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| Zimmer |
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End: (Hans
Zimmer/Various) Sailing to the highest profits of any film in 2006 was
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, the Jerry Bruckheimer
camp's much anticipated sequel to the wildly popular 2003 adaptation of
the famed Disneyland ride to the big screen. The filming of the third
film in the franchise,
At World's End, was completed in snapshot
succession with the second entry, producing a heightened state of mania
over the concept that the sequels for
The Matrix once tried to
capture as well. While during production there was no indication that a
fourth film was in the works, hints of a continuation from Disney were
almost immediate, and with profit potential that was too grand to
ignore, it became inevitable that at least some of the same gang of
lovable rogues would be traveling the globe once again in future
adventures. The plot of the third film brings together elements spanning
the previous two, compiling a host of conflicted characters for an epic
journey to the ends of the earth. The number of characters and
corresponding thematic fragments representing them were so plentiful in
the franchise by this point that lead composer Hans Zimmer could just as
well assign a character theme to each of his seven ghostwriters and have
some concepts left over for his own ideas. That's the cynical approach
to these
Pirates of the Caribbean scores, of course, and despite
those criticisms, credit has to be given to Zimmer for at least making a
valiant attempt to take the franchise's music in the right direction
with each entry. The score for
The Curse of the Black Pearl was
an understandable nightmare, a five-week replacement effort of synthetic
nonsense and contractual problems that didn't even allow the composer to
be credited with the mess. Meanwhile, Alan Silvestri, whose score for
the film was rejected, was likely in a bar somewhere ordering a double
shot of a potent beverage. For
Dead Man's Chest, Zimmer had the
time and resources to correct the ills of the first score, and while he
attempted to broaden the stylistic horizons of the musical identity for
the concept, the score ultimately suffered from the same lack of style
and tact. In short, the sequel was a bastardized adaptation of ideas
from
The Peacemaker and
The Rock into an inapplicable
setting.
For
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End,
Zimmer would try to make significant corrections to the constructs of
his ideas for the franchise, expanding the scope of the music to include
a far wider orchestral and choral palette. The ensemble performances and
the final mix in the soundscape lean more on orchestra's role over the
synthesizers', also utilizing a chorus and individual solo elements with
a much-enhanced sense of worldly spirit. Unlike
Dead Man's Chest,
which relied on the "guilty pleasure" sensibilities of its veteran film
music listeners to be satisfactory in parts,
At World's End
offers several cues of more intelligent ideas that may maintain the
interest of listeners who consider themselves outside of the comfort
zone of Zimmer's ardent fanbase. The orchestral instrumentation has been
expanded to include, most surprisingly, a handful of woodwinds.
Bruckheimer had personally refused to allow such "girly-men" instruments
to be heard in his films to this point, but Zimmer apparently
transcended that closed-mindedness and incorporates solos for oboe and
flute, as well as roles for piccolo and bassoon. For the jaunty, playful
portions of the score, Zimmer employs an accordion, mandolin, and
dulcimer for additional color, and the use of both the harpsichord and
erhu allows for a more rounded, cultured sound. A better emphasis on
live percussion (as opposed to drum pads and synthetic sampling) is
commendable, with good reverb in its mix. The use of voices is also
particularly creative in
At World's End, with the film opening to
a source song that serves as the anthem for all pirates and one of the
score's two major new themes. Solo female voices, occasionally operatic
in their soprano tones, perform ghostly subthemes throughout the score,
sometimes layered in ways that foreshadow
On Stranger Tides.
Zimmer's normal role for deep male chorus continues to be prevalent in
At World's End, but he expands it to a fuller adult choral sound
for an effect similar to
The Da Vinci Code at times. The
recording and mix of the music more often avoids the bass-heavy
headaches of the previous two scores, with a cue like "Singapore"
instead providing a far more dynamic range of mixed elements. Even a
playful tribute to Ennio Morricone (a Zimmer favorite) is blatantly
conveyed by guitar in "Parlay."
The number of themes that exists in the
Pirates of the
Caribbean series is so plentiful that jokes about ghostwriters are
inevitable. But one aspect of
At World's End that Zimmer has
handled quite well is the integration of thematic ideas from the
previous two scores with the new ideas in this one. As mentioned before,
the "Hoist the Colours" source song that opens the film and album is
expanded to full, easily digestible ensemble statements throughout the
score. More likely the central identity of
At World's End,
however, is the love theme for the Will Turner and Elizabeth Swann
characters. The interesting thing about this theme is that it seems that
Zimmer and his associates at Remote Control couldn't decide on which of
three ideas to make the primary one for the theme, leaving the score
with three fragments of love-theme identity that are often stated
separately and only a couple of times performed satisfactorily in
succession. An "Edge of the World" subtheme is offered during the height
of associated action cues, heard briefly but gloriously at the
conclusions of "At Wit's End" and "Up is Down." The themes for Sao Feng
and the East India Trading Company are both performed in full in
"Singapore." The two Jack Sparrow themes from the previous films follow
in succession in the same cue, making it a decent suite of sorts; his
theme from the second film ultimately receives more air time on the
album for
At World's End. The Davy Jones theme is presented on
music box in "At Wit's End" and by the full group in "I Don't Think Now
is the Best Time." Some of Tia Dalma's identity carries over into the
vocals of "Calypso," and Lord Beckett's material is reprised as well.
Finally, no
Pirates of the Caribbean score would be complete
without the primary "He's a Pirate" theme from the first film, despite
its catchy and arguably obnoxious and inappropriate tone for the genre.
Its major appearances in
At World's End are provided in "I Don't
Think Now is the Best Time" and the shamelessly victorious "Drink Up Me
Hearties." It's instantly recognizable, of course, because it seems that
nearly every jazz and school band has attempted to perform it over the
past three years. Being as over-exposed as it is, and given its nature
to irritate with its alternating static and choppy staccato movements,
the theme could be more of a detriment to the sequels than
otherwise.
While Zimmer's music for
At World's End reaches
into a far more dynamic range of instrumentation and holds the power of
the underlying synthetics to a slightly less distractingly problematic
level of bombast, there still exist the challenges inherent with his
basic approach to the genre. Zimmer is to the blockbuster films of the
2000's what the power ballad was to 1980's rock. His music is a distinct
sub-genre within the world of film music, and his tendency to write
overbearingly powerful and simplistic anthems for nearly anything
remotely connected to the concepts of action and drama begs for
criticism and skepticism when it's applied in unconventional ways. These
new themes for
At World's End are
extremely predictable
given Zimmer's past production, and their overly simple neo-classical
chord progressions, squeezing every last drop of melodrama out of their
super-harmonic movements, lack taste, style, and subtlety. Zimmer proved
that these appeals to primordial aural pleasures can make for enjoyable
listening experiences in an effort like
King Arthur, though in
the world of
Pirates of the Caribbean, the same formula has never
been able to convince many ardent and knowledgeable film score
enthusiasts. The bass region continues to be abused, and although there
isn't any noticeable distortion caused by this technique here, it's
still a defining characteristic. The love theme's three ideas,
additionally, are packaged into two powerful statements of anthem-like
proportion at the ends of "One Day" and "Drink Up Me Hearties," taking
the relatively delicate idea of a romance between two people and
elevating its importance to the level of interstellar war. It makes for
great listening on album, as it often has in its previous variants
throughout Zimmer's career, but there is no style to that music. Only
power. And there's only so much brute force that a score can pound you
over the head with before you lose faith in its intelligence. The first
two scores left you completely beaten by their in-your-face tactics, and
At World's End suffers from that attitude in about half of its
cues. Maybe Zimmer will never shake his habit of playing the role of
Thor, God of Thunder whenever he tackles another action score, wielding
that giant musical hammer on his listeners (and maybe wearing a helmet
with horns... who knows?). His ghostwriters are Remote Control certainly
do enough of that for him in any regard.
The lack of subtly or tact in the action and drama
portions of
At World's End once again raises the same issues
about whether this style of music fits the traditional definition of
"swashbuckling" or is trying to redefine it. Some have claimed that this
third entry satisfies critics by simply toning back the synths and
expanding upon the authentic instrumental ensemble. Others point to the
jaunty comedy cues as evidence of swashbuckling style. But that's a
stretch at best. There was lengthy discussion about this controversy in
the Filmtracks review for
Dead Man's Chest, and most of the
points made and questions posed there are still valid in the context of
this newest score's review. The most relevant part of that discussion is
restated for the remainder of this paragraph: "There are intangibles
about the soaring effect of orchestral sailing music that stir the
imagination like none other. If you look at the definition of something
swashbuckling, it's 'flamboyantly adventurous.' In a masculine sense,
Hans Zimmer's current electronically-aided blockbuster style could be
called adventurous. If you're in a technological setting, it matches the
adventure well, and in his developing theme for Jack Sparrow in
Dead
Man's Chest, he tried to capture the flamboyant side of the
character's wit. To be flamboyant, though, you have to be elaborate,
ornate, and resplendent. Its own definition includes 'richly colored,' a
phrase that dooms Zimmer's score because of the music's inability to
resonate with the brilliant beauty and splendor necessary for the high
seas (because, of course, the brute masculinity prevents it). If Zimmer
wishes to persist with his deep bass droning and limited
instrumentation, then a flamboyant presence is simply not possible.
Instead of flamboyance, the best he can accomplish is a pounded,
melodramatic sense of adventure, which is why you hear a cue at the end
of
Dead Man's Chest that sounds as though someone's just disarmed
a huge bomb, saved the world, or discovered the Holy Grail. Especially
for those of us who have heard Zimmer from the start, how can we blindly
accept this music for a historical Caribbean pirate genre when it's
already seen its glory days in scenes where fighter planes are bombing
Alcatraz Island and George Clooney is chasing nukes from a helicopter?
Do people really wonder why the score nearly ruins the film for
others?"
Also discussed in the
Dead Man's Chest review is
the frustrating history of the
Pirates of the Caribbean scores on
album. At odds with the desire of fans to hear all the material from the
films on album is Zimmer's tendency to prefer his music rearranged into
suites for presentations apart from context. Also problematic is the
fact that the music that you hear in the film often contains a different
mix of orchestra, synthesizers, and other elements from what is chosen
for the albums. Finally, you sometimes hear passages in this franchise
of movies in which music from someplace else in the same score (or from
one of those that preceded it) is tracked in to a circumstance that is
sometimes unrelated to Zimmer's original intent for that music (
On
Stranger Tides was a disaster in these regards). After the original
trilogy of
Pirates of the Caribbean films debuted, fans requested
expanded versions of the soundtracks on album, preferably in the
luxurious, complete format established by the comprehensive sets
representing Howard Shore's
The Lord of the Rings trilogy. In
2007, Disney released what may had hoped would be such treatment of
those original
Pirates of the Caribbean scores. The "Soundtrack
Treasures Collection" of four CDs and a DVD was an immense
disappointment, however, providing very few tracks of additional
material that hadn't in some form been previously released. The CD
dedicated to
At World's End (#3) is identical to the commercial
product, and the remixes on the fourth CD are simply shorter versions of
those already heard before (though who actually wants to hear that trash
remains a question). The supposedly new score tracks on that fourth CD
are mostly rearrangements of themes already released, some of them
simply elongated or merged into more palatable tracks. From
At
World's End, you hear a very long extension of the three facets of
the love theme in "Marry Me," equal treatment of Beckett's theme in
"Lord Cutler Beckett," a different mix of the end credits music in
"Hoist the Colours Suite," an elongated version of "Singapore"
(including some unused music) in "The Pirate Lord of Singapore," and a
rejected cue featuring Beckett's theme for the outset of the final
battle, "Just Good Business." This collection of "new" music does not
merit the high cost of the entire product, though, and the "Soundtrack
Treasures Collection" is a slap in the face by Disney to all of the film
music collectors and concept enthusiasts who deserve, despite the
arguably poor quality of these scores, a decent presentation of this
famous music.
Finally, an issue that won't be addressed in this
commentary to the extent that it was discussed in the
Dead Man's
Chest review is the role of the ghostwriters in the creative
process. Six of the seven ghostwriters from the second score returned
for
At World's End, along with most of the production crew. If
you disagree with the label of "ghostwriter" being applied to them, then
seek the
Dead Man's Chest review once again for the reasons why
they indeed are ghostwriters. One of the overarching problems with the
score for
At World's End, despite its more numerous strengths in
individual moments, is that it seems badly fragmented, the tell-tale
sign of a composition with more than half a dozen contributors pushing
their own ideas at it. As such,
At World's End is a score that
doesn't transcend to become more than the sum of its parts, and this
issue would become even more crippling in
On Stranger Tides.
Zimmer never allows each theme to be mutated into truly intelligent
deviations, only occasionally employing competent use of counterpoint to
integrate two themes over each other. The two or three new themes are
too weak in rhythmic and progressive construction to survive outside the
warm nest of Zimmer's usual rendering of those ideas. It serves as
testimony to the argument that any theme, even one banged out by a
10-year-old on the piano, can be made deliciously heroic if given the
robust treatment that Zimmer applies like a blanket to seemingly every
idea that he and his assistants conjure for this franchise. For
listeners seeking relief from the massively realized, forceful
crescendos of thematic glory, the comedy cues like "Multiple Jacks" and
"The Brethren Court" will be enticing not because of their own merits,
but simply because they're different. That said, the enthusiast of the
franchise will indeed enjoy the ultra-masculine instrumentation and the
identification of all the themes and motifs that whip through the score
on a constant and often engaging basis. Zimmer fans will delight in the
extended use of the churning string lines that place this score in the
mid-2000's era of Zimmer's career (along with
The Da Vinci Code
and
Batman Begins). The old-school Zimmer action fans will hear
plenty of
The Peacemaker in "I Don't Think Now is the Best Time,"
a cue that rips through the room with enough steroid-induced pomp and
muscularity to make even Barry Bonds' suppliers jealous. Overall, the
course is steady in this franchise, and the wake tells you everything
you need to know. Oh finesse, prudence, subtly, elegance, and
savoir-faire, where art thou?
** @Amazon.com: CD or
Download
| Bias Check: |
For Hans Zimmer reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 2.84
(in 121 reviews)
and the average viewer rating is 2.96
(in 298,172 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.
|
The insert of the regular album includes extensive credits and
lengthy personal anecdotes from "digital instrument designer" Mark
Wherry about the scoring process on the three films. The 2007 "Soundtrack
Treasures Collection" contains extra notation about the music. Its DVD
contents include "Making of a Score" (19:48), a general production
overview of the scores, "The Man Behind the Pirates Music" (17:38), an
interview with Zimmer alone with recording sessions footage, and "Hans
Zimmer's Live Performance at Disneyland for the World Premiere of
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End" (8:37).
