Unlike the scores of most horror films, composer Christopher Young’s approach to the music of Hellraiser largely avoids anything verging on “scary.” Instead, his synth-heavy score conjures a feeling of grandeur that is more akin to dark fantasy. The main […]
The world is full of noise. On David Lynch and Alan Splet’s score for Eraserhead, that noise is the industrial chaos of a blue-collar nightmare. The score begins with howling winds and a slow, low rumbling like the maw of […]
The films of David Lynch have always been renowned for their bizarre, surreal nature. However, this attention typically overlooks the music of his films, which are as equally strange. Take, for example, Tractor’s score for Lynch’s early short film The […]
The world is slowly dying, but the dead aren’t. Sqürl’s (the musical duo of director Jim Jarmusch and Carter Logan) score for Jarmusch’s The Dead Don’t Die provides the perfect foil: meandering, darkened drone against the film’s silly meta-comedy backdrop. […]
Film music can be incomprehensible when detached from the underlying film. Snippets of ascending strings building tensions, rhythmic unaccompanied drums, or ominous rumbling synths build atmosphere for the images on screen. But they have trouble standing on their own. They […]
Nicholas Britell’s score for If Beale Street Could Talk conjures up a parallel world, where memories, hopes, and fears meld together, floating like some great overwhelming cloud. Much of the film lives in the memories of its main character, Tish. […]
Independent film is one of the great breeding grounds for new film composers. Consider Hans Zimmer, for example, who started his career scoring direct-to-video films before eventually securing eleven Academy Award nominations. While these films don’t offer the same monetary […]
Michigan’s Upper Peninsula is a lonely, desolate landscape, one of the few places left in America that feels undisturbed by humanity’s touch. And yet, in Anatomy of a Murder it feels lively. Duke Ellington’s stylish score is the cause, making […]
By 1981, John Carpenter had already composed six film scores. Among these are his iconic scores for Halloween and The Fog. But, while both utilized synth in the periphery, they mostly relied on piano for their themes and melodies. Modern […]
300,000 soldiers trapped on the shores of Dunkirk. A rescue fleet comes from the north; Nazis from everywhere else. The soldiers know this. They also know that they have no say in whether they live or die. They can only […]
Sometimes things are not what they seem. Take Demolition Man. At first glance it’s the dumb, brutishishness you’d expect from a 1993 action movie starring Sylvester Stallone and Wesley Snipes. But it’s also an oddball comedy and social critique and […]
Bone Tomahawk quickly rose to notoriety due to the overwhelmingly graphic, brutal nature of one particular scene. But, despite the fame of this scene, it’s not representative of the movie. Violence is rare and ends quickly. Instead, the majority of […]