Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince

Yup. It's pretty bad.

 

*sigh* Just what I heard from some of the clips is already horrible.

 

This is no surprise. They have really ****ed up royally with the Harry Potter scores.

 

Heh, I just came in here looking for this thread to see if people already had opinions (wasn't even sure if it's out yet) and slightly hoping the scores have improved again. Thanks for the info to the contrary...

 

if Williams doesn't come back for Deathly Hallows, I'm going to take a massive **** on Yates.

 

Especially since Williams has expressed an interest in coming back!

 

Yates and Hooper are apparently long time collaborator and friends (i.e. Tim Burton/Danny Elfman, Spielberg/Williams, Hitchcock/Herrmann), so it will not be surprising if Yates allows Mr. Hooper to continue. In fact, without a riot of some sort from the HP community, I doubt Williams will come back at all.

 

The producers could overrule Yates if they wanted to.

 

I haven't much bothered with the score beyond being completely underwhelmed by a few tracks. Personally, I prefer the last couple of video game scores by James Hannigan. Highly Williams influenced (there's a slight Across the Stars tinge to a part of his Friendship Theme) without being derivative, he uses a few nice motifs and both have an overall playful and fun mood that Hooper seems to miss completely. Hannigan's "To Catch an Owl" from the OotP game score is an utterly wonderful cue.

 

While I'm not sure Hannigan's scores would be compatible with the tone of the latest two films, they're great scores in their own right, far superior to Hooper's lazy TV efforts.

 

Well, the producers know that plenty of green's going to be made regardless of whether or not the score sucks, so unless the fans step up, nobody's going to give a damn.

In other news, my blood is boiling:

"Among the always outstanding production values and top-drawer visual effects, special note should be made of... Nicholas Hooper's emotionally churning score, which contains only the slightest trace of John Williams' original themes." -- Todd McCarthy, Variety

...I'm pretty sure the only thing Hooper's churning is steaming brown poop.

 

I defended Hooper's previous score because I did enjoy parts of it and heard promise in it, but I can't defend this new score. He really hasn't developed from OotP, and quite frankly, his music to HBP is just dull. There's nothing hear to latch onto.

However, there is hope that Williams may return, albeit just a tiny bit, but still it's something: http://bit.ly/CGOM4

 

It would be awesome. I really hope they make it work.

 

That sounds quite promising! Slight confusion over his comment about it "depending on his schedule for part 2" though. Does that mean they're only considering him to score part 2, or does it mean that his schedule is open to score part 1, and they just need to work out his schedule to score part 2? I'm going to assume that it's the latter.

 

Hooper will not be scoring the Deathly Hallows films, according to an upcoming Film Score Monthly interview.

 

Thank the lord. His score as it appears in the film was boring as hell. I cannot help but feel that the lack of emotion in the climax of the film was largely because of the crap score.

 

Excellent news. Although if Williams can't work it into his schedule, I wonder who they will go with instead. Doyle perhaps? Or another new composer bringing the total to 4?

 

As long as it's not Hans Zimmer.

 

Hans Zimmer would be 10x better than Nicholas Hooper.

 

This is very true.

 

Well, I did like the harp (if that's what it was) when Hermione was crying with Harry

 

I watched the film again recently and really noticed once more how many good moments in the film are not supported at all by good film score. There are a number of emotional climactic moments at the end that are hurt by a total lack of any substantial score. It's really sad that the filmmakers or the studios or whoever did not react quickly to the crapfest that was the Order of the Phoenix score and replace Hooper immediately.

 

Hooper's scores aren't 100% terrible, if you sit and listen to them they get better, but they don't have much of a Harry Potter feel to them. Here's an example:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xDOVDhMZ8Hk

Great piece written by Hooper for HBP, doesn't fit in at all.

 

This is like the argument that coffee tastes like crap but if you drink it enough you get used to it. Hey it still tastes like crap, you've just trained yourself not to hate it. Why would I do that with music? And with score, its primary function is to work well within the film. So if it fails utterly at that, what good is it? Outstanding score is stuff that works very well within the film and stands on its own away from the film.

 

wow you guys have ripped Hooper to shreds. whilst i agree that his work on OotP and HBP could be further developed i like pretty much all of what he has submitted.

I'd be interesting to hear where exactly you feel like he's dropped the ball. i felt his music and how it was used in the films perfectly complemented the material. i'll give some specifics where i think he's hit the mark, however i have a hard tome talking about music. i know how it makes me feel but i just dont know how to put it into words. make sense? Hoopers music are such a big part of some awesome moments in the films. like in OotP Umbridge theme was mischievous and sweetly conspiratorial when used over the montage of Unbridge taking over the school. the scenes with Dumbledore's Army had a brilliant sense of rebellion to them. i love the Possession theme which carries heavily into HBP. it's like swirling overbearing consumption. again brilliantly layered over the montage of harry's mind and the end of OotP.

In HBP the entire 3rd act was spot on. The firestorm, Dumbledore in the tower and then his death was tingling stuff. I'm gonna cut this short because i'm not using my words properly i just dunno how to write about music!

Am really interested to hear why people here hated it so much though. I trust the response will be more eloquent than i've managed here!
-Doodie