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Entries in Score (5)

Wednesday
Apr212021

Emile Mosseri: The king of 2020's film music

by Cláudio Alves

He may have only been composing film scores since 2016, but Emile Mosseri has quickly become one of the most exciting composers in today's Hollywood. At least, he's got a prime spot on my list of ones-to-watch. Two years ago, he made a big splash with the hauntingly beautiful compositions for The Last Black Man in San Francisco. Joe Talbot's delicate tone poem about a city and its people earned much critical acclaim and even a couple of awards for the young composer. Flash forward to today, and Mosseri's at the top of the world, having conquered his first Oscar nomination for Minari. What's more, that wasn't even the only masterful score he delivered in 2020…

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Monday
Dec282020

Can Reznor and Ross make Oscar history?

by Cláudio Alves


In 2008, the music branch of the Academy caused a stir when it announced that The Dark Knight was disqualified from the Best Original Score race. The reason for this had nothing to do with the use of non-original compositions as it's often the case. Instead, AMPAS had deemed that the picture had too many composers. In total, there were five credited artists – Hans Zimmer, James Newton Howard, Alex Gibson, Mel Wesson, and Lorne Balfe. Even though the first two did most of the soundtrack and the remaining three signed affidavits relinquishing their chance at a nod, the Academy didn't budge.

Since then, rules have changed and then changed back again. Still, the presence of collaborative teams on the Academy's lists of nominees remains rare. In the past decade, only The Social Network, Lion, and Her have earned nominations for featuring the credited work of multiple composers. The first example even won Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross the Oscar. The erstwhile Nine Inch Nails members are back in contention this year. Thanks to Mank and Soul, they might become the first such team to receive a double nomination, effectively competing against themselves…

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Thursday
Dec032020

Ludovico Einaudi on the big screen

by Cláudio Alves


After its premiere in Venice and the Golden Lion victory, Chloé Zhao's Nomadland has quickly become one of the most talked-about and most critically acclaimed films of 2020. Personally, I can't wait to watch the nomadic drama starring Frances McDormand, though I'm uncertain when the picture will be coming to Portugal. For the cinephiles of the USA, however, Nomadland is being theatrically released tomorrow, December 4th. If you feel safe enough to do so and it's playing nearby, you can venture into the cinema and experience Zhao's new film.

Meanwhile, I'll wait and let my expectations ferment and grow like some metaphorical sourdough starter. While much has been written about the picture's sweeping landscapes, intriguing narrative, and applause-worthy performances, I confess the singular element I'm most excitingly anticipating is its music. Specifically, Ludovico Einaudi's latest film score…

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Friday
Oct172014

Birdman's Beating Heart: An Interview with Composer Antonio Sanchez

Birdman, the pitch-black comedy from Alejandro Gonzalez Iñárritu that recently took the festival circuit by storm, opens in theaters today. Among its most distinctive and arresting features is its drum-based score, composed by Grammy-winning jazz drummer Antonio Sanchez. A classically trained musician considered by both critics and peers to be among the foremost drummers, bandleaders and composers in contemporary jazz, the Mexico City native had never scored a film before his partnership with Iñárritu. Margaret caught up with him to discuss the project. The soundtrack was released on October 14, on Milan records.

Margaret: Since you’re a first time film composer, how did you get involved with Birdman

ANTONIO SANCHEZ: I met Alejandro [Gonzalez Iñárritu] a few years back—there’s a very famous jazz guitar player that I play with a lot named Pat Metheney—and Alejandro has been a big Pat Metheney fan for a long time. In fact, the first time I ever heard Pat Metheney was in Mexico City when Alejandro used to DJ this radio show back in the day.

Margaret: No way!

ANTONIO SANCHEZ: He had a radio show on WFM 96.9 in Mexico City that played really hip, modern music-- music you would not normally hear on Mexican radio stations. I became a fan really fast.

Years later I was playing with Pat Metheney in L.A., and Alejandro came to the concert. I met him afterward, we really hit it off, and we kept in touch. Last year he called me to say he was going to shoot a film in the next couple months and was thinking that the perfect film score would be just drums, solo drums. And while of course I was interested, I had no idea how it was going to work. Like you said, it was my first time scoring a film, and also just drums? I had no idea how that would sound 

[Dreams of EGOT & Internal Monologues after the jump...]

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Monday
Aug052013

Burning Questions: Movie Killing Scores?

Michael C. here to take a cue from the Summer movie season and release the first Burning Questions sequel. 

The story goes that at the eleventh hour the original score to Chinatown was deemed a film-ruining disaster and composer Jerry Goldsmith was brought in and given just ten days to write a replacement.  Miraculously, the score Goldsmith delivered turned out to be the quintessential film noir soundtrack. When the AFI listed the 100 greatest film scores Goldsmith’s trumpet-laced masterwork ranked #9. So a happy ending, which is one of the rare times when that phrase can be used in conjunction with Chinatown.

This is a terrific example of the filmmakers having the resources – and more importantly the will – to strive for perfection even if it meant taking a risk late in production. We’ve all heard enough terrible soundtracks to know tales such as this are bound to be the exception rather than the rule. Perhaps commissioning a new score would be too much of a hassle or too big an expense. Maybe the filmmakers in question are blind to the damage the music is doing to their movies. Then there are those unfortunate cases which are merely the victims of their times. Today’s trendy soundtrack is tomorrow’s time capsule punchline.

These musical misfires are the subject of today’s column. A few months back I posted a colum asking for the names of great soundtracks wasted on lousy movies. This time it’s the opposite question: Which scores are movie killers? I’m talking soundtracks that seriously distract and detract from otherwise quality movies. 

I’ll get the ball rolling with these three unfortunate cases that never fail to aggravate me:

Ladyhawke (Score by Andrew Powell)
I chose Ladyhawke as a particularly odious offender, but really, on the subject of disastrous scores, one could simply type “The 80’s” and move on. So many of that decade’s artificial, synth-heavy scores that have aged like rotten fruit, stinking up countless otherwise strong movies. (Manhunter, I’m looking in your direction) Ladyhawke’s music is so bad I wonder if the film would actually work better as a silent film. Or hit the subtitles and play a classical music channel on Pandora. Any random shuffle has got to be an improvement 

Planes, Trains, and Automobiles (Score by Ira Newborn)
This is also an eighties title, but I think it’s such a uniquely awful case of a score bringing an otherwise terrific comedy to a screeching halt that it deserved to be singled out. Exhibit A on why experimental scores and comedy rarely go together and why you should never, ever mix snippets of the film’s dialogue into the score.

Eyes Wide Shut (Score by Jocelyn Pook)
I have struggled with this title since it came out, but if there is one thing that will always stand between me and fully appreciating this fascinating waking nightmare of a movie it is that godforsaken plink-plink-plink piano score. I can imagine a psycho killer from Hannibal using this music to torture a victim tied up in their basement. Before you say it, yes, I freely admit that this may have been exactly what Kubrick was going for, but even if I believed this to be true (I don’t) it would make no difference. The music is viscerally alienating in a way that bypasses the intellect entirely, like jackhammers or squeaky balloons. Just thinking abou it sets me on edge.

Previous Burning Questions
You can follow Michael C. on Twitter at @SeriousFilm. Or read his blog Serious Film