Scoring Exodus

I just learned something interesting while reading the Exodus: Gods And Kings press kit that aspiring movie directors and musical directors might find very useful. Director Ridley Scott, who also did Gladiator, Alien, Black Hawk Down, Kingdom Of Heaven and other successful films, edits his movies with a temporary, ready-made, used soundtrack.

This means that he takes bits of music he likes from other films and uses them as the soundtrack while editing. Says Scott:  “The way I like to work is that first of all, I put a temporary score down and the temporary score is tough for composers because I am really good with sound and music and so is my editor. So I’m going to have a temp score and it’s fantastic because I’m choosing it from the best things that already exist, pieces of music from other films that are already out there.

“And the temp score helps the film emotionally and dynamically. It’s all about how it pushes along or how it slows it down in the right way. It’s like an emotional graph, a guidance system for the composer.” Once he is through with his editing to this temp soundtrack, Scott then hands the film over to his musical director. In the case of Exodus, this is Alberto Iglesias, Pedro Almodovar’s favorite MD, who also did Tinker Tailor, Soldier Spy and The Constant Gardener. Iglesias then scored the film with his own music.

“Obviously, he must be free to do his own thing,” continues Scott. “He may say to me, I want to do this here… or I’m thinking of having this happening here… And Alberto has all his own ideas, which is what you want. But that temporary score showed him all the musical signposts that I was thinking about when I edited the film. So as I say, it’s a good guide.”

The music, says the director, is an integral part of his film and can be as important as the perfectly crafted lines of dialogue spoken by his actors, most notably Christian Bale as Moses and Joel Edgerton as Rhamses. Given its subject matter, Moses and the deliverance of the Hebrews from Egypt and Scott’s reputation as a director, Exodus: Gods And Kings is expected to be an epic production. I say, so is the task that Scott has chosen to undertake. 

Scott is coming on the heels of the legendary Cecil B. DeMille who directed the still massively popular Ten Commandments back in the late ’50s. That was a true epic and you have to admit that DeMille did very well despite his lack of digital technology. As for the music, I still hear Elmer Bernstein’s score whenever a radio or TV drama needs some heavy, majestic music support. So Iglesias’ head is also on the block here.

But then what Exodus: Gods And Kings has mainly going for it is Scott’s reputation as a maker of entertaining action flicks.  Rumors have it that is just what he did. He made an entertaining action movie with Moses as his superhero. So go, watch and enjoy.

 Still on movie music. Director Sergio Leone, you know he did The Good the Bad and the Ugly, Once Upon A Time in the West and other great films, has so much faith in his musical director that he has him record his music first so that this can set the mood during the shoot. No risk taken here because the man who scored and still scores Leone’s films is no other but Ennio Morricone.

For a look at Morricone’s type of movie music, get a copy of The Essential Ennio Morricone album. This is made up of parts of the popular scores that he created for many memorable films. If you are an aspiring filmmaker who intends to adopt Scott’s style of editing to an existing soundtrack, then this is the album for you.  There is a very slim chance that your scorer will later come up with something to rival Morricone’s work but he would have spent time with some of the greatest movie music of all time.

The Good, the Bad And the Ugly; Once Upon A Time in the West; Once Upon a Time in America; The Professional, Cinema Paradiso; The Mission; The Untouchables; In The Line of Fire and others.

As for contemporary movie music, surely the most effective use of hit songs in a movie can be found in the Grammy- nominated soundtrack to the space adventure Guardians of the Galaxy. This collection has been compiled in an album that approximates the cassette tape that proved crucial to the story. 

Titled Awesome Mix Vol. 1, this is made up of tunes like Hooked On A Feeling by Blue Suede; Moonage Daydream by David Bowie, I Want You Back by the Jackson 5; Cherry Bomb by The Runaways; Escape: The Pina Collada Song by Rupert Holmes; Ain’t No Sunshine High Enough by Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell and others.  As a bonus, the soundtrack album comes with a second disc that contains the film’s original score by Tyler Bates.