[Ventoxote]

I finally had a chance to watch The Social Network, and to hear the Academy Award winning soundtrack by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross. Can anyone explain to me how it's possible that this won for best score? While it was mostly transparent and forgettable wallpaper, I have to say I found the music to be barely working on a functional level at the best of times. I heard bland and half-baked NIN c-sides on Valium. When it was used as underscore, it set up a simple loop, and remained static and stubborn, fighting against (instead of working with and lifting up) the flow of emotional storytelling, editing, and cinematography. Simply put, it was weak music and weak scoring, lacking novel thought or concept. The only memorable moment was during the strangely drawn-out rowing scene, and then it was Grieg's In the Hall of the Mountain King!! If you wanted to nominate a score for being apart from the pack, then even Daft Punk's Tron: Legacy would stand head and shoulders above this.

Thoughts?

[Dianous]

I hthink people are negative about non-orchestral scores right away. Reznor and ross were given the award for pushing boundaries and doing something completely new and different. They didn't just go the typcial route, and it was especially important because this was a film about a bunch of guys who also didn't go the typical route, and who were using modern technology to do it - so the score matched that.

[Gichre]

Yes, but doing something different does not automatically mean that what you produce will be 'good'. Perhaps the idea to use a non-orchestral palette was good, but the score still failed?

[mario]

I was certainly confused as to why the award was given to Trent Reznor for this score to The Social Network, especially considering who he was up against. There are a few non-orchestral scores that I like such as Mark Isham's "Crash" and Vangelis' "Blade Runner". Let's not forget John Carpenter's "Halloween" and Brad Fiedel's "Terminator". I'm a huge admirer of Trent Reznor and his music but I just don't think of the score to The Social Network as film music or award winning. I am looking forward to hearing what he does for the film Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. We'll see what happens.

[Aaron McDonald]

I may just be regurgitating something Fincher said in an interview or something, but I think the idea was that the film was essentially two hours of talking heads.. The challenge of that particular score was to help keep that from getting boring, whilst staying out of the way of the (important to the film) dialogue. I thought the music for the creating "facemash" scene worked pretty well in helping to keep interest through what to most people was a lot of programming gibberish. I thought a lot of the deposition music worked really well in conveying this kind of sad disconnect.. something important to the character development.

But at the same time I thought the boat race / hall of the mountain king scene - the music was distracting. Take a well known piece of music mostly used in film and commercial for comedic affect, and then present it in a novel way for something more serious - that took me right out of the movie.

You're definitely not alone though. I've heard a lot of people talk about Hanz Zimmer's Inception score.. which wasn't bad persay.. but was more successful (I think it's safe to say Iconic) in the trailers for the film than it was for the film itself.

Who knows.. maybe the Academy got bored of Hanz Zimmer scores..

This post has been edited by Aaron McDonald: 26 April 2011