Updating a classic - Limp Bizkit, "Take a Look Around"

I'm not a movie person, but I'm a music person. And I realize that when you're updating a classic movie, or putting a classic TV show into movie form, the music can form a key part of the update. Do you retain the original feel of the music, do you junk it for something completely new, or do you moderate and take a middle path?

I submit to you Limp Bizkit, the pinnacle of moderation:



And the video's interesting too. But back to the music. ASCAP records the following information for "Take a Look Around":

TAKE A LOOK AROUND
(Title Code: 500694048)

Writers:
DURST WILLIAM FREDERICK
SCHIFRIN LALO

Performers:
LIMP BIZKIT

Variations:
THEME FROM M I 2
MISSION IMPOSSIBLE 2 THEME
M I 2 THEME
MI2 THEME
TAKE A LOOK AROUND (THEME FROM M: 1 2)
M:I-2
"M:I-2"

Publishers/Administrators:
SONY ATV HARMONY
% AMY CRANFORD
8 MUSIC SQUARE WEST
NASHVILLE , TN, 37203
Tel. (615) 743-1779

Contact ASCAP Clearance representative at (212)621-6160
for other publisher information.

In a nice little twist, the original theme is a BMI work:

MISSION IMPOSSIBLE THEME (Legal Title)
BMI Work #998226
Alternate Titles:
THEME FROM MISSION IMPOSSIBLE
MISSION IMPOSSIBLE THEME MISSI
Songwriter/Composer Current Affiliation CAE/IPI #
SCHIFRIN BORIS CLAUDIO BMI 27889341

Publishers
SONY/ATV MELODY BMI 538928114

Artists
ADAM CLAYTON AND LARRY MULLEN
ELFMAN DANNY
GRASS ROOTS
JAMES TAYLOR QUARTET
MICHAEL E JOHNSON AND THE KILLER BEES
MORELLO JOE
SAN DIEGO SYMPHONY AND LALO SCHIFRIN COND
SCHIFRIN LALO
VENTURES

But the songwriter was more than a TV theme hack:

Movie audiences may know Lalo Schifrin for his themes to Bullitt, Cool Hand Luke, Enter The Dragon, Rush Hour and Mission: Impossible, but jazz lovers know the pianist, arranger and composer as a master of orchestral works, such as his Gillespiana suite, written for his early idol and mentor, Dizzy Gillespie....

Boris Claudio Schifrin was born on June 21, 1932, into a musical family in Buenos Aires, Argentina....He was nicknamed "Lalo" in his youth, and legally adopted this name after he became a U.S. citizen in the 1960s.

This accounts for the differing names in the ASCAP and BMI catalogs.

After several years with Dizzy Gillespie, Schifrin relocated to Hollywood in 1964.

As his prominence in Hollywood grew, Schifrin shifted his attention away from jazz performance. But the best of his TV and film music retained a strong flavor from the many different shades of jazz Schifrin had mastered. "Mission: Impossible," Schifrin's most popular song, which ties "Take Five" as the most popular song in 5/4 time, as well as "Down Here On The Ground" from 1967's Cool Hand Luke, which was made popular by Wes Montgomery and Grant Green, and the entirety of the Bullitt soundtrack from 1968 stand side by side with Schifrin's best jazz work.

Of course, Durst (whoops, William Frederick Durst) and Limp Bizkit took that 5/4 song and...um...re-arranged it to 4/4 time. And then it made the soundtrack. A Tori Amos fan site collected several reviews of the soundtrack, including "Take a Look Around." Reviews varied:

There's not a single cut on this soundtrack to the second MISSION IMPOSSIBLE that could be described as "feel-good music"; in fact, most of it--a very au courant mix of extreme metal and rap--is typified by Limp Bizkit's effective bludgeoning of the familiar theme from the original TV show. [half.com]

Right: you're making an action film, and you need some bands to give you a kick-start. Are these the right bands? Well, the show opens with an explosive version of the main theme from Mission Impossible: 2, Take A Look Around by Limp Bizkit, a grunge, in-your-face mega-voyage through guitars, drums and a raging voice. [The Irish Times]

[Y]ou've got Fred Durst and company turning the usually compelling Mission: Impossible theme into a standard Limp Bizkit throwdown, with Durst ranting and railing against us rock critics who make poor Fred's life so miserable. [MTV.com]

To his credit, Limp Bizkit frontman Fred Durst offers up his own restrained, dreamy take on the Mission Impossible theme, until raging guitars kick in at the end. [Toronto Sun]

Limp Bizkit...twists the famous "Mission Impossible" theme into the surprisingly easy-to-digest rock/rap tune, "Take a Look Around"... [CDNOW.com]

Well, I liked it...