Henry Mancini

You wouldn't think that a run-of-the-mill sci-fi/horror flick like Lifeforce (1985) would deserve to have its soundtrack expanded into a two-CD set running close to two-and-a-half hours, but the film has an involved history that explains the indulgence. Based on Colin Wilson's 1976 novel -The Space Vampires, Lifeforce was produced by Cannon Films, an exploitation studio that apparently was hoping to score a mainstream success on the order of Alien or Poltergeist by upping its usual budget somewhat and hiring some name talent. That included co-screenwriter Dan O'Bannon of Alien, director Tobe Hooper of Poltergeist, and famed Hollywood composer Henry Mancini. Mancini might have been better known for pop songs such as "Moon River," but he had worked on science fiction movies in his younger days. Cannon seems to have felt that the resulting picture as submitted was a little too prestigious, or maybe just too long and not scary enough, because the studio re-cut it, trimming 15 minutes, from 116 to 101 for theatrical release. Mancini was asked to come back and revise his score, but he was on to his next project, and Michael Kamen was brought in instead. The 34 minutes of music on the soundtrack LP released by Varèse Sarabande Records was all Mancini's, however. When Lifeforce was released on Laserdisc, and later on DVD, Hooper's original cut was restored, along with Mancini's score. The expanded version of the soundtrack album, released in a limited edition of 3000 copies, begins with the 82 minutes of the Mancini score as it was heard in the film, followed by Kamen's 19 minutes of additions to the altered version, and then the music from the soundtrack LP as it was released in 1985. What all this reveals is that Mancini was going more for a Star Wars/Raiders of the Lost Ark style, à la John Williams, than a horror score, particularly on the old LP version, which features long suites. The actual film score does correspond more to the contours of the movie's plot, with its passages of tension and violence. Kamen mixes orchestral and synthesized elements, and his music sounds more like what might be expected of a horror movie. But it's the two versions of Mancini's scoring that will interest film music fans on what remains an atypical project for the composer, but one he clearly put a great deal of effort into. ~ William Ruhlmann, All Music Guide