 2:40
8. Into the Cage 2:04
9. The Yearbook 1:43
10. Copper Creek 3:31
11. Values 2:29
12. Cheryl 1:08
13. The Truth Is Out There 3:10
14. The Study 2:04
15. What Message 2:26
16. Last Day 7:56
17. Stoplight Flight 1:25
18. Escape 4:50
19. The Bomb 2:02
20. Aftermath 5:30
21. Leah's Theme 3:50