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A.I.: Artificial Intelligence [Original Motion Picture Soundtrack]

John Williams - CD

A.I.: Artificial Intelligence John Williams CD
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  • Artist: John Williams
  • Format: CD
  • Year: 2001
  • UPC: 093624809623
  • Item Number: WEA480962
  • Release date: 05/19/2009
  • 1. The Mecha World
  • 2. Abandoned in the Woods
  • 3. Replicas
  • 4. Hide and Seek
  • 5. For Always
  • 6. Cybertronics
  • 7. The Moon Rising
  • 8. Stored Memories and Monica's Theme
  • 9. Where Dreams Are Born
  • 10. Rouge City
  • 11. The Search for the Blue Fairy
  • 12. The Reunion
  • 13. For Always (Duet)
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A.I.: Artificial Intelligence [Original Motion Picture Soundtrack] by John Williams on CD


For his 17th collaboration with director Steven Spielberg, film composer John Williams finds himself in familiar territory. Though drawn from the unmade project pile of director Stanley Kubrick, A.I. Artificial Intelligence, with its science-fiction theme and central character of a child, is strongly reminiscent of previous Spielberg/Williams works, none more than E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, with which it even shares a similarity of title. Once again, Williams is able to explore his gentler and more lyrical musical nature, though he doesn't have as much of an opportunity for the kind of lush, heroic melodies he has enjoyed in the Star Wars and Indiana Jones movies. Here, his major influences seem to be contemporary classical composer Philip Glass and new age music. Glass' style is heard in the film's main theme, "The Mecha World," which employs short, quickly repeated notes in percussive patterns running up and down the scale. Williams adds other elements to the pattern in "Abandoned in the Woods," and by the third track, "Replicas," has gone to an ambient sound that recalls much new age music. "Hide and Seek" is delicate and charming, and after the more demonstrative "The Moon Rising," there are several cues featuring the wordless vocals of Barbara Bonney. "For Always," a song with lyrics by Cynthia Weil that is presented in both a solo version sung by Lara Fabian and a duet version by Fabian and Josh Groban, is attractive but emotionally distant and unlikely to score a hit for the composer. Nevertheless, this is one of Williams' better scores, and all the better for managing to find such an appealing tone while remaining true to the film's remote, wistful themes. ~ William Ruhlmann, Rovi
  • Artist: John Williams
  • Format: CD
  • Year: 2001
  • UPC: 093624809623
  • Item Number: WEA480962
  • Release date: 05/19/2009
  • Label: Warner Bros., Warner Sunset
  • Genre: Film Music, Soundtrack
  • Style: Film Music, Soundtracks
  • Album Time: 70:07
  • Album Type: Soundtrack

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  • A.I.: Artificial Intelligence John Williams CD
A.I.: Artificial Intelligence John Williams CD

Editorial Reviews

A.I. is a heady but surprisingly mournful blend of styles from two filmmakers whose disparate artistic points-of-view mix uncomfortably yet produce fascinating results. This highly anticipated science fiction fable is a somber meeting of Pinocchio (1940) and the dystopian visions of humankind's downfall that fueled such futuristic films as Soylent Green (1973), Logan's Run (1976), and Blade Runner (1982). Despite the obvious parallels with the Disney feature, this emotionally wrenching picaresque is a lot closer in cynical spirit to the latter films, the story's dim view of humanity's woes astonishing coming from director Steven Spielberg, whose tastes until recently ran to the sickly sentimental. Blame it on Stanley Kubrick, whose sardonic take on humankind might have made this long-simmering but aborted project even darker still, had he lived to complete it. His and Spielberg's world views are ill-suited bedfellows and the final result shows it: depressing but poignant, by turns silly and heartbreaking, with an ending that will either leave viewers giddy with awe or giggling with glee (or both). Still, while the film unfolds schizophrenically, it also benefits from this multiple-personality aesthetic by creating a welcome, though never quite satisfied, ache for the hero's woes to be assuaged. Spielberg sets viewers up for rousing psychological completion à la E.T. (1982), but channeling Kubrick, he heads for a slightly different destination. So it is that in an age when all films must, according to corporate dictates, end happily or in buckets of tears, the quiet dignity of the film's final curtain call is a stunner. Notice must be paid to young actor Haley Joel Osment, probably the best child actor since Jodie Foster and one of a miniscule handful ever to succeed on acting talent and not apple-cheeked, adorable precocity. A.I. is not the classic it should have been, but it's one of the most unusual, eccentrically enchanting films of either director's resumé, and probably the biggest-budgeted experimental film ever made. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide