The Sound of 007

This is an interesting watch as it tells you much of the inside story of the music of James Bond, but I am disappointed that the two songs of the franchise that have stayed with me the most are hardly mentioned.

1: "Tomorrow never dies" by Sheryl Crow. Being the wife/girlfriend of a government assassin would not be a comfortable place to be, and nothing captures the pathos of this situation more than this song. So it would relate to the plight of the Teri Hatcher character, and does so eloquently.

2: "You know my name" by Chris Cornell. Unmistakably Bond, but, also unmistakably new, like the film itself. Sets up the first appearance of Daniel Craig very nicely.

Whilst I found the Sound of 007 to be fascinating, insightful and compelling as a James Bond fan, and as a fan of all the music scores and theme songs from the past 60 years, it didn't completely satisfy my thirst for wanting to know about the musical origins of all the Bond films.

The works of John Barry and David Arnold are quite rightly covered in detail and celebrated as being most influential on the franchise but it didn't cover the lesser contributions of Bill Conti, Michael Kamen and Eric Serra. These were ominously overlooked and I really wanted to know more about these scores, or maybe that is just the completist coming out in me, but either way I felt it was a missed opportunity to make this a definitive documentary about the Bond music film by film. They could easily have stretched out the running time to 2 hours instead of 88 minutes by giving more even coverage to every film.

The Timothy Dalton era is almost completed omitted. Why were there no contributions from A-Ha or Gladys Knight? Even John Barry doesn't mention his score for The Living Daylights. Apart from that shortfall it is still worth a watch as there were many stories and facts I hadn't heard before from the many talented writers, performers and producers who created them.

Everyone has their favorite (and least favorite) Bond songs. This film looks not only at the songs, but at the scores that accompanied the films, although most of the attention is rightly given to the songs. A great amount of footage from older John Barry interviews is included (he passed away about 10 years prior) as well as Monty Norman, David Arnold, Thomas Newman, and Hans Zimmer. Zimmer, as the most recent composer, receives as much attention as Barry, likely due to the fact that this appears to have been produced alongside "No Time to Die."

Although the music is wonderful, and many of the stories behind the music are fascinating, the film tap dances around many of the musical Bond moments we'd rather forget. Some of the bottom tier songs are briefly mentioned as being less popular, but are mostly praised for being daring and brave. That they may be, but daring and bravery doesn't always result in success, so maybe they shouldn't pat themselves on the back so much. One exception to this rule is Madonna's song for "Die Another Day," which is so irredeemably bad that it is completely ignored, aside from a brief image of Madonna's face towards the end of the film. This was one of three films whose music was ignored entirely. Also ignored were the missteps in scoring, namely the disco laden score in "Live and Let Die" and the electronica score for Goldeneye. I'm all for celebrating the musical successes of James Bond, but the failures could have been very interesting to explore.

One of the darker aspects of Bond's musical history was the lawsuit regarding whether Norman or Barry deserved credit for the theme from "Dr. No." This hostility may have contributed to Barry's departure from the franchise, and is not even mentioned in the film. The story behind the creation of the theme at least offers a glimpse into how each man felt deserving of credit as the composer.

While the film briefly mentions some of the alternative songs that were considered, namely Radiohead's "Spectre," other notable songs were ignored. K. D. Lang's "Surrender" was composed for "Tomorrow Never Dies" by David Arnold, and the song was heavily referenced throughout the film's score. Since Sheryl Crow was a more bankable name, Lang's song was replaced and relegated to the end credits of the film. It's widely considered the better Bond song of the two, but neither song is mentioned in the film. Neither is "No Good About Goodbye," the song David Arnold was writing for Shirley Bassey to perform for "Quantum of Solace" before changing direction. She later approached Arnold and asked him to complete the song for her anyway. He did, and like "Tomorrow Never Dies" the original song that got replaced is often considered superior to the song that was finally chosen. As the only vocalist to perform three Bond songs, even the abandoned idea of writing a fourth song for her seems noteworthy, at least.

At 88 minutes, there was plenty of time to include notable stories such as these. It was a very enjoyable film through and through, despite its effort to maintain that everything was always so rosy. If only it had been willing to tell the full story, bruises and all, I'd have been willing to give it full marks, but an abridged documentary deserves an abridged rating.

John Barry wrote the most iconic music score in film history. Film and music have had an important integration that predates "talkies" when the only sound that came out were the musical scores played to fill the silence. Music sets the tone of films and amplifies the emotion of the scene, and has done so forever in movies. Try watching a film where the music score is eliminated and the difference is often startling.

No score is more identifiable than that composed and orchestrated by John Barry, who penned the immediately identifiable James Bond 007 theme. All one has to hear are the first handful of bass string electric guitar notes played to recognize it's the James Bond 007 movie theme. No other song is more connected to film.

'The Sound of 007" is the story behind how it all happened, and the amazing journey of artists and other composers, songs and performances involved over 60 YEARS!

Truly a worthwhile film to see, this is by a wide margin the best documentary on the subject, and a must-see for everyone interested in film and music arts.

👍👍

The documentary "The Sound of 007" enriches us with details about the construction and choices of songs/writers and performers for each of the James Bond films. Composer John Barry created the sound of James Bond, he mastered 11 of Bond's music scores. He invented the style and it was the basis of all other subsequent Bond movies.

Any of the 007 movies without the well-known opening theme doesn't sound like a James Bond movie. The theme became one of the main characters of the film, without it the film would be incomplete.

Aside from the opening theme, each Bond film brings the trademark of a song originally written to embrace the plot, this is for all 25 Bonds films.

The documentary focuses a bit more on the soundtracks from the 60s to the 90s and touches on the 2000s onwards. But the film manages to give a good view of how important a soundtrack is for the construction and identification of one character: BOND...James Bond!!!