Sweet Potatoes is a Mexican short film, directed by Rommel Villa, that is based on the life of Luis E. Miramontes, a Mexican chemist best known for his contribution to the synthesis of the main hormone used in early oral contraceptives. The score is written by US-based Danish composer Jesper Ankarfeldt, whose recent projects include music for the Netflix series, Ares. Ankarfeldt’s score for Sweet Potatoes is noteworthy on two counts. Firstly, he has written a couple of lovely themes which, though limited in their expression due to the movie’s subject and the film’s short running time, immediately draw the attention. And secondly – though this reason may be a little niche – the composer has captured the methodical, sometimes lonely, and almost always anonymous nature of the life of a laboratory scientist.
Ankarfeldt’s score opens with a couple of short cues that quickly establishes both the geographical location of the film (using acoustic guitar) and the overriding feel of the score – introspection and studiousness. Following this opening, “Doubts” brings the first tentative statement (on acoustic guitar and double bass) of what could be called a main theme. Even the appearance of this theme manages to reinforce the score’s tone and hints at the routine (or even boredom) that accompanies most of chemist’s day-to-day scientific endeavour. Spilling over into the following track, “Breakthrough”, the theme grows with the addition of strings and a quickening of the tempo as, presumably, Miramontes makes his crucial discovery and the realization of its importance dawns.
The mood of the score rarely lightens again: after the discoveries of “Breakthrough” low strings and tentative acoustic guitar now reinforce the religious and personal consequences of the discovery (the aspect of the story at the heart of the film). “Going To Church” is the score at its brightest. Sweet Potatoes’ ubiquitous guitar and strings now play an upbeat and jaunty theme that seems to offer strength to the community in general and to Miramontes in particular. But it is an oasis of lightness as the remainder of the subdued score plays to a conclusion. The “Credits” offers a lovely statement of the “Going To Church” theme.
Jesper Ankarfeldt has written a thoughtful little score for Villa’s film and his couple of themes are the main draw. Miramontes’ theme is restricted somewhat by the role it is designed to play and it would be nice to hear a more exuberant version as a stand-alone piece. Having said all of this, Sweet Potatoes – and the themes therein – is a score certainly worth your time.
And why is the film called Sweet Potatoes? The best that I could come up with was that the potato’s domestication appears to have originated in Central or South America (i.e., in the region of Mexico) and there does seem to be some sort of a link between the potato and fertility.
Rating: **½
- Abstinence (0:38)
- Radio (0:45)
- Doubts (1:11)
- Breakthrough (1:19)
- Diary (0:49)
- Working In Lab (1:37)
- Thrown Out (0:35)
- Candle (1:05)
- Going To Church (0:54)
- Signs (0:49)
- Rain (1:25)
- Credits (1:36)
- Pregnant (1:57)
- Baptism (2:40)
Running Time: 17:26
AvidPlay (2020)
Reel Music 