1991. The Cold War was over. The Iron Curtain had fallen. So it was only fitting that as the real thing came to an end, so did the fictional cold war between Star Trek's Federation and the Klingon Empire. With Gene Roddenberry's health poor, the powers that be at Paramount very wisely came to Leonard Nimoy to take the proverbial helm with things. Nimoy had previously directed Star Trek's III and IV to great success, but never before had a cast member made the transition to a role of such creative control and power as Nimoy did as Executive Producer of the 6th Star Trek film. Leonard hired Nicolas Meyer (director of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan) to direct, and together they orchestrated the final voyager of the original crew of the Enterprise on the shows 25th anniversary.
The score to Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country stands out as unique through it's dark, brooding, ominous themes that resonate throughout, offset by it's more typical upbeat and hopeful elements. Composed by Cliff Eidelman, one of the only composers in Star Trek not to return and compose for other elements of the franchise, the score to TUC (as it's known in internet short-hand) is one of the few Star Trek scores that stands alone. It fits the film itself perfectly, in my humble opinion, and I've often wondered why Eidelman never returned to Star Trek. For the past 15 years, most of us have only ever heard the 13 tracks made available on the commercial album. Recently though, I discovered the expanded edition through my friend Jose at La Leyenda De Los Soundtracks. As far as I know, he is responsible for putting it on-line first, so credit goes to him. I've re-uploaded it so that we aren't mooching off of Jose's download link. Enjoy!
5 comments:
Thanks for this link. The Undiscovered Country has always been one of my fave Star Trek Movies. I always had a bit of a love hate relationship with them until TUC came along. Although the Horner scores had a bit of a Captain Hornblower/Jolly Jack Tar feel about them I always had a hankering for Eideleman's dark and brooding score. So it's nice to have something more to be dark and brooding about!
Very much appreciated - this is the best Star Trek movie and living in the UK the soundtrack has been somewhat hard to acquire (especially on limited funds). Kudos to you, sir, and keep up the good work!
By the way, does anyone have any idea what happened to "La Leyenda De Los Soundtracks" blog.
I recently discovered it, and found some incredible hard to find soundtracks.
Unfornately, it's been been either taken down or moved somewhere else. If anyone has an idea what happened to the blog, please respond.
Many thanks, Frontier :D
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