I have to admit, I am a music junkie. I eat, breathe, sleep, and just plain love music. I cannot put into words how much I love the music in Batman Begins and The Dark Knight -- to me, this is what movie music should be; an accompaniment to the visuals. Every single beat matched and even added emotional weight to the scenes in Batman Begins and The Dark Knight. Think about the scene in Batman Begins when Bruce Wayne first explores the bat cave under Wayne manor and the bats burst out and rush Wayne, engulfing him; the music was a rush that fit like a glove. Think about the scene in Dark Knight when the Joker bursts out of the body bag to surprise Gambol; a jolt of panic induced by the Joker, popping up when you least expect; so too was Zimmer's music, like a tear through the mundane with an electricity you just cannot duplicate. The music in The Dark Knight just matched so damn well with every single minute of the film; there wasn't a false moment. Everything gelled.
Now comes Inception. Possibly the most intriguing and anticipated of Nolan's films to date. But everyone also anticipates Hans Zimmer's score; we expect it to top The Dark Knight. Does it? No. Not by a long shot. Not even close. This is disappointing to me because I expected so much from Hans Zimmer. When the first teaser for Inception hit theaters in August of 2009, we were treated to a sound none of us had heard before: Rising tension interrupted by an unusual sonic BONG that repeated over and over. This was truly unique. Contemporary. Awesome. I expected the score to be like this, but kicked up a notch and into another gear by Zimmer. Instead, the music is conventional and misplaced in the final film. There are glimpses of brilliance, though. Most notably a foot chase through Mombasa and Gordon Levitt's bullet-exhcanging battle against projections through a window. But the rest just simply does not fit with what is going on on screen; especially the rest of the action scenes. There are scenes in the third act that are high octane, high stakes, and absolutely fantastic, that include multiple players on multiple levels, with time running out; the action is rapid and intense, shoot outs in snowy mountains on skis and snowmobiles, a car chase through rainy streets, and an intense fist fight in a rotating hallway, and this is the music that plays over it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1Uti8ucuEw
It does not match or add anything to what is on screen. What was Zimmer thinking??? All art is subjective. Maybe some will like this sort of music to serve the action, but to me this is so conventional and so slow that it defeats the purpose of the scenes and becomes overly repetitive throughout the course of the film. The Dark Knight and Batman Begins had music that was meshed with the films' DNA. With Inception you have the film playing on screen and Hans Zimmer's score playing outside it, conventional and isolated from the heart-pounding visuals. If music were couples, Zimmer and the Batman movies would be Sonny and Cher. And Inception would be Michael Jackson and Lisa Marie Presley.
Many people on the board were surprised that I gave Inception such a low score simply because I didn't like the music, so this time I'm gonna score the film and the music separately. After all, they are two separate and different animals that don't go well together at all:
The Movie: 7/10
The Music: 1/10
Now comes Inception. Possibly the most intriguing and anticipated of Nolan's films to date. But everyone also anticipates Hans Zimmer's score; we expect it to top The Dark Knight. Does it? No. Not by a long shot. Not even close. This is disappointing to me because I expected so much from Hans Zimmer. When the first teaser for Inception hit theaters in August of 2009, we were treated to a sound none of us had heard before: Rising tension interrupted by an unusual sonic BONG that repeated over and over. This was truly unique. Contemporary. Awesome. I expected the score to be like this, but kicked up a notch and into another gear by Zimmer. Instead, the music is conventional and misplaced in the final film. There are glimpses of brilliance, though. Most notably a foot chase through Mombasa and Gordon Levitt's bullet-exhcanging battle against projections through a window. But the rest just simply does not fit with what is going on on screen; especially the rest of the action scenes. There are scenes in the third act that are high octane, high stakes, and absolutely fantastic, that include multiple players on multiple levels, with time running out; the action is rapid and intense, shoot outs in snowy mountains on skis and snowmobiles, a car chase through rainy streets, and an intense fist fight in a rotating hallway, and this is the music that plays over it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1Uti8ucuEw
It does not match or add anything to what is on screen. What was Zimmer thinking??? All art is subjective. Maybe some will like this sort of music to serve the action, but to me this is so conventional and so slow that it defeats the purpose of the scenes and becomes overly repetitive throughout the course of the film. The Dark Knight and Batman Begins had music that was meshed with the films' DNA. With Inception you have the film playing on screen and Hans Zimmer's score playing outside it, conventional and isolated from the heart-pounding visuals. If music were couples, Zimmer and the Batman movies would be Sonny and Cher. And Inception would be Michael Jackson and Lisa Marie Presley.
Many people on the board were surprised that I gave Inception such a low score simply because I didn't like the music, so this time I'm gonna score the film and the music separately. After all, they are two separate and different animals that don't go well together at all:
The Movie: 7/10
The Music: 1/10
I sincerely hope I don't find it that bad.