Aldo Di MARCO
Sono Positivo
OST
CAM 496836-2 [39:03]
Occasionally we get scores for some pretty odd films to review on this site
but this one takes the biscuit! How anybody can make or enjoy a comedy about
being found HIV positive is beyond my comprehension. But the booklet notes
read, " I’m positive: in other words, how to discover to have AIDS and
live happily. After picking up his wife’s test results, the husband
discovers she is HIV positive. But then his test results are HIV positive
too as well as his gay brother-in-law…and also their freeloader friend.
Who started it and where did it come from? After a few initial stray moments
[I wonder what they were?], they all decide to face this new "reality" that
units them and discover that the important thing in order to be happy is
to be always true to oneself, following one’s own nature." The mind
boggles!
This is clearly a farce with, by the look of the stills, trousers dropping
at every opportunity.
Di Marco’s score is a frentic mix of many styles that can be usefully
categorized as easy listening. Commendably it starts off with a few bars
of menacing music in the style of John Williams’s Jaws presumably as
a warning of the dire consequences of getting AIDS.
This soon segues into 1960’s/’70s pop style material that is laced
with some more mock horror synth music. Then there is a kaleidoscopic mix
of source material from what appear to be earlier film soundtracks with music
that is mostly Latin. There are Cha Cha Chas, one of which has the extraordinary
title of ‘I am not Fred Astaire’, Tangos, Mexican and Caribbean
(complete with steel drums) pieces, proud Spanish rhythms, really exotic
Latin numbers -- some that are catchy some that are slinky. There is a cue
that is a take off of Morricone’s Westerns scores. There is even some
nice relaxed romantic music for guitar.
A mixed bag for a film that would seem to have to work hard to win against
its tawdry theme
Reviewer
Ian Lace
