Score: A Film Music Documentary: Review

• This is a NON-Spoiler review for Score: A Film Music Documentary directed by Matt Schrader

• Plot Summary: "This documentary brings Hollywood's premier composers together to give viewers a privileged look inside the musical challenges and creative secrecy of the world's most widely known music genre: the film score."

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• I love film scores. I think John Williams & Hans Zimmer are legends. And I believe what most movie fans will tell you is that film scores will either make or break a film. As James Cameron puts it "The score is the heartbeat of the film." Some of my favorite scores are Indiana Jones, Star Wars, Interstellar, E.T., The Walk, Mad Max: Fury Road, Inside Out, Up, Toy Story, Jaws, Rocky, Lawrence of Arabia, Apollo 13 the list goes on and on and on. I'm a gigantic fan of film composers. And I really really enjoyed this documentary.

• My complaints: I felt that there was not nearly enough John Williams in my opinion. They interview a bunch of composers like Hans Zimmer, Danny Elfman, James Cameron, Quincy Jones, Junkie XL, Christophe Beck, Howard Shore, etc. But it's obvious that the filmmakers of this documentary couldn't get John Williams in for an interview, probably because of scheduling. So they use only a few old interviews of John Williams. Which was a bit of a let down for me, to be honest.

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• I felt it dragged in a few places. I didn't love how the documentary was prioritized. It spent a lot of time interviewing scores and the composers from movies that I'm not all that interested in. For example - there's a scene with the composer of Transformers. I would rather be watching Hans Zimmer scoring The Dark Knight. And my final gripe is that I would have liked to see more of my personal favorite composers. I wanted A LOT more time with Randy Newman. I didn't get any time with Michael Giacchino or Alan Silvestri. But don't get me wrong, there is a lot to enjoy. I got so pumped watching Junkie XL score Mad Max: Fury Road.

• I really liked the way the documentary was filmed. It didn't feel at all like most documentaries. Most documentaries have a lot of people being interviewed that completely exaggerate and try to make everything sound remarkable. This one was very good about that for the most part. And the cinematography and the editing stood out from most documentaries which I appreciated.

• I can't say much about what I love about the documentary other than it's SO interesting to listen to what these composers have to say. I won't quote anything because I want you to hear it for yourself. There are two scenes with Brian Tyler (composer for The Mummy, Avengers: Age of Ultron, Thor, Iron Man 3) that were my personal favorite. There's a great part that's dedicated to scores that give the audience goosebumps. There's a lot of scenes to appreciate in this documentary.

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• My closing thoughts are that if you are a movie fan at all, you should watch this documentary. I promise that you will appreciate film scores and the people that make them more. It's awesome to see composers finally get the spotlight. I think John Williams should be considered a music legend just as much as John Lennon should. These composers are just as much artists as any other artists of any other art form. It always fascinates me listening to directors or musicians talking about what they do and how it affects them. And it's the exact same with composers. So listening to composers talking about what they do is fascinating and inspiring. I don't want to give too much away about what I enjoyed about it because it would be spoiling it. I think you all should check out Score. It's currently not playing in very many theaters at all. But it will be on iTunes September 5. My grade for Score is an A-