Ilan eshkeri stardust hotel
Interview: 47 RONIN composer Ilan Eshkeri scores the samurai way
By DANIEL SCHWEIGER / Soundtrack Editor
Posted: December 28th, / PM
Ilan Eshkeri | © Ilan Eshkeri
Ilan Eshkeri is a composer who knows his way around costumes, be it past or present. Starting his scoring career in England swinging a gladiator’s sword for two TV movies about the Coliseum, Eshkeri has fitted on the blood-stained mob business suits of LAYER CAKE, provided a rousing fantasy score for the eccentric wizards and air pirates of STARDUST, elegantly showed that YOUNG VICTORIA had sex appeal, helped apply the battered spandex of KICK-ASS and returned to the valiant last legion of the Roman Empire’s CENTURION. But whether the era demands a score that’s humorously enervating or bold and bloody, Eshkeri’s music has often shared a deep empathy for characters who can only hope for a blissful romantic destiny, especially in this stylistically varied year that started out with the raunchily comedic wedding dress of I GIVE IT A YEAR and the cheerfully classical, corset–obsessed Westworld called AUSTENLAND.
Now ends as Eshkeri plays the rich wardrobe that reflects the musical hemispheres of East and West, united their characters’ pained quests for love with a score that’s sumptuously epic, and the other intimately anguished. The first score for 47 RONIN represents Eshkeri’s true jump into a Hollywood tentpole. Having dealt with even more ferocious Asian action in NINJA ASSASSIN, Eshkeri’s more elegantly lethal music has helped Universal Pictures’ long-delayed, mega-million dollar Asian fantasy-action spectacle finally cross the finish line in rousing style. Given the emotional center of the impossible love between outcast Gaijin super fighter Kai (Keanu Reeves) and his dishonored warlord’s daughter Mika (Ko Shibasaki), Eshkeri conjures a memorable theme for the duo amidst an exciting, lavishly symphonic approach that palpably creates a feudal Japan of
The Sound Architect Podcast (TSAP)
(TSAP S04E06)
In this episode, Sam Hughes speaks with composer Raphael Reed about his journey into writing music, being a working composer in Canada, his influences and inspirations as well as his philosophies on the process! A great honest and creative conversation worth listening to!
Raphaël Reed is a Canadian composer and sound artist based in Montreal. Trained in classical guitar from an early age and a graduate from the University of Montreal in Music Research and Contemporary Creation, his style is an innovative hybrid integrating analog synth, electro-acoustic gestures, and classical instruments.
After being active in the underground music scene in Montreal, he's currently dedicating most of his time as a music composer. In film and television, his compositions include the soundtracks of Crisis () from Director Nicholas Jarecki. Cliff Martinez being an advisor for the creation of the soundtrack, this experience has been a milestone in Raphaël's career and a consolidation of his music personality. His other music scores include, amongst others, The Walrus and the WhistleBlower(), Louise Lecavalier: In Motion (), Révolution (), (), and A Little Bit Of Zombie ().
In largescale live events, he co-composed the opening soundtrack for the UEFA Champions League final held in Portugal, he directed and composed the music for the Chimelong International Circus in China (), and composed the music for the Cité de l’Énergie in Shawinigan, Quebec () and for The Carnaval de Québec (). For Cité mémoire, he composed the music for two events celebrating John Lennon's bed-in at The Fairmount Queen Elizabeth Hotel in Montreal: a virtual reality interactive installation taking place in the bedroom (suite ) and a video playing in the hotel lobby directed by Michel Lemieux and Michel Marc Bouchard.
His music has been heard in hundreds of advertisements, most notably the Skechers a
Stardust
Everything but the enchanted kitchen sink shows up in the sprawling fairy tale "Stardust," including evil witches, airborne pirate ships, double-parked unicorns and Robert De Niro as a cross-dressing sea captain.
Everything but the enchanted kitchen sink shows up in the sprawling fairy tale &#;Stardust,&#; including evil witches, airborne pirate ships, double-parked unicorns and Robert De Niro as a cross-dressing sea captain. Sprinkled with tongue-in-cheek humor, fairly adult jokes and some well-known faces acting very silly, this adventure story should have particular appeal to fans of &#;The Princess Bride,&#; but in any event will never be mistaken for a strictly-for-kids movie.
One of the opening scenes (there are several) involves the dubious conception of our hero, Tristan Thorne (Charlie Cox) &#; the collaborative effort of a witch&#;s slave (Kate Magowan) and Tristan&#;s wall-jumping father (Ben Barnes). They live in Wall, which separates England from the supernatural kingdom of Stormhold. There, a battle for succession to the throne of the ailing king (Peter O&#;Toole) rages among seven princes, only three of whom are left alive as the story begins.
There&#;s a lot going on &#; at times, perhaps too much &#; in &#;Stardust,&#; which is based on the novel written by Neil Gaiman and illustrated by Charles Vess. The royal rivalries are raging; the dead princes, who appear in black-and-white, are a hilarious Greek chorus, providing play-by-play on the homicidal antics of their surviving brothers. Meanwhile, the young, inept Tristan is wooing the fair Victoria (Sienna Miller) by telling her he&#;ll bring her the fallen star they&#;ve seen pass over their heads. Then there&#;s Yvaine (Claire Danes), who is the fallen star.
And then there&#;s Lamia (Michelle Pfeiffer), the evil witch who wants to cut out Yvaine&#;s still-beating heart and eat it with her horrid sisters so they can prolong their already unnatural youth.
A man in a mortal settlement in the vicinity of a magical realm ventures out on a journey to recover a fallen star.
ABSTRACT
Nineteenth-century England serves as the inspiration for this whimsical fantasy tale concerning a country boy's attempts to charm a beautiful woman in a world where mortals and magical beings exist together. Stardust follows Tristan, a young man easing into adulthood, as he sets out in search of a fallen star to prove his worth to the village's most beautiful young woman, embarking on a journey where he must face off against some of the magical kingdom of Stormhold's fiercest characters in hot pursuit of the same item if he is to win the day.