Music Composed by Alexandre Desplat
Rating: ****

Alexandre Desplat had a huge breakout year in 2007, with two grandstanding Hollywood fantasy scores sitting alongside his more typical serious arthouse fare. And with all of the buzz surrounding his extravagant work for The Golden Compass and his rhapsodic contributions to Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium, it seemed that his less flashy work for Ang Lee’s Lust, Caution was doomed to obscurity as the other film Desplat scored in 2007 (well, that and the even more obscure French thriller he scored, L’Ennemi Intime). But in the aftermath of both The Golden Compass and Mr. Magorium’s disastrous critical and box office receptions, it’s beginning to seem that Ang Lee’s critically acclaimed espionage drama will be the only Desplat-scored film from 2007 that anybody will remember after the dust has cleared. Which is fine with me, as it actually represents some of Desplat’s best and most moving and mature work of recent memory.

As the film is set in China, surface similarities appear between this and his acclaimed work for 2006’s The Painted Veil. Outside of a few passing nods to Chinese instrumentation and phrasing, however, Lust, Caution is really a much different animal. Where many of Desplat’s early scores thrive on the juxtaposition of contemporary minimalism with earlier movements (i.e., blending minimalism with early 20th century impressionism in The Painted Veil, or with late 19th century romanticism in The Girl with the Pearl Earring), Lust, Caution seems far more focused on Desplat’s own melodic invention and less concerned with period movement fusions. That’s not to say that he doesn’t lace the music with a few signature neo-Classical, neo-Romantic, and minimalist threads – they’re part of Desplat’s voice by now – but the music on the whole is much more focused on direct melodic statements than it is on those musical hybrids that tend to be signatures of his work.

This makes the score somewhat more emotionally accessible than many of his earlier scores have, however much he might sacrifice a portion of his cerebral bravado in the process. This is the first Desplat score in recent memory where the themes themselves are more interesting than the orchestrations or the painstaking attention to detail. That’s not to say that either of those elements are under par in Lust, Caution, but they’re no longer the most significant things you take away from the music. The themes are varied and too numerous for me to do any justice dissecting here, but the score tends to oscillate between melodies that carry wry suspense and melodies that hold surprisingly frank tenderness.

On the former front, we have subtle themes like the one that opens the score with “Lust, Caution” (hey, that’s the name of the movie!). Here a tremulous violin edges its way through a melody saturated with cautious suspicion, suspicion that grows more and more pronounced as the score wears on. At times, Desplat recalls John Barry in suspense mode, particularly when he brings the strings out with more fullness in “The Secret,” a cue that melds the aforementioned suspense theme with a secondary waltz theme. At other times, he brings to mind Morricone’s 1970s suspense scores, particularly when the strings stab in “Nanjing Road.” Throughout, however, Desplat generally restrains himself, and keeps the suspense and suspicion relatively light on its feet, keeping the tone uneasy but rarely unmelodic or unpleasant.

Still, all of this would all be a bit much to stomach for an hour of listening were it not for the many respites that we receive from the more tender themes. As with just about every Desplat score, he brings in a waltz with “The Dinner Waltz,” piece that reverberates with Bizet-flavored romance and gently warms the heart every time it appears (and in fairness, the melody doesn’t always take the form of a waltz – see “The Secret”). But this still isn’t the real highlight of the score. Desplat doesn’t often write the sort of melodies that get you humming to yourself, but “Wong Chai Chi’s Theme” is a gorgeous theme that will stay in your head long after the album’s finished. Tender with just the right amount of stoic bittersweetness, it’s one of the most affecting things I’ve heard from Desplat, and it brings a painfully human dimension to the music every time it appears. First introduced in understated form in “Falling Rain,” it gradually develops throughout the course of the score until it accumulates into a full-fledged emotional powerhouse with “Wong Chai Chi’s Theme” at the end of the score. Anyone who claims to have trouble finding the heart in Desplat’s music needs this album for that cue alone. It just makes you melt.

And following in the tradition of classical source cues working their way onto Desplat score albums, we also have a recording of Brahms’ “Intermezzo in A Major” worked into the album. I usually get aggravated with the score is interrupted with any outside intrusion, but one can never tire of Brahms, and the piece’s restrained Romantic impulses actually flow perfectly into the body of Desplat’s score.

So on the whole, another winner from Desplat, one that’s arguably his most impressive contribution to 2007 (it’s certainly his most mature). It’s not the world’s flashiest score, and I’ll allow that it can be slow going at times, but it never reaches moments that are anything less than impressive and at times it shows a refreshing willingness to wear its heart on its sleeve. I don’t know if Desplat is going to be doing more Hollywood blockbusters anytime soon in the immediate future, but scores like Lust, Caution only serve to remind us why it’s really not so bad to have him composing on the fringes of the system.

Music Composed, Orchestrated and Conducted by Alexandre Desplat; Recorded and Mixed by Andrew Dudman; Label: Decca Records, Availability: In-print, U.S. Release Date: September 25, 2007.

01. Lust, Caution (1:08)
02. Dinner Waltz (1:53)
03. Falling Rain (1:14)
04. Brahms Intermezzo In A Maj. Op. 118 No. 2 (6:12)
Performed by Alain Planes
05. Streets Of Shanghai (3:02)
06. Playacting (2:45)
07. Tsim Sha Tsui Stroll (1:45)
08. Exodus (1:37)
09. Moonlight Drive (3:06)
10. Shanghai 1942 (2:30)
11. The End Of Innocence (2:31)
12. Sacrifice (4:19)
13. Remember Everything (2:12)
14. Check Point (1:05)
15. The Secret (1:34)
16. Nanjing Road (3:07)
17. On The Street (1:37)
18. The Angel (2:21)
19. The South Quarry (2:17)
20. An Empty Bed (1:57)
21. Dinner Waltz (Traffic Quintet) (2:00)
22. Wong Chia Chi’s Theme (3:45)
23. Seduction (1:41)
24. Desire (4:27)

Total Running Time: 59:54