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Zimmer does a good job utilizing the Bond sound for the most part, but right around the climax the tracks like “I’ll Be Right Back” and “Open the Doors” has a very Zimmery feel to it. And of course “Final Ascent”.
Yeah, for me I definitely get those vibes as well.
https://londonjazznews.com/2021/10/02/john-altman-putting-some-big-band-brass-into-no-time-to-die/
Very interesting. I had no idea. Thanks for sharing.
And that BB melody was straight from Black Rain.
The moment the cue from OHMSS was played it took me out of NTTD. It felt cheap and somewhat rushed. Another problem is it made me compare Madeline to Tracy and I don't think that was the intention
You're welcome.
I am also a firm believer in the Zimmer "factory theory" by the way. It's not a secret, after all, that Zimmer continues to work with other people who contribute to "his" music just as much. He's like the Greek writer Homer in that sense--'Hans Zimmer' is the brand that represents a musical collective. And there's nothing wrong with that since the outcome is what matters.
In my opinion, Zimmer is/are now in a better "zone" than he/they was/were 20 years ago, so I'm glad he did a Bond score now rather than in the days of DAD. If he could do another M:I now, it would most likely sound a lot different (and better) than in M:I 2 as well.
Positives
Negatives
Overall, if I were ranking the first half it would be a solid 8/10, and then probably a 5/10 for the second half, giving an overall ranking of 7/10. Its decent, given its short development time.
But (and perhaps controversially on these forums) I prefer both of Newman's efforts.
Curious, as I felt it was actually OVERused, other than in the latter stages of the film
During the shootout in Cuba
Surely that also counts as the Bond theme
Yeah, that low horns blasting of the Bond theme is great. Just watched it again last night and it pops up four times:
Square Escape when the guns are revealed,
Cuba Chase after Bond does a shot with Paloma,
I’ll Be Right Back, after Bond says goodbye to Madeleine on the boat on the Poison Island and goes into Commando mode,
End Credits.
I believe Zimmer referred to it as the “danger motif”, something they created to use in the film.
However, all of those you mentioned should have been the full on James Bond theme.
In terms of a full-blasting reprise of the classic Barry orchestration, yes, it only really appears in 'Back to MI6' in that spirit.
(But that's been fairly common in Bond films for a long time now, to only hear it in its "glory" once (if at all). Heck, it was even common back in the 1960s when Barry pioneered it! By this standard, off the top of my head, I think it only appears "once" in From Russia with Love, You Only Live Twice, On Her Majesty's Secret Service, etc. - and comically, never in Goldfinger which, to me, is still the most James Bondiest of James Bond film scores that an orchestra has ever James Bonded.
Like others, I hear the Bond theme everywhere on the NTTD to score because to me the definition is when pieces of it are re-interpreted, re-orchestrated, and used either explicitly or to infuse other melodies. By this logic, I find Die Another Day, Quantum of Solace, No Time to Die, and (yes, gasp!) Skyfall as being all fairly "Bond theme-heavy" scores.
Again, off the top of my head in NTTD (and using the above logic): I hear it in the Gun Barrel, Message from an Old Friend, Square Escape, Someone Was Here, What Have You Done, Shouldn't We Get to Know Each Other, Cuba Chase, Back to MI6, Norway Chase, Gearing Up, I'll Be Right Back, Opening the Doors....I mean, geeze...
And, similarly to both the songs for Casino Royale and Skyfall, the "DNA" of the title tune in No Time to Die is very, very, very built from the same harmonic DNA of the Bond theme itself, so you can almost argue that those reprises are edging being references to it as well.
For me the bond theme (or at least the 3 note rising and descending motif) is everywhere. I think the main theme is rather too celebratory for a moment where bond suspects his girlfriend of trying to collude to murder him.
That's a really good point, and I think it's a key reason why we don't hear it the way some people would like to.
James Bond music has evolved for the modern era, just like the character. The "James Bond theme" in its original orchestration doesn't just fit like it used to.
We all have wonderfully nostalgic memories of it being used under action scenes or Bond arriving somewhere, etc., in different times and different films. But it's such an inherently triumphant victory sound, that reprising it in its entirety just simply doesn't fit a lot of the actual scenes in the modern films that the score needs to support.
At the end of the day, the directors/editors/composers have to use it where it's appropriate. I'm not saying you couldn't make it work in a modern Bond film, but I just think it would take some very, very tonally appropriate scenes to do it.
You'd need a sustained 1:45 of action or celebration where James Bond is at his utmost cool/victorious/ready-for-on-the-nose-cheering. Craig's era simply hasn't contained a sequence like that. It's too, frankly, real. It allows for wonderful flourishes and references of it, but Craig's Bond simply doesn't step out of the dramatic stakes of the film for sustained periods in that way. The best and closest spot was, honestly, the end credits of CR after he said his name -- right where it was used.
(...although I think a case could have been made to use it at the end of SPECTRE, instead of reprising the Skyfall arrangement...)
Really I think it depends on the performance. Like you get the bond theme in a very different manner in say, the tank chase in Goldeneye (bombastic action) and lazenby driving just before Tracy appears at the beginning of OHmSS (so much swing it’s just fantastic). I could see the swing version playing when bond returns to London in NTTD
All the bits have slightly different connotations to me, which typically reflects how they're used.
Iconic vamp - suspense, hype
Guitar riff - badass
Swing section - victory
Bee-bop/swing section - a lot of victory
Very last bit + guitar twang - anything unexpected and/or worthy of an eyebrow raise
Great summary. Very accurate in my opinion.
Ha ha. This is wonderful. Especially the eyebrow raise. Bravo.
I would be very surprised if Team Zimmer doesn't return for Bond 26.
Honestly, though I adore a lot of David Arnold's work for Bond (QoS, CR, TND mainly), I really think he has done all he can with his scores. He just doesn't have the creative repertoire to add anything further and would risk recycling his own cues...