Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince [SOUNDTRACK]
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Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince [SOUNDTRACK]
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince [SOUNDTRACK] Reviews
The Harry Potter movie franchise has traditionally been graced by great film scores. First came John Williams, who scored the first three films masterfully and established a great number of themes, including the famous Hedwig’s Theme. Then came Patrick Doyle, who left behind most of Williams’ themes but retained his spirit and creative energy.
Enter Nicholas Hooper for Order of the Phoenix. Getting a Harry Potter film scoring assignment would be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for a middling composer like Hooper; even for Doyle it would have been a rare opportunity. Hooper, like Doyle, managed to retain most of Williams’ energy in his score for Order of the Phoenix.
Here, Hooper branches out a bit more and creates a kind of film score that is less thematic than William’s or Doyle’s, but more atmospheric. There’s nothing wrong with that kind of approach: a great film score from 2008, The Dark Knight, didn’t have many fully fledged-out themes either.
Unfortunately, the score for Half-Blood Prince not only has less thematic material than past Harry Potter scores, but it’s less memorable and less powerful as well. Listen to tracks like “Opening”, “The Story Begins”, “Harry and Hermione”, and “When Ginny Kissed Harry”. Tracks like those are almost entirely consumed by simple chord progressions that leave no lasting impression on the listener. They lack complexity and development, and so they often tread in the waters of–I hate to say it–boringness. I’m a composer myself, and I know that it probably took Hooper only about a couple of hours to write a cue like “Harry and Hermione”, which is inexcusably lazy on his part. I can’t see how Hooper listened to a cue like that and said to himself “Yes, I’m finished here. There’s nothing I could do to further perfect this track.” The cue is begging for more orchestration and development, and Hooper doesn’t deliver it. If you want an example of a good Harry Potter character theme, listen to “A Window to the Past” from Prisoner of Azkaban or “Harry in Winter” from Goblet of Fire, both of which leave far more powerful impressions.
Lack of memorability and emotional power are thus my main complaints about Hooper’s otherwise passable score for Half-Blood Prince. But there are a few stand-out tracks worth mentioning:
“Wizard Wheezes” is a jazzy cue that seems appropriate for the Weasley twins’ joke shop, and while it is quite simple, it’s memorable, and maybe even catchy. “Farewell Aragog” is appropriately played on a somber violin, and it seems to be a good match for the would-be-tragic scene in the movie when two drunken men mourn the death of a giant spider. “Malfoy’s Mission” is Hooper’s atmospheric writing at its best, and its the best “theme” on the album. It’s not memorable, but it’s decently chilling.
Again, Hooper has done okay work for Order of the Phoenix and now Half-Blood Prince, but one HAS to compare his work to that of Doyle and, especially, Williams. Those two masterfully handled their film scores, which is a compliment that I can’t bestow on Hooper. But Hooper has nevertheless once again produced a blockbuster film score that is considerably better than most others (I’m looking at you, Transformers 2), and that can be commended. I’m still hoping that Williams makes a surprise move and returns for Deathly Hallows, but if Hooper is again hired, it wouldn’t be so bad.
If Hooper is returning for Deathly Hallows , I hope he can produce a truly great film score (or 2 film scores, since Deathly Hallows is being split). I think the days might be gone where I can listen to a new Harry Potter soundtrack and be blown away, but I’ll be giddy if Hooper can prove me wrong.
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