Getting the Score

Quentin Tarrantino on his use of music in film.

I don’t normally use original score. I don’t trust any composer to do it… The music is so important. The idea of paying a guy and showing him your movie at the end and then he comes over it; I would never give anybody that kind of responsibility…I have one of the best soundtrack collections… That’s how I write it, that’s how I design it; I go into my soundtrack collection and I start visualizing the sequences…I cut out the composers. I work with the best composers, Ennio Morricone, Lalo Schifrin, John Berry[sic]…but I don’t deal with them.

~ From a seminar in Cannes.

Well, now, I am a composer, so my opinion is biased but here is what I find funny about his attitude:

This film music he proudly collects and apparently uses was written by film composers after the film, exactly the way he avoids working.

I’ll be honest, I find his statement somewhat self-contradictory. I mean, based on his apparent love of film music that came from a certain way of working, I would expect him to adopt this method of adding music to a film, rather than avoid it.

Could it be ego making that decision?

Personally, I see film music as part of the story-telling, part of the movie’s identity. Patching up a score from other sources just seems like making a Frankenstein monster if you ask me.

Songs are a different matter entirely.