Film directors take different approaches to music in their movies; one is to root around in your own record collection and just score your picture to music you like. That, notoriously, is what Woody Allen does, and it seems to be what writer/director Noah Baumbach has done for his film Margot at the Wedding. At 38 in the fall of 2007 when the movie came out, Baumbach was a bit more than half of Allen's age, however, and instead of being fascinated by the hot jazz of the 1920s and '30s, he seems to have great affection for ...
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Film directors take different approaches to music in their movies; one is to root around in your own record collection and just score your picture to music you like. That, notoriously, is what Woody Allen does, and it seems to be what writer/director Noah Baumbach has done for his film Margot at the Wedding. At 38 in the fall of 2007 when the movie came out, Baumbach was a bit more than half of Allen's age, however, and instead of being fascinated by the hot jazz of the 1920s and '30s, he seems to have great affection for the soft rock of the '70s and new wave/alternative rock of the '80s. That's what fills this soundtrack album, with the likes of Steve Forbert, Jorma Kaukonen (at his most lyrical), Alice Cooper (at his most sentimental), Gilbert O'Sullivan, and Stephen Bishop as examples of the former and Dinosaur Jr., X, Blondie, and the dB's as examples of the latter. The press release for the soundtrack says, "Music supervisor George Drakoulias and Noah Baumbach [who is credited as "soundtrack album producer"] put together a collection of songs that mimic the havoc created by Margot and her relationship with, well, everyone when she returns to her childhood home." That said, it should be noted that, while the songs Drakoulias and Baumbach chose for the soundtrack tend to date from the late '60s to the early '80s, the film is set in the present day of the mid-2000s. In addition to the well-known performers, they make a point of unearthing music by such cult figures as Evie Sands, Lesley Duncan, and Karen Dalton. And they also throw in a couple of contemporary ringers. The result is a disc that could almost be part of one of those Time-Life series on soft rock, if, that is, it had more hits. ~ William Ruhlmann, Rovi
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