One review of the film, Once Upon a Forest ends with the line "...it makes one long for animals whacking each other with sticks of dynamite," and having seen enough of the film to get a grasp of its fundamental message, I would be inclined to concur with the reviewer. It is quite unfortunate that James Horner has often been saddled with the least engaging animated films, especially since his contributions to the genre are unfailingly entertaining and have turned out to be some of his best scores. About the only aspect that lets him down are the often sickeningly twee songs and this turns out to be the case here. The bizarre thing is that the tunes themselves are often quite lovely, but when Will Jenning's soppy and unimaginative lyrics are added, together with a maudlin lead vocal and children's choral accompaniment, the results are on the wrong side of vomitous. The worst offenders here are Once Upon a Time With Me, which is a song version of the otherwise pleasing main theme, but as a song is just far too twee. Please Wake Up is given a tender, but ultimately quite patronizing rendition by Michael Crawford, while He's Back is one of Horner's comedy songs that similarly marred his otherwise wonderful American Tail scores.

Now the bad is out of the way, it is pleasing to note that the score is every bit as good as would be expected of a Horner score for an animation. The aforementioned main theme does indeed work much better as an instrumental where it just sounds lovely and gentle, rather than sickly. True, Horner piles on sugar with a chorus, but it's all done with such simple minded enthusiasm and sincerity that it's really quite hard to resist. It is even easier to enjoy because there are some really quite dark moments that make up for the sentiment. The Accident is a stirring action cue where the chorus turns quite a bit more threatening and some hefty brass are really quite imposing for a score which, up to that point, is quite gentle. Being Horner, there are plenty of hints of other scores, The Journey Begins has a few licks from Krull and a jaunty march that isn't entirely dissimilar to portions of Willow, plus other fleeting moments that recall his other animated scores, but they are more down to a similar style than obvious copying.

Despite the album's generous length, there is - save for the mediocre songs - rarely a weak moment in the score. Even when the tracks are long and subdued, Horner keeps everything moving with his pleasant, reasonably memorable and uncomplicated melodies, while interspersing these with more dramatic segments. Notable amongst these are Flying, which turns from playful to a little more threatening and leads into another impressive action cue, Escaping the Yellow Dragons. Maybe One Day reprises all the major themes for an unsurprisingly lush finale. A reprise, or more precisely, an exact repeat of Once Upon a Time With Me closes the album, but I would suggest stopping the player before it starts. For some reason, the album is quite hard to find these days and I suppose anyone with The Land Before Time, Pagemaster or An American Tail won't find a great deal new here, but that doesn't detract from its enjoyment value and certainly makes one wish that Horner would accept more animated assignments than he has done recently.

Rating ~

1. Once Upon A Time With Me (5:56)
   Performed by Florence Warner Jones and The New London Children's Choir
2. The Forest (9:11)
3. Cornelius's Nature Lesson (3:41)
4. The Accident (4:24)
5. Bedside Vigil (2:15)
6. Please Wake Up (2:36)
   Performed by Michael Crawford
7. The Journey Begins (8:08)
8. He's Back (2:00)
   Performed by Ben Vereen and The Andrae Crouch Singers
9. Flying (4:49)
10. Escaping From The Yellow Dragons - The Meadow (6:36)
11. Flying Home To Michelle (6:32)
12. The Children - Maybe One Day... Maybe One Day (4:41)
13. Once Upon A Time With Me - End Credits (5:56)
    Performed by Florence Warner Jones and The New London Children's Choir

Total Time ~ 66:45