Score: A Film Music Documentary Page #8

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[BROUCEK] There's a brutality

about the way

that the orchestra plays.

There's a violence, if you will.

An aggression.

There's an intensity about it,

an intensity about how it's written,

an intensity

about how it's played.

["GLADIATOR" "NOW YOU

ARE FREE" BEGINS]

The single female voice

of Lisa Gerard in that film,

on top of the visceral

power of the orchestra

Really had an impact

on the audience.

I will see you again.

But not yet. Not yet.

[LISA GERARD VOCALIZING]

We had this idea. It had

to be a woman's voice.

[VOCALIZING CONTINUES]

Why do you want a woman's voice

in a gladiator movie?

The next day we came in, and there

was that hand on the wheat Field.

And that shot holds

for a minute.

If you have written

that in the script

it wouldn't have even made

it to being shot.

Why would you hold your hand

on the wheat Field?

The only way that shot can

work was because of the music,

because of Lisa's voice.

But it sort of gave license

for the rest of the movie

to be a little bit more poetic

and to be a little bit

more expansive.

[LEMONE] It really, I think,

elevated the whole experience,

and it shaped the sound

of Hollywood for years afterwards.

Now we're in the Hans

Zimmer era.

It just looms over everything.

[DEBNEY] This is why

he's a revolutionary.

Hans took the string section

and made them like a guitar.

They're playing rhythm.

[IMITATES STRING SECTION]

And that's a really

interesting thing.

I don't think anybody

had really done that.

["PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN"

THEME MUSIC PLAYS]

"Pirates." it's like Led

Zeppelin.

It's like freaking Led Zeppelin

played by an orchestra.

[THEME MUSIC CONTINUES]

What Hans has certainly

done on "Dark Knight"

is obviously blur this line

between this giant symphonic

sound and electronics

and you're not quite sure where

one ends and the other begins.

The sort of light,

repetitive string ostinatos.

You hear that so often.

["THE DARK KNIGHT" MAIN THEME]

It's just all about

this constant pulse going on.

[DEBNEY]

Terribly powerful.

Terribly exciting.

[KRAFT] Hans Zimmer is still-

he's a legend and still

becoming more legendary.

["INCEPTION" THEME MUSIC PLAYS]

[BROUCEK] The end of "Inception,"

it's like a new morning.

When he gets home, he's going

to be reunited with his family

for real, in reality.

You're led in one direction

like it's going to be okay.

Hans Zimmer's score really

washes over you in waves.

Then the music just piles it on.

[THEME MUSIC CONTINUES]

The camera pans down and you're

left with a big question.

[MUSIC GROWS QUIETER]

Wow, music adds

quite a bit here.

[HOLKENBORG] We've seen

over the last five, six years

where people that are not

film composers

were asked by a director

to do something unique.

Like Trent Reznor

and Atticus Ross.

And I think these

are really good examples

where people just

really love people

that have an artist's career

in the world outside of film scoring

can bring so much authenticity

in music and sound to the picture.

["THE SOCIAL NETWORK"

THEME MUSIC PLAYS]

[BECK] The sounds they're using

are extremely contemporary.

[KRAFT] Their score

for "The Social Network"

it's an emotional palette. It's a very

disturbing kind of lyrical piano.

It's human, but it's technical.

It's emotionally dark,

but it's got some feeling to it.

[REZNOR] When David

Fincher called,

"Hey, I want you to score

my next film." F*** yeah.

"It's a movie about Facebook."

I would be hard-pressed to think

of something that sounded less sexy.

And we were shuffling the deck

trying things that didn't

feel intuitive.

Talking about changing

the temperature of a movie

and the emotional

response of the audience.

Radically different.

[REZNOR] The whole movie

feels different after that.

I think it feels like a much

more important film

than the kind of "Ah,

college life, tomfoolery"

that it could have been misled

into feeling with the wrong

music in there.

And ever since that point, there

are a lot more electronic

artists doing film scores.

Electronic production,

and engineering

and a whole different

way of looking at music

that is often much

more visceral.

Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross

for "The Social Network."

[HOLKENBORG] I think it's totally

deserved that Trent Reznor

not only got nominated but also

won an Oscar for score.

It's completely deserved.

When you have an unconventional

image with unconventional sound,

like with a lot of the things

Trent and Atticus are doing,

the results can really

be so much greater

than the sum of their parts.

What the net result

of that is, you know,

in some ways is sort

of beautiful chaos.

Film music has changed,

fairly radically.

There's far more

experimentation.

There's far more freedom and inviting

artists who would never have

thought of doing a film score

and nobody would have thought

of doing a film score before.

And to me that's really

exciting.

Technology has made it possible

for every composer to be

a producer, as well.

At the core of it,

though, is the tune.

For this one is the only cue

that I feel

that we still need

to work a little bit.

It happens to be

the opening of the movie.

So, if we can get like this

our orchestral

ukulele, so to speak,

in a very simple Very like

plink, plink, plink,

plink, plink.

- Like that way, yup.

- Flies it by, yeah.

Very, very kinda sweet.

One, two, three and

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Can we do it okay.

Can we do it so your nails

go on top of the string,

so it's kind of dirty.

So you plink, plink, plink,

yes, yes.

[STRINGS PLAYING]

The cellos now.

An amazing sound.

- Happy?

- I'm more than happy, man.

I'm like hypnotized.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Yeah, yeah.

Whoo-hoo!

Man, this is some

powerful stuff.

Beautiful.

I just wanna thank you again

because you are amazing,

and what a privilege

it is for a musician,

like myself, to have you

guys playing my music.

So, thank you very much.

Thank you, heitor.

Film music is essentially

a recorded art.

Once you have the recording,

then you're into mixing,

the more technological

part of the production.

[JABLONSKY] Before the music

leaves my studio,

I just give it

one last final mix

to make sure everything

that I want to be heard is heard.

Every element needs

some amount of attention

to create the overall

feel that you want.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

So that's That's his main

little melody.

Very simple, because he's a big

simple, evil dude.

So there's a point where, it's a really

dramatic moment in the film.

Up until this point in the music

I didn't have any French horns,

so I introduced them.

[FRENCH HORNS PLAYING]

You probably can't

even hear them.

I can hear them because I know

what they're playing, but

Okay, so, now simply

mixing them up a bit.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Every time I played that just

then, they were there.

When I turn the horns down,

I don't feel

that emotional peak.

Now there's 50 foot robots

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