#also also the movie’s musical arrangement of the wordsworth song is kind of boring sorry

[manderleyfire]

hey, ali! i feel your pain about the tbosas adaptation! i cried so much during the movie but not because i felt emotional, seeing MY book comes alive on screen but because we were robbbbbbbbbbed and shot 😞😞😞😞😞😞 anyways, what's your opinion on the music tho? fav/least fav song? (my is the oldtherebefore and least fav the 0livia r0drigo's one)

hey, lollis!

‘robbed and shot’, exactly. i couldn’t have said it better myself because unfortunately, that’s spot on 🥲

I LOVED THE MUSIC! a dystopian reflection of our reality through intentional use of folk/bluegrass music is something that resonates strongly with me. i mean, they knew how to strike the right chord in the hearts of book readers for sure! *the only other thing i wish was different about the music it's the variety of tempo and rhythm because as much as i LOVED the unified sound of LG's songs, i would prefer each song to have its own individual tune and ~aura)

my absolute favourite adaptation that they did was 'nothing you can take from me' (boot-stompin’ version); i am utterly in awe of the powerful passionate energy that they gave to this song?? also i loveeed the similarity of rhythm and tone between 'nothing you can take from me' and a traditional american folk song 'man of constant sorrow', i kinda feel it was a deliberate parallel which worked just great. (also i’m glad they added maude ivory’s 'keep on the sunny side'!)

my least favourite is perhaps 'the ballad of lucy gray baird'?.. and though i did enjoy rachel’s rendition (she copies a young dolly parton in such a warm-hearted respectful manner!), and the respect for traditional appalachian music, she sang it in a cheerful 'to hell with you!' manner which is less intense and intimate that i remember it from the book to be? to quote tbosas here: 'the haunting melody set the tone, and her words did the rest as she began to sing in a voice husky from smoke and sadness' – the movie version really failed to capture both the haunting tune (their version doesn't really tell the story musically because of a major key) and the lucy gray's vulnerability here for me. in the book she did what carrie fisher told us all to do: 'take your broken heart and turn it into art' while in the movie she isn't even angry at billy taupe?? like his betrayal (and her place in the games) is not a big deal? she's openly rebellious and sassy with out of place 'i need no man' attitude and that simply didn't work for me personally.

it took some time for 'pure as the driven snow' to grow on me (i expected it to be more of a waltz-like, similar to maiah wynne's cover), but i'm coming around to it. yet… i wish it was STAGED differently??? they had to combine certain scenes and songs in the film but it was such a SURREAL idea to meld PATDS with 'sell you for a song' setting? and it took away so much from that moment of love and connection and unconditional acceptance, where lucy gray is finally ready to be emotionally unshielded in front of her lover (maybe for the first time ever)?? it was a PIVOTAL snowbaird moment but they needed to blend two songs together because obviously PATDS can't be love confession in form of a song because it should be taken as an ominous warning instead (duh!). 'bitch you better not turn out to be a bad guy even tho i knew you were a villain all along' :??? and it could've worked in its own angst-y way, if there had been any development in snowbaird love story?? but since movie!they are full on survival the whole time (there's no canonical teetering on the edge of an actual fondness/love and survival instinct), PATDS makes no sense at all. so… i extremely frustrated by the use of PATDS on screen but at the same time i love the sound of the full version on the soundtrack album.

annnd i'm actually IN PAIN because they had the audacity to leave so many songs out?? especially given their ties to the original trilogy?? 'deep in the meadow' aka rue's song???? 'the valley song' aka the one peeta mentioned seeing katniss sing at school when they were children????  the festive 'crawling to you' ('that thing i love with') likely performed at finnick’s wedding?? idk maybe it's a musical nerd who is speaking in me but i wish they could have included more of the book songs at least on the album, if not in the actual movie (even tho i'm still sure, it would've been possible to present the whole complexity of this book AND its poetic side too, if they decided to split the film in two).

[the score album wasn't much to talk about but 'snow lands on top' piece tho… vivid, striking, remarkable]