Sneakers is certainly a score worth owning. It is my hope, and that of others, that Horner still has it in himself to return to, and maybe even exceed his past glory days. With these days a few nice themes here and there, and a great deal of incidental music that sounds a great deal alike. Many pundits will argue, including myself, that while Horner's music fits well in films still, his great works are mostly in the past. He became hugely criticized for borrowing heavily from himself, and even others - he was successfully sued for plagarizing Nino Rota at one point. While Horner gives no real indication in interviews, a guess is that he exhausted himself, and felt a bit shunned by great accolades that he deserved (namely an Academy Award - which he later did earn for Titanic, an average score with a very nice theme) and figured why burn himself out on every moment of every score, when the music is often buried behind dialog and sound effects, and hardly anyone notices anyway? His scores became less innovative, and much, much more repetitive. That turning point ocurred during the early 90's. While he's has had some strong scores since Sneakers (Braveheart, Apollo 13, Titanic, Zorro) Sneakers is often considered the last film he scored in this era, and a turning point of sorts. So highly praised in music circles was he, that his name often popped up as someone to listen to by the contemporary classical world. He repeated a few phrases, and lifted from a few Classical composers (as many film scorers do), but there could be no doubt to his brilliance. And the soundtrack albums had almost no dead spots. Time and again he would write a score that both fit the film perfectly, covered an enormous range of styles, and posessed a powerful command of instruments and sounds.
It's as if during the 1980's Horner was an absolute pure genius with the midas touch, and once called the future of film scorers by Elmer Bernstein. "There is a peculiar dichotomy to the career of James Horner in the minds of many soundtrack audiophiles.
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