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DiscountDelight - Memoirs of a Geisha
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List Price: $18.98
Our Price: $9.99
Your Save: $ 8.99 ( 47% )
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Sony
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Audio CD
EAN: 0828767470825
Format: Soundtrack
Label: Sony
Manufacturer: Sony
Publisher: Sony
Release Date: 2005-11-22
Studio: Sony
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: bewitching
Comment: I have fallen in love with this movie and now with the soundtrack. As you listen it casts a spell over you, and shuts out everything except the music and the emotion. From the innocence of "Going to School" to the drama of "the Fire Scene and the Coming of War" it enchants and pulls you in. Listening to this CD is almost like meditation. I will buy another so I don't have to keep switching between my home stereo and my car.
Many thanks to John Williams for sharing his genius, again, and to Yo Yo Ma and Itzhak Perlman for heartfelt performances.
Customer Rating: 
Summary: Plenty of Variety
Comment: I have always liked John Williams ever since I heard Hook. He's a good composer and this soundtrack shows that.
I like this soundtrack but everyone else has covered why it's good so I won't bother.
I just have one problem and that's the 'Going to School' track. It was a good try, and he didn't horribly ruin it, but the original is better. Also, give credit where credit is due. That track belongs to David Byrne and he did a wonderful job with it the first time.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Bathing Music
Comment: This soundtrack from one of my favorite movies is the perfect end-of-day music to enjoy in bed or bath. Darken the room, light a candle, contemplate.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Masterful
Comment: A wonderful score that touches the heart of the viewer. It truly manifests the hardships and feelings of the central character-
Customer Rating:
Summary: John Williams delivers by failing to deliver
Comment: Composer John Williams, known for his monster scores for Jaws, Star Wars, and the Indiana Jones series completely fails to deliver on his usually bombastic style and thus this most recent effort establishes itself as his best score yet.
For the first time in years, Williams shows a certain restraint and an ability to pull in the reigns on his characteristic orchestral flourishes. The score is also anything but boring or dull, Williams just seems to have learned when the moments of bombast are appropriate and when they are not. Some of the high lights include the fragile and lilting theme ('Sayuri's Theme'), The stark and foreboding 'Fire Scene/Coming of War' and the appropriately child like 'Going to School'. The three best tracks are 'Becoming a Geisha' and 'End Credits' where the theme really comes into it's own as Williams allows it to wash with such intensity over the listener and 'Confluence' where Williams makes a surprisingly welcome return to his characteristic 'big' moment (this is probably because we've spent 15 track without it). Special mention should also be made to the utilisation of Yo-Yo Ma and Itzhak Perlman who provide us with some of their best work.
It was disappointing to see Williams lose the Oscar this year to Gustavo Santaolalla (whose score to the otherwise brilliant Brokeback Mountain was boring and repetitive at best) because this was the award he richly deserved over all his other work. If only it wasn't for the vote split between this and Williams other nominated score for Speilberg's 'Munich'.
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Editorial Reviews:
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Director Rob Marshall hired three of Asia's most fabulous stars (Zhang Ziyi, Michelle Yeoh, and Gong Li) for this Japan-set movie, so one wonders why he didn't put in a call to a local composer as well. Was Tan Dun's line busy? Was Joe Hisaishi otherwise engaged? In any case, John Williams won the assignment, and he didn't end up with egg on his face. Mercifully, Williams left the bombast at home and put cellist Yo-Yo Ma and violinist Itzhak Perlman to good use in this sensitive score. The lovely "Sayuri's Theme" resurfaces at regular intervals, and it's good to hear Williams keep his showier instincts in check through a good chunk of the movie, as he delivers a more subdued sound. One of the most dramatic moments happens during "The Fire Scene and the Coming of War." By then Williams has basically reverted to the familiar, brooding mode he uses for ominous scenes, when suddenly the track integrates an excerpt from "The Folding Fan as a Target," a traditional piece for voice and the Japanese lute known as biwa. Though Williams is right to err on the side of low key, it would have been nice to get more of these stark sounds in his competent but ultimately unmemorable compositions. --Elisabeth Vincentelli
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