This is a great collection, both on its own terms and in its relationship to the film it soundtracks; it's one of those soundtracks whose constituent pieces seem continually to be echoing and referring to each other, and so it has the unity so necessary to records of this kind. Disc 1 contains most of the 'songs' - energetic post-punk and new-wave pop for the most part - while disc 2 is more contemplative and weighted towards the ambient, moody soundscapes of Aphex Twin, Air, Squarepusher, etc.
Part of the reason it works so well is that, while the music is essentially contemporary, it's also in a certain way unmoored from its own historical referents by the fact that the most recognisable of it was contemporary some 20 or 30 years ago (rather than right now), so that when it appears in the setting of a 'historical' film set in the 18th century, there's a sort of doubling - a ghostly mirroring - of the effect of strange familiarity. That is, if the music were thoroughly and recognisably of the post-millennial moment (or a more bowerbird-esque cherrypick of the history of popular music à la Moulin Rouge), transposed to 18th century Versailles, the effect could have ranged from jarring and thoroughly incongruous through to hyper-real and totally Up To Date, but the effect which is in fact wrought by the choice of New Order, Adam & the Ants, the Cure and so on - a distinctly backwards looking but nonetheless revisionistic reinvention - would probably not have been possible. The refractive effect of the 'period' songs is, too, augmented by the dreaminess of the instrumental and downbeat electronic works and their intersheaving with a couple of 'classical' extracts.
As to specifics, the string part grafted on to the beginning of Siouxsie & the Banshees' "Hong Kong Garden", which opens the record, followed by the pell-mell of the song itself, sets the mood; the opening bars of "What Ever Happened" vividly bring back the scene they track, as does "Ceremony" (which I've listened to most, even though it's not new to me); the appearance of "Plainsong" in the film caused an intake of breath on my part when it crashed in (and reminded me of the grandeur and majesty of the song); and the nicest of the new songs (which, though new, very much partake of the same mood and aesthetic) are Windsor for the Derby's "The Melody of a Fallen Tree", the Radio Dept's "Keen On Boys" (which I thought was JAMC when I heard it in the film) and Squarepusher's "Tommib Help Buss" (echoing the track on the Lost In Translation soundtrack).
This is basically the only thing I've listened to over the last few days; evidently I need to watch Marie Antoinette again, and soon.
