As we just said, if you’re paying attention, the Toronto International Film Festival site is loaded with interesting music/film collaborations. We could probably write an individual piece about all of these, but then we’d be here all day. So to keep it all brief and digestible, here we go.
Director Mike Mills has exceptional taste and always has. He started out as a designer and music video director (various hip ’90s/’00s collaborations for Sonic Youth, Elliott Smith, Air, Beastie Boys, Beck, Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, Cibo Matto, Blonde Redhead) and then moved on to feature filmmaking. His earnest and non-ironic feature film debut “Thumbsucker” included an optimistic score by the Polyphonic Spree, plus contained one of the last songs Elliott Smith ever recorded (a cover of “Trouble” by Cat Stevens). So it’s no surprise to hear his new film, “Beginners,” starring Ewan McGregor, Christopher Plummer and Melanie Laurent, has some interesting musical collaborators as well. The music in the film is credited to Roger Neill, Dave Palmer, and Brian Reitzell. All three of them have worked with Air in some capacity and sometimes as touring musicians. Palmer is an LA producer who has worked with Fiona Apple and toured with Air and Zooey Deschanel among many others. Reitzell is known for always being the music supervisor on Sofia Coppola’s films, and one of his biggest coups ever was convincing My Bloody Valentine recluse Kevin Shields to come out of hiding to record a few score pieces for the film (you can also thank Reitzell for the comeback tour as every bit of coaxing back into the spotlight helped). A talented arranger, Neill and Reitzell also worked with Spoon’s Britt Daniels to compose the score to the 2006 film, “Stranger Than Fiction.” Another feather in Reitzell’s cap, getting Explosions In The Sky featured throughout Peter Berg’s “Friday Night Lights.” Suffice it to say he is a good taste magnet and is always dreaming up excellent cinematic music ideas for various talented directors (Reitzell and Palmer most recently worked on “The Brothers Bloom”). Reitzell also wrote the score for “30 Days of Night,” Cillian Murphy’s “Peacock,” and is attached to help out the unmade picture, “Goats.” Here’s more info about Mills’ “Beginners.” [TIFF]
Irish DJ/electronic musician David Holmes composed the music to Russian filmmaker Alexey Uchitel’s picture, “The Edge.” The picture has been described as a “love-laced war epic” with “post-apocalyptic territory” tendencies. Holmes is best remembered for the funky exotica scores to Steven Soderbergh’s “Ocean’s” films and the wonderfully moody and ambient score to Michael Winterbottom’s “Code 46.” [TIFF]
No surprise here. Vincent Gallo’s third feature film — which he commandeered from another director who was too much of a newb — “Promises Written In Water”? Yeah, Gallo wrote the music for this one too. [TIFF]
The film played at Cannes and yet no one ever really noted it. Electronic/ambient musician Ulrich Schnauss (along with Mark Peters and Vivek Maddala) scored Gregg Araki’s “Kaboom.” Again, this one is probably no shock considering Schnauss’ shoegazery proclivities and every Araki film is peppered with music from those bands and that era (perhaps the best example is “Mysterious Skin” which is scored by The Cocteau Twins’ Robin Guthrie — the use of Slowdive et al throughout is also just heavenly). Maddala, an international award-winning composer and multi-instrumental performer is credited with the full score, so we imagine Schnauss just recorded additional music. [TIFF]
Just fyi, venerable French composer Alexandre Desplat (“The Tree of Life,” “The Fantastic Mr. Fox,” “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”) scored Tom Hooper’s “The King’s Speech,” starring Colin Firth. Every time Desplat pens a score those with an affinity for impeccable soundtrack music listen. [TIFF]
Nathan Larson of Shudder To Think is no stranger to film scores. In fact, he’s pretty much transitioned into that area full time aside from playing on and producing records for his wife (Nina Persson of A Camp; former singer of The Cardigans). Larson wrote the music for David Schwimmer’s sophomore directorial effort, “Trust.” The film stars Clive Owen, Catherine Keener, Viola Davis, and Liana Liberato and is essentially a potent Internet drama about a young girl who gets involved with another teenager who turns out to be a sick pedophile. You can hears some of the score in the trailer over at the TIFF site (it’s quite good). [TIFF]
John Carney is a man of many talents. He directed the music films, “Once” and “Zonad,” wrote both films and even did his own camera and electrical work for the aforementioned busking picture that turned the Swell Season into stars (and Oscar winners). Well, he also wrote the music for the Irish-made indie drama “Sensation,” directed by Tom Hall (co-director of “Zonad”). However, it’s not Carney’s first score. He also provided the music to his 2001 directorial effort, “On The Edge,” which co-starred Cillian Murphy. You can hear some of the score over at the TIFF site in the movie’s trailer and it’s quite lovely. [TIFF]
Max Richter, who wrote the haunting score for “Waltz with Bashir,” wrote the music for “Womb” starring Eva Green. We listed the ‘Bashir’ score as our number 1 instrumental score of that year so we’re expecting great things once again. [TIFF]
