08. Art & Doddy Todd “Song Of Love” from “Trance”
Boyle’s latest, “Trance,” is a hallucinogenic mind-bender that concerns a stolen painting, a love triangle, and the dark heart beating inside even the most seemingly ordinary of men (a favorite theme of his) – a return to the bleak terrain that made him famous after spending a couple of movies examining relatively sunny scenarios (Aron might have cut his arm off but at least he got out of the damn canyon). The movie centers around an unscrupulous auction house security guard (James McAvoy), who after being knocked unconscious during a robbery (a robbery, it should be noted, he helped engineer), forgets the particulars of the crime (something his confederates, led by Vincent Cassel, are none-too-thrilled with). The gangsters enlist the help of an unnaturally beautiful hypnotist (Rosario Dawson), who tries to unlock his secrets subconsciously. Part of how she does that is by asking him to imagine a day with a beautiful young woman with “an old song” playing on the radio – the old song being this obscure gem, Art & Doddy Todd‘s “Song of Love.” It’s a beautiful little pop song, one that plays during one of the gauzy dream sequences. Once again, the reason it works so well is that it not only contrasts so strongly with the rest of the inky-hued movie, which includes fingernail-extracting torture and nudity, but that it also sharply contrasts with the score by Rick Smith, which is mostly droning electronic propulsion (he cowrites a pop song for the end credits that features Emilie Sande that is gorgeous, but talking about the ending of this movie is downright treasonous). Like the fantasy sequences themselves, the song lulls you into a false sense of tranquility and when you’re ripped out of that world, things are even grittier and more violent.
The 10 Best Music Moments In Danny Boyle’s Movies
