Estimable film composer and ex-Pop Will Eat Itself Member Clint Mansell and has either got to be offended or flattered.
Hollywood loves to appropriate his original film music compositions to goose their trailers into having that extra heightened drama that they’re always desperate for.
We already did a play-by-play on all the people that jacked “Lux Aeterna” from his celebrated score to Darren Aronofsky’s chilling, “Requiem For A Dream” (most notably “Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers”), but he’s either thinking, “why don’t these people fucking hire me in the first place?,” or just takes pride in seeing his music being used for big budget projects (and presumably smiling at the sizable checks he receives in the mail).
Well, now Mansell’s “Death Is The Road To Awe,” a song composed for Aronofsky’s psychedelic love story “The Fountain,” (and performed by Scottish indie-rockers Mogwai and fancy, avante garde classical musicians The Kronos Quartet) is being hijacked by the makers of Will Smith’s “I Am Legend.”
Shame on you! Or, good taste, depending on where you stand on film music appropriation we guesss [ed. it’s sort of two part lazy, one part flattering in our minds]. Note: Mansell has a very excellent and unreleased version of “The Fountain”s “The Last Man” on his myspace page that features the ghostly falestto of Antony Hegarty from the melancholy torch balladeers Antony & The Johnsons. It’s worth checking out.
“I Am Legend” trailer (“Death Is the Road To Awe” at the 1:56 mark)