Directors' audio-visual styles

All-right! Watch the show and reply whenever you can What's the book's title? Happy watching of the pacific!

Ah yeah, Kubrick's a great example too. But i am looking mostly for examples that work largely with original score and not so much with source music...however, if any good articles on him exist i'd be very interested to read them (and or books btw).

It seems director's that are the most conscious of the effect of music, and especially in synchronisity with the visuals, get a lot from source music (Kubrick, Tarantino, Malick, the latter often asks the composer to early start composing based upon the script). Their original vision is of music and visuals, as opposed to director's working with an original score, where it's a lot more difficult during the development stage to know what the original music is going to be. Kubrick, naturally, was a control freak, who had trouble giving such an impotant part in the hands of others. Malick obviously starts tempscoring with classical pieces. I don't think you can write a piece about it where you don't go into source.

With Ridley, Tony and even Darren - the music may play an important part in the final mix, yet is not key in the storytelling or style and comes relatively late in the process (The Fountain a possible exception, though mind that Mansell originally had a completely different music style he was experimenting with, changing it 180 degrees later on in the process, which means it might've not been Aronofsky who had this in mind, and might not be a part of HIS original vision, even though music and images ultimately completely melt with each other in the film, same goes for PI -lots of source- and Requiem). It's the work of a collaborative vision, as opposed to one mind.

By the way, Paul Thomas Anderson springs to mind. Even though he has worked with several composers, his usage of music has a clear pattern and his editing is always in synch with the score. Another example might be Lynch, though he also works with songs and source. BTW: PTA is also a source guy, in There Will Be Blood clearly showing his influence from Arvo Part, and the use of an existing Greenwood piece betraying the original tempscore. It almost seems source/tempescore is intertwined with music conscious director's.

Oh, and by the way; DON'T do Tony Scott. Though he's an incredibly visual director, Harry Gregson Williams called him in a press conference I attended 'as musical as a banana'. Tom Tykwer could also be interesting, though, being a composer himself and writing the score before the start of the shoot. The music in Lola Rennt is in integral part of the movie. And we all know Perfume!

Just some random thoughts that spring to mind on my difficult-to-type-with iPod...

Oh, and don't forget Hitchcock!

This is a favorite subject of mine, by the way - it's the awareness of the images and music by a director that can elevate it into art, for me.

Well, Burton obviously is extremely visual, and Elfman is very musical, and they work very well together, but I hardly get the impression there's a grand design beforehand of visuals and music. It's much like, for example, the creative process of Spielberg and Williams.

Jean-Luc Godard springs to mind as well - Le Mepris, for example (Delerue) has a remarkable use of music (in fact, much of the nouveau vague movement has, like L'Annee Dernier a Marienbad from Alain Resnais where the oppressive organ music has a certain function that's not necessarily one of beauty or comfort for the audience). But I'm not familiair enough with him yet.

Herrmann and Hitchcock was the duo who came to my mind also. But then they may not be recent enough for what is required.

The advantage of picking people like Darren Aronofsky and Tony Scott is that not a lot has been written about their musical choices to date. There is a risk in that Scott is a bit of an artless hack, so there really isn't much to write about, but he does have an agenda, as empty as it seems at times.

Malick presents interesting issues, along with Michael Mann and Wong Kar Wai, as all appear to have their issues in getting what they want from perfectly capable composers, suggesting that there is some inner instinct about music which isn't being satisfied by their collaborators. All 3 make very musical films.

Thank you so much for the replies everyone. I am going to study those and reply whenever possible, your input is greatly appreciated.

I read a lot of the replies and i also did some thinking these past 2 weeks or so, as i am addressing (with this project) mostly people who aren't really into film music in the first place (with few exceptions that is), i was thinking of something kinda modern and up to date so they can too relate...i am between choosing 2 of the following.

DARREN ARRONOFSKY
RIDLEY SCOTT
MICHAEL BAY
TONY SCOTT

Terrence Mallick is a very interesting case but albeit a difficult one i guess; plus i don't know if any books / papers that cover such cases as the above (or relevant to the topic in general) do exist?

Yeap, that would be very interesting indeed. Although i am really afraid of sitting through all that Marc Streitenfield scores!

And I'd be more concerned with getting over recent HGW output than Streitenfeld to be honest.

Don't choose Michael Bay because he's a royal fucktard.

That's my two cents anyway.

I wouldn't say that Ridley is any less of an artist than Darren is.

Yeah, there's a degree of that, but I've always considered Ridley an auteur on par with any other auteurs that operate more outside the mainstream - from Antonioni to Bergman to Ray. He's like Spielberg in a way, who is also able to put his thematic and audiovisual stamp on a film, even if it is geared more towards the mainstream.