Eric_JWFAN

Back when I saw Joker in the theater I absolutely hated the score, almost as much as I hated Dunkirk. After it won the Golden Globe last night, I decided to give it a second chance and so I listened to the entire OST by itself first thing when I got up this morning.  Oy.  This is a terrible excuse for a film score. No variety throughout the entire thing, zero melody, zero creativity with the orchestration, no rhythmic movement whatsoever, it's basically a bunch of time-wasting long notes sustained in the strings with some added sound design type stuff. Hans Zimmer would be proud. I swear there are student composers with better writing ability than this. But of course, my non-composer friends will all tell me it was an INCREDIBLE soundtrack and that I just don't "get it". 

I've learned that film composers who write like this and take this easy way out (with long 1-note string cues and sound design gimmicks) aren't doing so because they think it's the right artistic choice, but rather because they don't have the proper compositional ability to write anything better.  And the sad thing is, we now have to spend the next two months hearing about what a masterpiece this score is and how this woman from Iceland is actually a musical genius. I really hate these award shows. 
 

Back when I saw Joker in the theater I absolutely hated the score, almost as much as I hated Dunkirk. After it won the Golden Globe last night, I decided to give it a second chance and so I listened to the entire OST by itself first thing when I got up this morning.  Oy.  This is a terrible excuse for a film score. No variety throughout the entire thing, zero melody, zero creativity with the orchestration, no rhythmic movement whatsoever, it's basically a bunch of time-wasting long notes sustained in the strings with some added sound design type stuff. Hans Zimmer would be proud. I swear there are student composers with better writing ability than this. But of course, my non-composer friends will all tell me it was an INCREDIBLE soundtrack and that I just don't "get it". 

I've learned that film composers who write like this and take this easy way out (with long 1-note string cues and sound design gimmicks) aren't doing so because they think it's the right artistic choice, but rather because they don't have the proper compositional ability to write anything better.  And the sad thing is, we now have to spend the next two months hearing about what a masterpiece this score is and how this woman from Iceland is actually a musical genius. I really hate these award shows. 
 

Back when I saw Joker in the theater I absolutely hated the score, almost as much as I hated Dunkirk. After it won the Golden Globe last night, I decided to give it a second chance and so I listened to the entire OST by itself first thing when I got up this morning.  Oy.  This is a terrible excuse for a film score. No variety throughout the entire thing, zero melody, zero creativity with the orchestration, no rhythmic movement whatsoever, it's basically a bunch of time-wasting long notes sustained in the strings with some added sound design type stuff. Hans Zimmer would be proud. I swear there are student composers with better writing ability than this. But of course, my non-composer friends will all tell me it was an INCREDIBLE soundtrack and that I just don't "get it". 

I've learned that film composers who write like this and take this easy way out (with long 1-note string cues and sound design gimmicks) aren't doing so because they think it's the right artistic choice, but rather because they don't have the proper compositional ability to write anything better.  And the sad thing is, we now have to spend the next two months hearing about what a masterpiece this score is and how this woman from Iceland is actually a musical genius. I really hate these award shows. 
 

The comparison to Dunkirk is troubling. As I said during that film's release - wouldn't it more appropriate to nominate Hans for Sound Editing than Score? Because he's literally provided sound, not music. And the category is called Best Music - Original Score.

Yeah, if it follows the pattern of the Academy over the last 20 years at least, the Oscar is already Hildur's. Just look at some of the winners from this century:
 
2000 - Tan Dun 
2004 - Jan A. P. Kaczmarek
2005 - Gustavo Santaolalla
2007 - Dario Marianelli
2008 - A.R. Rahman
2011 - Ludovic Bource
2018 - Ludwig Goransson
 
All composers that, like Hildur, come from non-English speaking countries, and are on their first or second Hollywood movie of proeminence.
 
Also, on 2001, 2009, 2010, 2012, 2013 and 2016 Shore, Giacchino, Resznor & Ross, Danna, Price and Hurwitz had their careers, but were on their first nominations.
 
Pretty much only in 2002, with Goldenthal, and 2015, with Morricone, the Award was given to a beloved, iconic composer, which had never won a competitive Oscar before.
 
So, by this logic, I think the Music Branch prefers giving the Award either to foreign composers or to newcomers to the Oscar, probably as a way to boost their careers. Sometimes it works (Marianelli, Giacchino, R&R, Goransson), sometimes it doesn't. Danna these days only does indie movies that no one watches and weird kid movies with his brother. And does anybody knows what became of Kaczmarek and Bource? Are they still scoring movies?
 
Hildur is the person that best embodies this philosophy of the Music Branch, considering her competitors will probably be older, experienced composers (Williams, Randy and Thomas Newman, Desplat).

Back when I saw Joker in the theater I absolutely hated the score, almost as much as I hated Dunkirk. After it won the Golden Globe last night, I decided to give it a second chance and so I listened to the entire OST by itself first thing when I got up this morning.  Oy.  This is a terrible excuse for a film score. No variety throughout the entire thing, zero melody, zero creativity with the orchestration, no rhythmic movement whatsoever, it's basically a bunch of time-wasting long notes sustained in the strings with some added sound design type stuff. Hans Zimmer would be proud. I swear there are student composers with better writing ability than this. But of course, my non-composer friends will all tell me it was an INCREDIBLE soundtrack and that I just don't "get it". 

I've learned that film composers who write like this and take this easy way out (with long 1-note string cues and sound design gimmicks) aren't doing so because they think it's the right artistic choice, but rather because they don't have the proper compositional ability to write anything better.  And the sad thing is, we now have to spend the next two months hearing about what a masterpiece this score is and how this woman from Iceland is actually a musical genius. I really hate these award shows. 
 

Back when I saw Joker in the theater I absolutely hated the score, almost as much as I hated Dunkirk. After it won the Golden Globe last night, I decided to give it a second chance and so I listened to the entire OST by itself first thing when I got up this morning.  Oy.  This is a terrible excuse for a film score. No variety throughout the entire thing, zero melody, zero creativity with the orchestration, no rhythmic movement whatsoever, it's basically a bunch of time-wasting long notes sustained in the strings with some added sound design type stuff. Hans Zimmer would be proud. I swear there are student composers with better writing ability than this. But of course, my non-composer friends will all tell me it was an INCREDIBLE soundtrack and that I just don't "get it". 

I've learned that film composers who write like this and take this easy way out (with long 1-note string cues and sound design gimmicks) aren't doing so because they think it's the right artistic choice, but rather because they don't have the proper compositional ability to write anything better.  And the sad thing is, we now have to spend the next two months hearing about what a masterpiece this score is and how this woman from Iceland is actually a musical genius. I really hate these award shows. 
 

Many people have scoffed at the suggestion that Jaws was inspired by The Rite of Spring. I was one of them... until I actually listened closely.
These two main themes are pretty much based on the same dissonant chord.
Pianists, play the following-
RH: Eb7 chord in 1st inversion, play it in the middle C octave
LH: E note, play it two octaves below
This is the cell that is prominent through much of Rite. Play it quickly and repeatedly with the ragged accents of Danses des Adolescentes and you'll hear it.
Now for Jaws... instead of repeating that chord over and over again, transpose both hands up a half step so that the RH plays an E7 chord 1st inv and the LH plays an F. Go back and forth between these two chords quickly and staccato, just like you were playing the Jaws theme.
There you go.

I think Katherine got more out of this film than I did.
 
 
This was an obvious commentary on current immigration parallels, succinctly handled by Nolan.
 
 
I disagree. There's a stark contrast in visual ID between these two films, and the silent vacuum of space was a far better pairing with its own encircling score than what Zimmer put against Dunkirk, which was already a very loud soundscape to begin with. Gravity, in my view, was more successful in melding the separate sound design elements together in a way which felt homogeneous; compared to Dunkirk, which ended up sounding like a blaring contest, with Zimmer determined to win.

I know I'm late to the thread, but I thought the movie was disappointing and the score was Zimmer at his absolute laziest. I keep holding out hope that he'll start making some sort of effort to compose real music, but I guess he has no reason to at this point. And frankly I don't think he's even comfortable with the idea anymore. 
 
The direction of film music continues to go downhill, and Zimmer (and his success among the masses) is a big reason why. Yeah you kids get off my lawn.. 

I know I'm late to the thread, but I thought the movie was disappointing and the score was Zimmer at his absolute laziest. I keep holding out hope that he'll start making some sort of effort to compose real music, but I guess he has no reason to at this point. And frankly I don't think he's even comfortable with the idea anymore. 
 
The direction of film music continues to go downhill, and Zimmer (and his success among the masses) is a big reason why. Yeah you kids get off my lawn.. 

I know I'm late to the thread, but I thought the movie was disappointing and the score was Zimmer at his absolute laziest. I keep holding out hope that he'll start making some sort of effort to compose real music, but I guess he has no reason to at this point. And frankly I don't think he's even comfortable with the idea anymore. 
 
The direction of film music continues to go downhill, and Zimmer (and his success among the masses) is a big reason why. Yeah you kids get off my lawn.. 

Sorry, didn't mean to be "outrageous". :-) But I do believe in what I said, about the chops. It's not elitism. It's just knowing what takes enormous skill, and what doesn't. There's nothing wrong with Eno's music, it possesses some great moments, really cool atmospheres, sonic colors etc and I can enjoy it for what it is. But the technical chops required to write it is WAY below what is demanded in Williams' music. I mean it's not even close. It's funny you say "elitism" because Eno in that clip comes across as pretty darn elitist, while Williams has always publicly shown the highest regard for even the most questionable talents, graciously giving really nice compliments to extremely inferior composers, just to be nice.
But back to the point, okay he probably did choose his style because he liked it and not because he tried/failed at symphonic composing. But from my experience, most of the minimalist composers I've met entered that genre because it was easier to learn, master, and (hopefully this won't sound offensive) "fake" their way through. Eno's very good at what he does, but generally speaking you can fake your way through an ambient album. You can't fake your way writing for a 70 piece orchestra, especially with Williams' musical language.
Again not trying to be "outrageous", but when I hear someone of Eno's expertise say that Williams has "ruined many great films", that'll get a rise out of people. After all, this is a John Williams site.

If there was any doubt that Zimmer is the most overrated composer of the last quarter century, this score cements it.



A superhero flick like Superman is every film composer's dream to tackle, that rare opportunity for a composer to pull out all the stops, be CREATIVE, use memorable leitmotifs, utilize the symphonic palette and all its majestic offerings to the absolute fullest.... and what do we get? A shockingly minimalistic soundtrack with nothing but ambient sounds and extremely long sustained notes (which is what you do when you really don't know how to write for the orchestra). And of course it has lots of Zimmer's trademark "lets beat these giant drums as loud as humanly f'ing possible".



What a disappointment. Even more disappointing is how many people in the world think this guy is a great composer.



How sad would it be if this wins the Academy Award 35 years after Williams' masterpiece inexplicably didn't?