The Man in the Iron Mask

This score sounds so much like The Rock that it sometimes is hard to tell which one you are listening to. The first track, "Surrounded", for instance, could easily be switched with the first track from The Rock, and the music would still create the same modd, and almost sound the same. There are many more similiarities too, like the use of the male chorus, energetic percussion and synths. And the strong, powerful main theme (one of those themes you walk around humming after you have listened to the score). Perhaps one should mention that Nick Glennie-Smith actually wrote a lot of the music in The Rock, so it's not like he has stolen the music from someone else. Maybe this is his way of saying which part of The Rock he wrote. Isn't it strange, by the way, that the guys at Media Ventures writes music that's so similiar?

Anyway, this The Rock inspired music doesn't make the score bad. On the contrary I think it's a very enjoyable one, and very entertaining listening to. There is almost always something going on, so the music really never gets dull or boring.

One might think that modern action music would sound out of place in a film about the 17th century, but for some reason it doesn't. Glennie-Smith explains in the booklet that he only wanted to use modern sounding music in the action sequences, and use more classical sounding music for the other parts of the film. And indeed there are some exceptional baroque music too, on the album. For example Glennie-Smith has written a terrific minuet, heard in the track "The Masked Ball". This is baroque music, but with a slightly modern sound too it.

If you like Hans Zimmer's explosive action music as well as the music of... say Handel and Bach, The Man in the Iron Mask is really worth checking out. To me, it was a very pleasant surprise.