Film Score Monthly's 247th title (three more to go, folks!) is a keeper: the third-to-last score by Bernard Herrmann, for the 1974 horror flick It's Alive!
The score to the Larry Cohen film about a murderous infant (effects of which were designed by a young Rick Baker!) was part of a Herrmann renaissance; the composer had moved to England after a falling-out with Alfred Hitchcock over the score to Torn Curtain, but was championed and utilized by a younger crop of directors, including Francois Truffaut, Brian De Palma and Martin Scorsese. Like De Palma's Obsession after it, Herrmann pays some tribute to his works with Hitchcock, eschewing strings for a unique ensemble driven by brass and winds but maintaining the sort of short, semi-thematic motifs that were a hallmark of his work at the time.
This unlimited pressing of It's Alive is near complete (save an unrecovered five-second cue) and presented from mono masters in the Warner vaults. It's yours to order after the jump.
Bernard Herrmann, It's Alive! Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (Film Score Monthly Vol. 15, No. 2, 2012 - original film released 1974)
- It's Alive (Main Title)
- The Delivery/Something Small
- I'll See You in the Morning/The Father Returns Home/Cry Baby
- Murdered Boy/Getting Ready for Fishing Trip/The Milkman Goeth
- Frank Visits Basement
- Raid on the School
- Davis Arrives at School/Something in the Room
- Your Kid Goes Here
- Two Policemen/Another Victim
- Frank Refrigerates the Milk
- Restless Night/Where's Lenore?/Someone's Thirsty
- Where's Chris or Someone?
- Empty Fridge/Father Stalks Baby
- Father Continues Search
- Father Searches for Baby
- Charley's Dead
- The Big Search
- More Searching/Frank Waits
- Still More Searching/Police Pick Up Mother
- Father and Child/Father Protects Child
- Father Runs with Child/Father Keeps Running with Child
- Kill It/Sad Reunion/End Title
- Restless Night/Where's Lenore?/Someone's Thirsty (Alternate)
- Father Continues Search (Alternate)
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