During the latest Film Music Festival, organised by the International Film Festival Flanders Ghent, [Main Titles] had the chance to talk to composer David Arnold, just a few hours before he would be handed over a World Soundtrack Award for Best Original Song, obviously that is You Know My Name for Casino Royale.
With a cup of coffee, seated at a table too small for 3 people, [Main Titles] talked about the recent Godzilla release, his career, and even clothes (though, the last is not included in this interview).
Main Titles: Godzilla was one of your last big scores. It made kind of a trilogy with ID4 and Stargate and now fans wait for a new “big one” to arrive. Something has definitely changed since Godzilla.
David Arnold: I wasn’t really offered this sort of films anymore and I am not sure why that was. I am not sure why I got offered the ones I did get offered; the third Narnia film, which was supposed to be immediately after the next Bond, would be a chance to go back to more traditional fantasy style scores that I haven’t done for quite a long time.
The one thing I love about those things is that there are no rules. Nothing is actually real, you don’t actually have to worry about having a responsibility to truthfulness in a real sense; it’s just about how to make the film’s feeling and heighten the film’s effectiveness. You’re not telling a true story. It’s not like Amazing Grace which was a film about something that really happened, a film that has actually affected real people… A giant talking lion (in Narnia) is not the same sense of responsibility.
Obviously you’re respectful of the material and of the certain amount of truth there still is in the film you have to be honest with. I am really looking forward to it though, it’s been such a long time since I last done this sort of thing, I am interested to see how I write now, it is a long time ago.
