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John Ottman in 2003

"I put more hours in than President Bush, and I have no personal life to speak of. It's difficult. I just want to think about Hawaii, laying around doing nothing for a while."
-- John Ottman in 2003, on juggling editing and composing duties

The young career of John Ottman has already given movie-goers and film music enthusiasts much to think about. A jack of all trades, Ottman is one of only a few artists in the history of Hollywood to have significant talents in directing, editing, and scoring of films. With his film Urban Legends: Final Cut in 2000, Ottman became the first person to accomplish all of those tasks for a single studio project. But most people became familiar with Ottman's skills in 1995, when his blossoming collaboration with director and friend Bryan Singer led to massive critical and popular acclaim for the cult hit The Usual Suspects. In the years that followed, Ottman continued to edit and compose for Singer's films, leading up Ottman's first major blockbuster, X2: X-Men United, in 2003. In the late 1990's, Ottman scored a series of arthouse films, often dark and disturbed in nature. His work for The Cable Guy, Incognito, and Apt Pupil was recognized for its consistent strength.

Although the early 2000's presented Ottman with projects of lesser box office success, including Bubble Boy, Eight Legged Freaks, and Trapped, he continued to approach his assignments with an enthusiasm for creativity and instrumental novelty. His early works have consistently gravitated towards the romantically perturbed, ranging from the classically troubled to the straight-forward horror of slasher films. His consistency in producing instrumentally interesting music is remarkable given the often less than perfect circumstances (in time and equipment) that Ottman had to overcome. Even in his rejected music for Cruel Intentions and Halloween H20, the quality of his thematic and orchestral output is evident. He has quipped that he wouldn't mind the opportunity to swing his career around and score a few major films with lush, romantic melodies of a positive heart, but until that happens, John Ottman remains a passionate master of the thriller and mystery genres.