About the movie

One of Travolta’s recent megahits, even though this movie is mostly fake in its exploitation of human emotions. The storyline also seems to borrow a lot of its ideas from the dubious Scientology-sect of which Travolta is a prominent member. Travolta plays the part of a simple workman in nowhereville USA, who encounters some sort of UFO, and subsequently starts growing smarter until he is a genious who doesn’t need to sleep. The movie has its touching moments, but the finale is somewhat of an anti-climax.

Starring John Travolta, Kyra Sedgwick, Forest Whitaker and Robert Duvall.
Produced by Barbara Boyle and Michael Taylor.
Directed by Jon Turteltaub.

About the music

The bad news: no score-CD is available with Newman's awesome music for this movie. The soundtrack contains only one track (The Orchard) by Newman, and while it's a pretty energetic and beautifully orchestrated piece of music, it isn't even the main theme from the movie. The good news: there was a cassette of the score that was sent out to the Academy's Music Branch voting members. It runs about 23 minutes and while it isn't generally available to the public, it shouldn't be that hard to find on CD-R or at online auction sites such as eBay. The Main Title from Phenomenon was rerecorded by Joel McNeely for his third collection of Hollywood themes, Hollywood '96. The Main Title begins with a lush pastoral Americana theme for clarinet, harp and strings, similar to Newman's themes for How to Make an American Quilt and Fried Green Tomatoes and the love theme from Little Women; it fits the athmosphere of the southern village where the story takes place perfectly. The second part of the Main Title changes the mood dramatically, with a cool and energetic theme for accoustic and electric guitar and electronics as Travolta's character is introduced. The melody is happy, care-free, much like Travolta in the movie. The track on the soundtrack, The Orchard, is a rhythmic piece of chase music, as the villagers try to find a missing boy. It combines the rhythm of the bodhran-drums, accoustic guitars, ethnic flutes and, of course, electronics to great effect.

The soundtrack

Street date: July 1996.
Availability: in print.

The track Phenomenon was included on Hollywood '96 (VSD-5764), Joel McNeely's third CD of Hollywood themes, recorded with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra.

A promotional score-only cassette was released to promote Newman's score for the Academy Awards. Click here for more information.

A bootleg CD-R of this promo cassette is available on the collector's market.

This score received a BMI Film Music Award in 1997.

Track listing

1. Eric Clapton: Change The World (3:56)
2. Bryan Ferry: Dance With Life (6:14)
3. Aaron Neville Featuring Robbie Robertson: Crazy Love (4:30)
4. Taj Mahal: Corinna (3:00)
5. Jewel: Have A Little Faith In Me (4:24)
6. Peter Gabriel: I Have The Touch (5:26)
7. Marvin Gaye: Piece Of Clay (5:11)
8. The Iguanas: Para Donde Vas (3:18)
9. Dorothy Moore: Misty Blue (3:39)
10. J. J. Cale: A Thing Going On (2:38)
11. The Orchard (2:33)