Top Composers and OSCAR® Nominees Discuss the Music Behind the Movies

Jason Bentley uncovered compelling stories behind the music for some of the year’s most highly acclaimed films in conversations with top composers on MBE. Check out some of the highlights below and read full transcripts and see other Oscar-related goodies HERE

Slumdog Millionaire composer A.R. Rahman discusses his approach to creating scores that are both perfect for film and listenable on their own.

--Rahman on his collaboration with M.I.A and Director Danny Boyle: “Danny wanted me to collaborate with her…She is like a tank of ideas.”  

--On Boyle:  “What I liked was he captured the spirit of Mumbai, which is undying. It was great.”

Composer Alexandre Desplat went backwards and forwards to capture the magical story of life and love in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.

--On Director David Fincher: “David Fincher is a director who has a very precise point of view on every aspect of his art history and the music is one of them… he didn't want the score to be overdramatic, overwhelming to the audience.”

--On Benjamin Button’s Theme: “This whole idea of time reversing was ticking in my head and I just suggested to David that I could maybe try and find a tune, a little pattern, a little hook that could be played forwards and backwards.”

Milk Composer Danny Elfman tells Jason he considers the title character an American hero and jumped at the chance to work with Director Gus Van Sant again.  

--On Van Sant: “Getting into any project with Gus means I'm going to go in a lot of different directions and mess around with a lot of different ideas. With another director, that can be very frustrating. Trying to hone in on ‘What do you want for this movie?’ With Gus it's more of a process of fun experimentation.

--On his creative process: “I don't do research going into a movie. I think the least I know the better. I like to forget that I've even read the script, even though I do read the script because the more prepared I am in the beginning, the more it sends me down a specific direction which may not be the right direction…So I started with a real blank slate other than -- don't mess this up. Except I didn't use the word mess, but we're live on the air.”  

World-renowned composers Hans Zimmer and James Newton Howard are deeply philosophical in their discussion of creating the music behind The Dark Knight, especially one of the most notable characters – The Joker, as played by Heath Ledger.  

--Zimmer on the Joker’s Theme: “I kept churning around…how do you describe anarchy, how do you describe a villian and not do it in a way that’s been done before? One of the things I got very much from the character was a fearlessness, and an evenness in a way. The Joker is the only person you can trust in the movie. The Joker is the only one who will never lie to you because he is consistent about his philosophy.”

“I really wanted to do the whole thing just with one note. I had this idea that rather than what a note is in the context of the notes surrounding it, what could I do emotionally through a performance within one note? How much can I stretch the meaning of a single note and get it down to such minimalism. I failed slightly. I had to use two notes in the end.”

--Howard on their avoidance of a traditional superhero theme: “We actually received a lot of grief about that, from a lot of people. ‘Why didn’t you write a big theme for Batman?  Because it wouldn’t have worked.”

The 81st Academy Awards® ceremony airs on February 22.