composed by George S. Clinton

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I’m making this page June 17th, 2021, 74th birthday

of George Stanley Clinton. Happy Birthday, GSC!!

 

George, from Tennessee, had the roots of his career based in

Nashville. He began scoring films around the turn of the ’80s,

though not being such a great big cinema-phile myself, and enjoying my own small circle of movies and other entertainment, I’m familiar with a mere two relative hits he scored... well, okay, three, technically: ’95’s Mortal Kombat... its unspeakably abysmal sequel, Annihilation, from ’97... and the film from which I gleaned this piece, also from the year 1997, Beverly Hills Ninja. The fact that I’d choose this particular chunk of score for Mr. Clinton’s birthday tribute probably indicates my small circle of immediate interest. So sue me; BHN’s fun.

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My tastes can be semi-eclectic depending on the subject matter and nuance therein—as can pretty much anyone’s, I suppose—and I’ve always had something of a taste for simplistic, gratuitous and not always super-sophisticated comedy. Chris Farley, rest his soul, always had a talent for comedically giving the American public what they so eagerly wanted, since his early ’90s SNL days (“...van down by the river,” anyone?). Actually, speaking of the early ’90s, a couple of the very first projects in which I saw Chris were both Wayne’s World movies, in which he played very different bit parts. As he and other comics helped demonstrate, it wasn’t terribly difficult to be funny in the ’90s; basically, just SCREAM amusing things with finessed timing, and boom: you’re hilarious.

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For director Dennis Dugan, BHN followed Happy Gilmore (and preceded Big Daddy), so he’s clearly skilled at delivering a big broad hearty comedy. And though it wasn’t Chris’ last movie, it was his last to be released non-posthumously. Besides also being scored by GSC, BHN has another easily notable similarity with Mortal Kombat: both are martial arts films featuring the talents of Hong Kong-American Robin Shou (who played Liu Kang in MK and Chris Farley’s “brother” Gobei in BHN). In my List, I’ve got the “Mortal Kombat Theme” in there as an entry, by George S. Clinton, although what I later realized, and fixed, was that that distinctive piece—which most listeners know even if they’ve not seen MK—is actually entitled “Techno Syndrome” (7” Mix) by The Immortals. So I cannot technically attribute that one to George, or use it here as his birthday tribute (as much as I’d like to).

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EMI put out the Beverly Hills Ninja soundtrack, which contained each song used in the film except for “Gimme All Your Lovin’” by ZZ Top. One of my absolute all-time favorites is in there too, “Tarzan Boy” by Baltimora. As well, it also included a piece of BHN score called “The End”... but not “Great White Ninja.” So this one was a pure download rip. This piece was used twice in the film that I can bring to mind: in the opening training montage depicting Haru (Chris’ character) to be the absolute bumbler he is as opposed to the actually talented ninjas, and 2/3 of the way through, as his Sensei decides he is a real ninja after all, and is truly worthy of the quest he’s on.

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Have notes to add? Let me know!

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YT:

full version