Hollywood, Mon Amour Issue #39

s/t

By Maya Kroth
Published: March 1st, 2009 | 2:49pm

French composer Marc Collin, one of the masterminds behind Nouvelle Vague, is among the few who believe there’s a legion of underappreciated songs buried on the soundtracks to films of the 1980s — songs that, if you just peeled back the synths and day-glo, would show themselves to be true works of art.

This 16-track collection tackles movie songs like Blondie’s “Call Me,” the theme from Arthur, and The Breakfast Club’s signature “Don’t You Forget About Me,” and attempts to reinvent them into transcendent modern masterpieces. Sometimes, it works: Collin’s rearranged “Footloose,” voiced by Cibelle, is a toe-tapping gem that’s three parts Andrews Sisters, one part Cabaret; his spacious, molasses-slow “Flashdance…What a Feeling” is heartbreaking when French-Israeli singer Yael Naim urges, “Take your passion / Make it happen.”

Other times the experiment falls flat, like on Juliette Lewis’ take on Bowie’s “This Is Not America,” originally written for The Falcon and the Snowman. With Nouvelle Vague, Collin showed a penchant for a certain kind of female vocal: girly, subtle, and demure, none of which come naturally to Lewis. Katrine Ottosen’s voice, on the other hand, is just sultry enough to match Collin’s spare, lounge-y arrangement of “Eye Of The Tiger,” and Inga’s broke-down sandpaper rasp on “Take My Breath Away” is precisely the thing to scrape the gloss off the saccharine original.

For better or worse, Collin’s approach unhooks these soundtrack cuts from their cinematic contexts and forces a closer look at the songs themselves. Beneath the Lycra and the Aqua Net, Collin finds chords and melodies that are poignant and timeless.