Film music and experience
For our final assignment, we were to choose a film and describe the musical elements that add to the experience of the film. I honestly hadn’t seen any films all summer besides the musicals from class due to the heavy load that I had to take. I decided to kick off my first day of summer by relaxing and watching a good film and completing the assignment as well. I decided to watch Spectre a classic James Bond film. The music for the film was composed by Thomas Newman who is a renowned composer in the film industry has won three Grammys and countless other awards. He has composed many scores in films such as; The Shawshank Redemption, Finding Nemo, Wall-E, Skyfall, as well as scenes like Darth Vader dying in Return of The Jedi. The filmmaker, Sam Mendes, is a longtime friend of Newmans having worked on many projects together such as; Skyfall, Jarhead, Revolutionary Road, Road to Perdition, and American Beauty. One thing that each of these movies has in common and is a trait that speaks to both Newman and Mendes is the interconnectedness between the scenes and the music. With the orchestra's dynamics that feature perfect timing between the highs and lows of the film.
From the beginning of Spectre, you hear the classic Bond theme song from the orchestra who is with you transitioning the mood of the film from beginning to end and is present in every major and minor part of the film. One thing that stands out in the Spectre is the Latin American culture and theme that is present in the melodies played throughout the movie. It features more world music than traditional bond films with Latin American romantic period sounding trumpets, horns, and soft sounding finger played guitars. The classic bond countermelody from the winds features darker and thicker textured sound than the traditional ones. It has a memorable scene from a dio de los muertos festival that has an interesting instrumental of light winds. This leads into the classic James Bond theme tune that tapers off with very dynamic strings hitting one note in harmony that leads into one of the Academy Award songs, “Writings on The Wall”. It features a solo in mostly tenor with a soft piano accompanied by the dynamic strings that kicked the song off. The dynamics transition from loud to soft as the credits come to an end. The latter half of the film features your more traditional setting as well as musical structure with the more typical suspense melodies with the brass, winds, and strings. Not only does it add suspense it brings most of the true emotion to the scene. It allows a sort of connection to where you can seemingly feel in the same shoes as the character present or the feeling of the scene.
