{"id":30592,"date":"2015-02-15T22:21:47","date_gmt":"2015-02-16T04:21:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.davidbordwell.net\/blog\/?p=30592"},"modified":"2020-08-01T16:44:56","modified_gmt":"2020-08-01T21:44:56","slug":"the-sirens-song-for-oscar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.davidbordwell.net\/blog\/2015\/02\/15\/the-sirens-song-for-oscar\/","title":{"rendered":"The sirens’ song for Oscar"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The Lego Movie.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Another guest blog this week, this time from Jeff Smith<\/strong>, our colleague in the department here at UW–Madison. Jeff is one of America’s experts on movie music and sound technology. He contributed an entry on Atmos<\/a> last year. He has written many articles on film sound, along with two books:\u00a0The Sounds of Commerce<\/a> and Film Criticism, the Cold War, and the Blacklist: Reading the Hollywood Reds<\/a>.\u00a0<\/em>He’s also our collaborator on the eleventh edition of <\/em>Film Art: An Introduction.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

‘Tis the season for Oscar buzz, and the media glut of award prognostications is already upon us.\u00a0 Most of the attention will go to the above-the-line talent who\u2019ve received nominations (actors, directors, and screenwriters).\u00a0 The craft categories tend to get much less scrutiny, but the work of cinematographers, editors, and composers plays an equally important role in making their films award-worthy.<\/p>\n

Today I offer some observations about this year\u2019s nominees in the music categories: Best Original Score and Best Original Song.\u00a0 By using the nominees as examples, I hope to illuminate some of the ways that music continues to contribute to cinema\u2019s narrative functions and its emotional impact on viewers.\u00a0 I\u2019ll also offer my predictions for who will win at the end of each section.<\/p>\n

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Best Original Score<\/strong><\/p>\n

Even before this year\u2019s nominees were announced, one of 2014\u2019s most distinctive and innovative film scores was declared ineligible by the Academy.\u00a0 Antonio Sanchez\u2019s driving percussion score for Birdman<\/em> was disqualified under Rule 15, which states that scores \u201cdiluted by the use of tracked themes or other pre-existing music, diminished in impact by the predominant use of songs, or assembled from the music of more than one composer shall not be eligible.\u201d\u00a0 Apparently, in the view of the Academy\u2019s music branch, Birdman<\/em>\u2019s use of substantial excerpts of concert music by Mahler, Tchaikovsky, Ravel, and John Adams weakened the impact of Sanchez\u2019s score.\u00a0 That explanation, though, probably doesn\u2019t pass the eyeball (or eardrum) test of anyone who has seen Alejandro Gonz\u00e1lez I\u00f1\u00e1rritu\u2019s film. \u00a0Sanchez\u2019s drum work adds verve and energy to several of the director\u2019s elaborately choreographed (and seamlessly stitched together) long takes.<\/p>\n

Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross\u2019s electronic score for Gone Girl<\/em> was also a notable snub, especially since their bold, pathfinding music for The Social Network<\/em> took home the top prize just four years ago. The fact that both of these scores failed to secure nominations may be a sign that the Academy\u2019s music branch is returning to the verities of good old-fashioned melody and harmony as the basic tools in the composer\u2019s kit.<\/p>\n

That being said, the absence of Sanchez, Reznor, and Ross from the list of nominees doesn’t mean that the remaining scores are dull or unadventurous.\u00a0 Quite the contrary. Several of them push film composition in new and exciting directions. Their scores fulfill traditional functions but employ innovative scoring techniques and orchestrations.<\/p>\n

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Old sounds, new sounds<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Take, for instance, Gary Yershon\u2019s score for Mike Leigh\u2019s biopic, Mr. Turner<\/em>.\u00a0 Bypassing the conventions of orchestral writing for film, Yershon composed for a chamber-sized ensemble. Some cues combine a saxophone quartet with a string quintet, a musical choice that seems deliberately anachronistic.\u00a0 (As Yerson himself says in the soundtrack\u2019s liner notes, Adolph Saxe\u2019s invention wasn\u2019t even patented until 1846, just a few years before Turner\u2019s death.) \u00a0Other cues add flute, clarinet, harp, tuba, or timpani to the mix. \u00a0But these embellishments simply add color to the basic sound of Yershon\u2019s twin string and saxophone ensembles.<\/p>\n

Yershon says he was attracted to the saxophone due to its ability to glissando \u2013 that is, bend pitch from one note to another. \u00a0Yershon certainly exploits this element of the instrument\u2019s sound by building his melodies from long sustained notes that slowly take on serpentine shapes.\u00a0 Saxophone glissandi have an almost iconic function in the idioms of jazz and pop music . (Think of the opening phrase of Wham\u2019s \u201cCareless Whisper.\u201d) \u00a0In this case, though, the technique gives Yershon\u2019s score a minimalist, modernist edge.<\/p>\n

Yershon\u2019s inclusion of a saxophone quartet departs from two norms: the period music of Turner’s time and the symphonic orchestrations that have characterized biopics for decades.\u00a0 The saxophone was never a major component of the Hollywood sound crafted during the studio era.\u00a0 Composers like Max Steiner and Victor Young occasionally included saxophones in their arrangements of music played onscreen by dance bands, but for the most part, their wind arrangements were for some combination of flutes, oboe, English horn, clarinets, and bassoons.<\/p>\n

Is Yershon’s score inappropriate on historical grounds? I don’t think so. By modernizing the sound of Leigh\u2019s period biopic, Yershon\u2019s score adds a contemporary resonance, perhaps encouraging viewers to see parallels between Turner\u2019s painting and the work of modern-day artists. Indeed, as Guy Lodge noted in his Hitfix<\/em> review<\/a> of the film, \u201cIt’s tempting, even, to view the film as biopic-as-self-portrait, revealing shades of one life through another. Leigh has a reputation for prickliness and resistance to self-explication; perhaps it’s not surprising that he’s long been fascinated by Turner’s allegedly gruff, taciturn genius.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yershon\u2019s use of contemporary instruments may not in itself suggest those historical parallels.\u00a0 Indeed, most viewers probably have no idea when the saxophone was invented. But it certainly invites us to think about Leigh and Yershon\u2019s reasons for opting for such a modern sound.\u00a0 And with its smaller instrumental forces, Yershon\u2019s score resists some of the sweeping emotionalism that is found in other examples of the genre.<\/p>\n

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Zimmer pulls out all the stops<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Hans Zimmer\u2019s nomination for Interstellar<\/em> is the tenth of his long and distinguished career.\u00a0 With all apologies to John Williams, Zimmer is arguably Hollywood\u2019s leading film composer and his work is emblematic of a larger industry turn toward emphasizing musical tone and texture rather than big memorable themes.\u00a0 Zimmer\u2019s score for Interstellar<\/em> is no exception to this rule.\u00a0 In this case, though, much of the tone and texture is provided by the four-manual Harrison & Harrison pipe organ found in London\u2019s Temple Church.<\/p>\n

Director Christopher Nolan says that he liked the sound of the church organ as something that added an element of religiosity to\u00a0Interstellar<\/em>.\u00a0 But the organ contributes other things as well.\u00a0 For one thing, the organ\u2019s booming bass register adds mass and heft not only to the music, but also to the astronomical bodies shown onscreen. \u00a0The sheer size of these lower frequencies enhances the sense of scale in Nolan\u2019s imagery.\u00a0 Thanks to the organ\u2019s huge pitch range, the instrument\u2019s upper register provides the quieter, swirling arpeggios needed to suggest the story\u2019s filial bonds between father and daughter. \u00a0At the same time, the instrument\u2019s big, fat bottom end adds the musical bombast needed to convey the film\u2019s epic visions of distant planets, wormholes, and alternate dimensions.<\/p>\n

More important, despite the church organ\u2019s strong association with sacred and liturgical music, Zimmer\u2019s score never sounds like a Bach toccata.\u00a0 Rather, due to its repetitive, but intricate arpeggiations and simple, but affecting harmonic structures, Interstellar<\/em>\u2019s music has the kind of trippy, drone-ish, psychedelic feel that suggests both Terry Riley and Iron Butterfly.\u00a0 Zimmer\u2019s score does not contain anything that is an obvious quote from the music of Stanley Kubrick\u2019s \u201cthinking man\u2019s\u201d sci-fi classic, 2001: A Space Odyssey<\/em>.\u00a0 Yet, in its own way, Zimmer\u2019s music recalls the period where such films were being produced, indeed the very kind of film that Nolan self-consciously tried to recreate.<\/p>\n

In developing the score for Interstellar<\/em>, Nolan and Zimmer also departed from the norms for director-composer collaborations.\u00a0 Most composers begin their work at a fairly late stage in the filmmaking process.\u00a0 In some cases, they may work from a completed script.\u00a0 In most cases, though, a composer starts with a rough cut of the film, making his or her contribution felt only during post-production.<\/p>\n

In contrast, Nolan acknowledged that he has gradually been bringing Zimmer into his production at earlier and earlier stages.\u00a0 Nolan dislikes the practice of temp tracking, a technique that involves slugging in preexisting music that temporarily serves as a guide to the production team during the editing process.\u00a0 Says Nolan, \u201cTo me music has to be a fundamental ingredient, not a condiment to be sprinkled onto the finished meal.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Interstellar<\/em>, Nolan asked to meet with Zimmer well before production began.\u00a0 As Nolan recounts in the liner notes to the soundtrack, he gave the composer an envelope containing a one-page summary of the fable that sat at the heart of the story.\u00a0 The description did not contain any details of the film\u2019s genre or plot.\u00a0 Rather the summary simply laid out the narrative\u2019s emotional core.\u00a0 Zimmer then took the summary and retired to his studio to start composing.\u00a0 Several hours later, Zimmer brought back a CD that contained about three or four minutes of music.\u00a0 Nolan listened to the new piece: a simple piano melody that nonetheless captured the feeling of what the director says he was \u201calready struggling with on the page.\u201d<\/p>\n

When Nolan began shooting, he frequently listened to Zimmer\u2019s simple piano piece, which functioned as a kind of \u201cemotional anchor\u201d for the film.\u00a0 Eventually, Zimmer returned to the studio and created the huge musical canvas that captures Interstellar<\/em>\u2019s heady exploration of space and time.\u00a0 Underneath it all, though, is the humble melody Zimmer wrote prior to production, the modest edifice upon which the rest of the score is built.<\/p>\n

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More songs about buildings and food service<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Like Zimmer, Alexandre Desplat has several previous nominations to his credit, including those for the scores of Best Picture winners The King\u2019s Speech<\/em> and Argo<\/em>. \u00a0Unlike Zimmer, though, Desplat has yet to win. \u00a0Among Hollywood\u2019s current A-list composers, Desplat has shown extraordinary versatility. He’s at home writing for foreign art films, American indies, animation, and studio genre pictures.\u00a0 Desplat\u2019s score for Wes Anderson\u2019s The Grand Budapest Hotel<\/em> is the third he has done for the director, following earlier collaborations on The Fantastic Mr. Fox <\/em>and Moonrise Kingdom<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Here again, Desplat\u2019s score for The Grand Budapest Hotel<\/em> departs from established norms of Hollywood orchestration.\u00a0 Although he uses a slightly smaller version of the wind and brass sections usually found in older Hollywood film scores, he avoids the normal violins, violas and cellos. Instead he opts for a string section comprised of balalaikas, cimbaloms, zithers, mandolin, and acoustic guitar.\u00a0 This choice is intended to reflect the vaguely Mitteleuropean <\/em>setting of the film.\u00a0 Just as the story is loosely inspired by the writings of Austrian novelist Stefan Zweig, the music reflects the social and geographical milieu of Zweig and his characters during the 1920s and 1930s.\u00a0 Eastern European and Russian folk melodies inspired much of Desplat\u2019s. \u00a0This combination of instrumentation and idiom creates a harmonic and timbral palette that proves to be enormously flexible in the composer\u2019s hands, enabling him to add classical, modern, and jazz touches wherever they are needed.<\/p>\n

Although Desplat employs unusual orchestration in The Grand Budapest Hotel<\/em>, his score is fairly traditional in other ways.\u00a0 There are leitmotifs for several of the main characters, such as M. Gustave, Zero, Madame D., and Ludwig.\u00a0 An eight-measure theme is also linked to situations of adventure or danger.\u00a0 These themes and motifs tighten up the film\u2019s structure. \u00a0Such cues for patterning are particularly important when one considers The Grand Budapest Hotel<\/em>\u2019s \u201cChinese box\u201d or \u201cRussian doll\u201d<\/a> narrative construction, which nests stories inside stories.<\/p>\n

Desplat\u2019s score also captures the film\u2019s dark yet whimsical tone.\u00a0 In interviews, the composer acknowledges that Bernard Herrmann and Carl Stalling were important influences on his work.\u00a0 At first blush, Herrmann, who composed several iconic scores for Alfred Hitchcock, and Stalling, who wrote crazy, almost manic music for Disney and Warner Bros. cartoons, would seem to occupy opposite corners of the universe.\u00a0 It\u2019s to Desplat\u2019s credit, though, that he is able to blend these diverse influences in a manner that is perfectly attuned to Wes Anderson\u2019s imaginary \u201csnow-globe\u201d world.\u00a0 Indeed, the cue for the scene where Gustave is hanging from a cliff features harmony that would not be out place in Herrmann\u2019s score for North by Northwest<\/em>, an obvious inspiration.<\/p>\n