All language subtitles for MasterClass Hans Zimmer Teaches Film Scoring - 11Tempo

The drummer for the film composer is the

editor. So you need to know your editor

and you need to know how your editor

feels tempo etc. I I remember in Crimson

Tide cutting a re figuring out this

really long scene um that Chris Levenson

had cut and I was thinking he must have

cut this to a piece of music. It's

rhythmically so accurate and I finally

worked out the BPM which just was

unwavering. I can't remember what the

actual BPM was, you know, and that it's

a 7-minute piece. Um, and I never I

never did a tempo change. It was quite a

slow tempo. And I saw Chris, I said,

"So, what piece of music did you cut

this to?" And he goes, "No, I didn't cut

this to a piece of music." You know, you

just want to, you know, part of who you

want closest to you is uh you want to

know the metabolism rate of your editor

because they're they're your drummer.

Here's

how I start the day. I go, "The click is

your friend. It's reliable. It's the

only thing I can rely on." You know, the

notes are lying to me. I am lying to me

going, "Yes, today you're going to write

a great tune." Well, that's [ __ ]

So, the only thing I can rely on, the

only thing that's my friend is the

metronome because it's just there. It's

steady. it's reliable. Um,

so I like being in a grid and um, it

gives me an enormous amount of freedom

to lie um, and to invent and to, you

know, if a great idea happens, you know,

you're playing something and there's a

great idea in there somewhere, but it's

it's just a free form floating around in

the air, it's really hard to capture and

make something out of it. If it's in the

grid, you're already a step ahead. You

know, you're already, you know, just put

up a click and look at the listen to the

click and look at the picture. And it's

just a click and it's just a metronome

and holes.

But if you listen carefully, something,

you know, in your head, not maybe a

tune, but a texture or a feeling or

something. Something will come about.

the picture will speak to you in a

different way when you impose a grid

onto it that isn't the same grid as the

editor has. And so if your if your

question is do you like single space or

double spaced in your emails or your

type or your script or whatever that's

the click for me. That's you know it's

it feels a certain way.

We were talking earlier about how do I

start and part of it is and I can sit

there forever trying to figure out what

my tempo is. What what is what's what's

the pace of the drama for me in this

one, you know, am I going to go against

it? Am I going to go with it? And if I

go with it, what is what's,

you know, how many cups of coffee did

the editor have before he cut the scene?

Um, you know, how are the actors moving?

You know, h what's their speech pattern?

Um, and it's not like I consciously work

it out. It's just I I try to take it in.

And I've take, you know, I've done a 100

movies or so. And you just you you don't

consciously look for you just sort of

feel it and then just put it in that

okay hang on I know what that is. I used

to play this game of watching a scene

once

figuring out what I wanted to hit and

then switching the picture off and just

writing and then putting it back up. And

I can hit anything you want. I mean,

uh, there was a there's a thing on

Interstellar.

Um, Chris was shooting in Iceland and he

we were talking on the phone and he was

describing the scene and how it hit, you

know, it had to hit this and it had to

hit something else, it had to hit

something else and then it had to do a

stop

and

I was saying I I finally said to him,

you know, I was writing all this down

and I said, "Look, I think this is too

complicated. I think you need to send me

the scene. I think I actually need to

write this to picture. And he paused for

for a second. He said, you know, look,

we've done pretty well at feeling temper

the same way. I mean, um, Inception is

all about time, you know, and

so we've been pretty good at feeling

time. So, why don't you just write it

and if it doesn't work,

I'll send you the scene, you know, cuz

it's Iceland. I was in, you know,

whatever. Um, so I wrote the thing and

uh sent it over and I phoned him up and

said, "So, how did it work?" He goes,

"Uh, it was it was frame accurate, you

know. So, even though we're working

independently, we we know,

you know, tempo is important,

you know, it's part of the drama."

Chris and I really get into it on on

BPMs. It's just because it's a language

we're comfortable with, you know. Um,

with Guy, it's much more about

it's, you know, it's it's like a

three-way dance between James Herbert,

him, and myself. And um

I very very very quickly figure out

literally just with James and and Guy,

you know, literally when they walk into

a room what pace the movie is going to

be at, you know, and oh yeah, I think

we're I don't think we're in 80 BPM. I

think we're more than 96 BPM or And then

there are certain tempos which just hit

things in an interesting way. You know,

what's my frame that I want to paint in?

Is it a big frame or a small frame? A

big frame is a 60 BPM slow

to certain emotion that automatically

comes forth. It's a more it's a more you

can instantly get more profound. Try to

get profound at 140 BPM. It's a bit

tricky because it's just, you know, it's

a little bit up and douncy. Dark Knight.

We actually talked about,

wouldn't it be cool

if Chris shot the movie with a BPM in

mind?

And we and so the first four reels of

that movie are at 96 BPM.

And then when we switched, you really,

you know, you don't notice that we

switched. But you know, it it's the the

trick is we just give you a jolt

suddenly because in one way or the

other, even though there's a lot a lot

of stuff been happening. There have been

bank robberies and dialogue scenes and

chases and all sorts of stuff. They were

all in one tempo and and in a peculiar

way, you've now gotten used to this. So

suddenly I'm pulling the rug out from

under you, you know, and the whole, you

know, the the whole

excitement sh it it wasn't even that

radical. It just was wrong. Do you mean

slightly wrong? Slightly wrong is great.

You know, slightly unc, you know, just

uncomfortable.

80 BPM 80 BPM is just a good tempo. is

of a good because you can go any way.

160 is going to be close to cardiac

arrest and sometimes you want to go up

there, but 80 BPM can be quite

subtractive as well. And and it just so

happens that

the math is easy.

You know, sometimes you got to go and do

you have to remember that one 44 bar at

80 BPM happens to be 3 seconds. So you

sort of can orient yourself or 96 is 2

and 1/2 seconds.

You know, it's just it's just weird

baggage you carry with you. You just

instinctively know. 140 usually means I

didn't have I didn't have the courage to

make your heart burst out of your chest.

Um

actually I'm pretty sure I didn't use

140. it would have been 142 or something

like that because there are certain

things which are divisible by frames and

certain things which aren't divisible by

frames and if you're not divis divisible

by frames

it lands badly you know like it doesn't

matter that we're all in this non

nonlinear digital medium these days

editors still think in frames you know

and and we we still think about you know

bit of film about this long you know or

something like out. Um

so maybe the next generation will use

completely different tempo you know

because for them time is just linear.

For us time is divided into rhythms.