Today, the European Film Academy announced the winners of this year’s Excellence Awards. These awards honour the different arts and crafts of film making in eight categories. The winners will receive their awards at the award ceremony of the 37th European Film Awards on 7 December in Lucerne. A special eight-member jury decided on the winners in the following categories based on the European Film Awards Feature Film Selection.

    European Cinematography
Benjamin Kračun for THE SUBSTANCE
 
The jury: “Just as Elisabeth Sparkle’s world in THE SUBSTANCE contracts, the cinematography of Benjamin Kračun simultaneously excels. Despite the constraints of her environment, he playfully explores her physical and psychological demise with highly stylised lens distortions and manipulations. It is loud and glossy, but also manages to eke out an unexpected intimacy and vulnerability. The audience is transported through to an unbearably painful, and hilariously raucous ending, achieved only through collaboration with all departments and is undoubtably a celebration of cinematography and cinema.”
 
European Editing
Juliette Welfling for EMILIA PÉREZ
 
The jury: “In the feverish musical odyssey EMILIA PÉREZ, Juliette Welfling's editing strikes us with its incredible fluidity and elegance. The richness of the story's registers and tonalities is orchestrated with remarkable meticulousness, immersing the audience in the narrative without feeling any of the usual stop-and-go between sung scenes and the others. Very impressive!”
 
European Production Design
Jagna Dobesz for THE GIRL WITH THE NEEDLE
 
The jury: “The difficult life and psychological drama of young Karoline in post-WWI Copenhagen is expertly illustrated by an excellent, interesting, visually strong, and striking production design.
Through skillfully designed interiors, along with carefully chosen exteriors, production designer Jagna Dobesz strongly and powerfully contributes to the visual quality and atmosphere of the movie.”
 
European Costume Design
Tanja Hausner for THE DEVIL’S BATH
 
The jury: “With great precision and great intelligence, Tanja Hausner's costumes in THE DEVIL'S BATH build every single character in a masterful and very modern way. They contribute perfectly to the overall picture and story. On top of that, each costume, including the background actors and extras, is a piece of art, exciting in colour, proportions, texture, and visual rhythm.”
 
European Make-up & Hair
Evalotte Oosterop for WHEN THE LIGHT BREAKS
 
The jury: “Evalotte Oosterop's make-up and hair in WHEN THE LIGHT BREAKS takes into account the complexity of the protagonists' relationships. Without a guideline to follow, she creatively combines classic hairstyles with something we're not so used to see, matching the story perfectly.”
 
European Original Score
Frederikke Hoffmeier for THE GIRL WITH THE NEEDLE
 
The jury: “In an original and experimental way, Frederikke Hoffmeier's original score in THE GIRL WITH THE NEEDLE works wi

Today, the European Film Academy announced the winners of this year’s Excellence Awards. These awards honour the different arts and crafts of film making in eight categories. The winners will receive their awards at the award ceremony of the 37th European Film Awards on 7 December in Lucerne. A special eight-member jury decided on the winners in the following categories based on the European Film Awards Feature Film Selection.

    European Cinematography
Benjamin Kračun for THE SUBSTANCE
 
The jury: “Just as Elisabeth Sparkle’s world in THE SUBSTANCE contracts, the cinematography of Benjamin Kračun simultaneously excels. Despite the constraints of her environment, he playfully explores her physical and psychological demise with highly stylised lens distortions and manipulations. It is loud and glossy, but also manages to eke out an unexpected intimacy and vulnerability. The audience is transported through to an unbearably painful, and hilariously raucous ending, achieved only through collaboration with all departments and is undoubtably a celebration of cinematography and cinema.”
 
European Editing
Juliette Welfling for EMILIA PÉREZ
 
The jury: “In the feverish musical odyssey EMILIA PÉREZ, Juliette Welfling's editing strikes us with its incredible fluidity and elegance. The richness of the story's registers and tonalities is orchestrated with remarkable meticulousness, immersing the audience in the narrative without feeling any of the usual stop-and-go between sung scenes and the others. Very impressive!”
 
European Production Design
Jagna Dobesz for THE GIRL WITH THE NEEDLE
 
The jury: “The difficult life and psychological drama of young Karoline in post-WWI Copenhagen is expertly illustrated by an excellent, interesting, visually strong, and striking production design.
Through skillfully designed interiors, along with carefully chosen exteriors, production designer Jagna Dobesz strongly and powerfully contributes to the visual quality and atmosphere of the movie.”
 
European Costume Design
Tanja Hausner for THE DEVIL’S BATH
 
The jury: “With great precision and great intelligence, Tanja Hausner's costumes in THE DEVIL'S BATH build every single character in a masterful and very modern way. They contribute perfectly to the overall picture and story. On top of that, each costume, including the background actors and extras, is a piece of art, exciting in colour, proportions, texture, and visual rhythm.”
 
European Make-up & Hair
Evalotte Oosterop for WHEN THE LIGHT BREAKS
 
The jury: “Evalotte Oosterop's make-up and hair in WHEN THE LIGHT BREAKS takes into account the complexity of the protagonists' relationships. Without a guideline to follow, she creatively combines classic hairstyles with something we're not so used to see, matching the story perfectly.”
 
European Original Score
Frederikke Hoffmeier for THE GIRL WITH THE NEEDLE
 
The jury: “In an original and experimental way, Frederikke Hoffmeier's original score in THE GIRL WITH THE NEEDLE works wi

IFFI, other Film Festivals, and the Media: Partners or undesirables?

When the first film festival as held in Bombay in the year 1952, by the Films Division, 30 years after the first international film festival was held in Venice, nobody would have expected we would be holding the 55th edition in 2024. In the 50s and early 60s, festivals were not held in India regularly, only sporadically. In the 70s it became an annual feature, hence only 55 festivals are spread over 72 years. Since then, it has shifted base many times, undergone name changes, become a competitive festival, again reverted to a non-competitive one, and finally, a competitive one. In 2004, the State of Goa was granted the privilege to host the International Film Festival of India (IFFI) there. Though Goa is not a major film production city (in fact not even a minor film producing city), the powers at be must have had compelling reasons to shift it there, permanently.

IFFI is a government organised one, with earlier festivals solely a Ministry of Information and Broadcasting event. In its early stages, it had the active participation of the National Film Development Corporation (NFDC), earlier known as the Film Finance Corporation, with the FFC head being film festival Director. A Directorate of Film Festivals (DFF) was established later, with the responsibility of holding the National Film Awards and IFFI. The Goa (Panaji, the capital, is where IFFI is held) festival was held in collaboration with the Entertainment Society of Goa (ESG), formed as a semi-government body, for financial facilitation. DFF and ESG jointly held IFFI, with the cost shared, probably on a 50-50 basis. Now, DFF has been dissolved and NFDC has stepped in, as an umbrella organising, also taking under its wing the Films Division and may other divisions of the Ministry of Information and Broadcsting, that dealt directly with the art and science of cinema.

IFFI is the biggest film festival in India, with 10,000+ registrations of delegates. Media is welcomed here. They have a dedicated Media Centre, with work centres for computers, printers, copying machines, and Press Conferences. For several years, journalists were given the task of moderating press conferences, I being chosen to moderate some. That practice is now completely taken over by the PIB, and as a result, we often find the PIB staff or its chosen Moderators ill-equipped to deal with the task. There are buses and free auto-rickshaws plying between the main venue and other centres where screenings or events are held, a most welcome facility.

Besides facilities, the Media was treated to beverages and snacks, but this was subject to the budget allowing it. So, in some years, we had tea, coffee and snacks, all free, all unlimited. In other years, it was just tea and coffee, with some biscuits thrown in, for the early birds only, and at fixed hours. There were also ferry cruises, with cocktails and dinner. At most parties, the media was invited. Several countries hosted their own parties, and there the media was invited to breakfasts, lunches, cocktails and dinner. This last practice has been almost discontinued of late. The duration of the festival, which used to be 15 days long before 2004, has been curtailed to 9 days, the inaugural and closing days included. At most parties, media is not allowed, and at some, passes are either given on first-come, first-served basis, because, the Press Information Bureau (PIB) says it gets 10/20/50 passes only, to distribute among the media, and there are 150-300 (my rough estimate) journalists/photographers registered. Doesn’t anybody (PIB? Why not?) tell the hosts that there are, say 200, journalists, about 100 of might want to attend? On many occasions, none of these reach the media. Wonder who gets them, in the end.

The media is given a free cloth bag, the quality of which has fast deteriorated to a street hawker q

The 36th ISRAEL FILM FESTIVAL in Los Angeles, which celebrates the best of Israeli culture and cinema, will run November 13th – 26th, 2024.  Come Closer, written and directed by Tom Nesher in her feature film directorial debut, will have its West Coast Premiere at the Festival’s Opening Night Gala. Soda, directed by Erez Tadmor, will have a special sneak preview as the Festival’s Sponsor Centerpiece Film Event.  At this year’s opening ceremony, Ynon Kreiz, Mattel Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, who has transformed the company and spearheaded its global blockbuster film, Barbie, will be presented with the 2024 IFF Industry Leadership Award.  Actor/Comedian Shaike Levi will receive the 2024 IFF Lifetime Achievement Award at the Closing Night ceremony.  Meir Fenigstein, founder and executive director of the ISRAEL FILM FESTIVAL made the announcement today. The Festival chairwoman is Michelle Sobrino-Stearns, CEO and Group Publisher of Variety. The Festival honorary chairman is Arnon Milchan, Founder of New Regency. 

“The Israel Film Festival has always maintained an environment of mutually respectful discussion and viewpoints as well as nonpartisanship.  Our thoughts and prayers are with all those affected by the war.  Festivalgoers represent the diverse communities of Los Angeles who want to be both educated and entertained by a selection of powerful and exciting Israeli films that offer a great window into Israeli culture,” noted Fenigstein.

He added, “This year’s two Festival honorees are extraordinary and renowned leaders in business and the arts.  Ynon Kreiz, who has revolutionized Mattel into an esteemed juggernaut, volunteered at the Festival over 30 years ago when he was a university student at UCLA.  The legendary comedian/actor Shaike Levi has been bringing joy and laughter to generations of audiences in Israel.”

Kreiz will be honored on November 13th at the Festival’s Opening Night Gala followed by the West Coast Premiere of Come Closer at the Saban Theatre in Beverly Hills. Soda will screen on November 18th at the Writers Guild Theater in Beverly Hills. Levi will receive the Lifetime Achievement Award on November 26th during the Closing Night festivities at the Fine Arts Theatre in Beverly Hills.

Festival screenings will also show at the Laemmle Royal Theatre (West Los Angeles) and the Laemmle Town Center 5 (Encino). To purchase tickets for the Opening Night Gala and all screenings, as well as to participate in Q&As and meet the attending Israeli filmmakers, visit: www.israelfilmfestival.com starting November 5, 2024.

This year many organizations are sponsoring select screenings as community partners during the Festival.  This includes:

Adam & Gila Milstein Family Foundation

American Friends of Tel Aviv University (AFTAU)

American Friends of the Jaffa Institute

Americans for Ben Gurion University

American Friends of Magen David Adom

Consulate General of Israel in Los Angeles

Craig Emanuel & Creative Community for Peace

David & Sheryl Wiener & the Holocaust Museum LA

EL AL Israel Airlines

Factor's Famous Deli

Jack Gottlieb & World Jewish Heritage Fund

Music Meets Film, part of Discovery Campus, the international education programme at Industy@Tallinn & Baltic Event, welcomes eight emerging film music composers and producers from around the world to its programme. 

Music Meets Film has been running for over a decade, bringing together film music professionals worldwide. Since its upgrade last year, the programme has focused on young film composers - the next generation of film music talent. A total of 28 talents applied for this year's edition. 

The eight selected talents for Music Meets Film 2024 edition include a French film composer Agathe Lavarel, who recently received Honorable Mention at the European Talent Awards at Soundtrack Cologne, a French multi-instrumentalist musician and a composer Célyne Baudino, an experienced Finnish media composer Mikko Aaltio, German-Czech film composer, arranger and musician Natalie Schäfer, composer, Brooks Leibee from USA and music producer and composer Kristjan Ruus together with composers Villem Rootalu and Lauri Kadalipp from Estonia.  

The four-day programme, which takes place from 19 to 22 November, includes lectures and masterclasses by award-winning professionals and industry-leading companies and partners. These workshops offer practical tools and guidance for the participants’ careers and help them navigate the industry in the filmmaking process. There will also be various networking opportunities. 

One of the main themes of this year's programme is co-production and collaboration through music. The panel discussion closely examines two award-winning films Driving Mum and Smoke Sauna Sisterhood, successful co-production projects between Estonia and Iceland. The discussion shedding light to these projects welcomes Driving Mum team including Hilmar Oddsson (director), Tõnu Kõrvits (composer), Matis Rei (sound designer) and Hendrik Mägar (editor), and Anna Hints (director) as well as Eðvarð Egilsson (composer) from Smoke Sauna Sisterhood.

The programme includes a creative competition workshop as practical skills are an important part of Music Meets Film. This time the participants will work with the music supervisor Kathleen Wallfisch, whose latest works include Gladiator 2 which will be released in 2024, Dungeons & Dragons: Honour Among Thieves (2023), Downton Abbey: A New Era (2022) etc. The workshop will take place at Selektor Studio in Tallinn, where the participants create a piece of score according to a sample brief. During this workshop, participants will experience what it's like to work with a music supervisor, and how to read and create for a brief in a fixed timeframe. The winner of the workshop will receive a recording session for the next day with selected musicians.

The programme also contains a workshop "Navigating the Industry", created by Tier Music Publishing and Orchestral Tools. Thea Zaitsev and Sandra Perens (Tier Music Publishing) with Graham Ball (Orchestral Tools) create a navigation map of suggested networks for the participants for them to find their next partners and projects. In this workshop the document will be introduced as well as practical exercises will be done on topics such as how to pitch yourself and your music.

In addition, there is a one-on-one discussion "Dialogue on Contracts: Before and After Signing" between film composer Liina Sumera and attorney and partner at TGS Baltic Priit Lätt, attorney at law, covering the tender topics of rights, negotiations and contracts, which are essential for everyone in the film industry. 

MAMI: The origins of the Mumbai Film Festival, and the people who realised this dream

IFFI, or the International Film Festival of India, began in Bombay, in 1952. It was then held in 1961, and after that, more regularly, till the mid-70s, in New Delhi. From the 3rd IFFI, held in 1965, it became a competitive festival, always held in New Delhi. Eleven years later, in 1976, it came back to what was at that time the equivalent of Hollywood in India. The festival in Bombay took on a new name, Filmotsav, which is the Hindi approximation of Film Festival, and was non-competitive. This was done with the intention of alternating/shuttling the film festival annually between New Delhi and other major cities of India, so that they get exposure too. But Filmostsavs were always non-competitive.

Since Mumbai had not had a festival for so long, and there was no infrastructure in place, some agencies had to be called in to make to contribute. Government wings, like the Film Finance Corporation (FFC), Films Division (FD), Press Information Bureau (PIB), Directorate of Advertising and Visual Publicity (DAVP), and the voluntary body, Federation of Film Societies of India (FFSI). Of these, only FFSI had any experience in screening International Cinema, shorts and features, animation and documentaries, and the non-mainstream films from all over the world. And so it was, called to help in the selection and programming of the film-fare to be screened.

In 1976, I was already an established journalist, having been a critic for a good seven years. Besides, I had been an Executive Committee Member of the University Film Society in 1973 and the Chairman of a Film Society, called Cine Circle, since 1974, with over 100 members. The biggest Film Society was Film Forum, which had members from the film industry and graduates of the Film and Television Institute of India. Other prominent Societies included Prabhat, Suchitra and Anandam. We had a Western Regional Council of film societies, which was an all-India organisation, with its current head-quarters in Calcutta, where it began in 1947. It had prominent names like Satyajit Ray, Chidananda Dasgupta, Vijaya Mulay, K.L. Khandpur and believe it or not, Indira Gandhi and Inder Kumar Gujral, as its members, in the initial years.

Serving on the Western Regional Council of the FFSI, I was appointed part of the Selection Committee and a member of the co-ordinating Committee. It is impossible to recall what films were selected, but I do recall that the FFSI played a prominent role in running the festival and that it was a moderate success, with some glitches. Among the venues was Tarabai Hall, outside Marine Lines Station, in South Bombay, an auditorium not meant for film screenings, but since FFSI members used to have many of their screenings there, it was chosen as a venue. I might mention in an aside that the first two non-Hollywood foreign films I saw were courtesy the FFSI: Red Beard at Apsara, in a morning show, and Rashomon, in Tarabai hall, when I was just 15. Seeing my keen interest and being aware that both the Akira Kurosawa masterpieces had no adult content, the Secretary of Film Forum, who had organized the shows for its members, allowed me in, on a guest ticket of Re. 1. Needless to say, both films remain timeless classics embedded in my memory, 57 years after I first saw them.

Moving along, the caravan called Filmotsav shifted to Madras, Bangalore, Thiruvananthapuram, Hyderabad and Calcutta, while IFFI continued to be held in New Delhi. I attended most of these festivals, however, I had to leave the Madras festival halfway because a frantic Nadeem (of the music director duo, Nadeem-Shravan) wanted me to attend the rehearsals of the show they were to hold at the Brabourne Stadium a week later. And he would not take no for an answer.

Right from 1976, Bombayites had felt that IFFI should be held in Bombay, and only

‘Taste of Music’ received a standing ovation at the Norwegian Ravenheart film festival in Oslo. The promise of this short directed by the brilliant and talented Kyle Sevenoaks is about a man (played by the maverick Chris Wiborg) for is facing his music keyboard turned evil after a cosmic storm hitting the Earth. The question is, “what would you do if your keyboard became alive and ready to attack you”? I was lucky to connect with Kyle and Chris and to explore a little more this fantastic horrific short movie that should be a perfect launch for the two men’s careers.

Q: How did this crazy idea for a movie come together?

Kyle: It came from a conversation I was having with Chris and other people about what would happen to electronic devices if a cosmic storm would hit Earth? Because we are both musicians we decided to choose a keyboard as an evil device. And so, the idea was born that this keyboard was going to attack and try to eat our protagonist, “Thomas”, played by Chris.

Q: What is this movie about beyond the crazy storyline? Were you trying to say something in particular?

Kyle: If it says anything it’s “Hire me for your feature film as your director”! haha! Honestly we just wanted to have a good time and entertain people with a crazy concept.

Chris: Music is dangerous! Put major restrictions on music, that’s what we are saying!

Q: What were the many challenges you faced making this short?

Kyle: The scene when Chris has his hand being eaten was quite a challenge to execute. We had to time all that and get the perfect shot. The blood spirting was difficult to time and make it work. The biggest challenge was time management because the cabin we got was a twenty-minute boat ride off the coast of Norway. We only had two weekends or four days total to shoot everything. We had to plan everything very carefully. There was a time crunch, but we knew exactly all the shots we needed, and it went fine at the end.

Chris: Lots of the shots were filmed at night. Summer nights are short in Norway and therefore we had an even greater time restriction. I remember that for the last scene Kyle was yelling: “the sun is coming up! Hurry up!”.

Kyle: We had to spend a few hours each time to black out all the windows of the cabin to make sure it looked pitched dark inside.

Q: How did you get into the skin of your character, Chris?

Chris: Kyle had a solid idea of what type of person Thomas was. So, I followed his direction. I tried to stay realistic about the character and, I tried to be funny as well. There is some dark humor about this horrific story. You can escape from seeing this film as being a little bit absurd.

Q: Why did you choose the horror genre to make this film? Do you have horror inspirations for your film?

Kyle: I always been a fan of horror since I saw “The Terminator”, even so I was way too young to watch it, like 5 or 6 years old. Here the inspiration comes clearly from Sam Raimi’s “Evil Dead” and Peter Jackson’s “Braindead”. I love the horror from the 80’s. It was such a great era for horror movies. Because there were movies that didn’t take themselves too seriously and it still was scary to watch.

Chris: For me I remember watching “Nightmare on ELM street” and it scared me for life! Haha! The chase of the keyboard running after me reminds me of Fredd

I can’t quite believe it’s been twenty years since the great Jerry Goldsmith left us. His music has been part of my life for most of my life – still today, rarely a day goes by that I don’t listen to at least some of it. We all have different reasons for liking film music – for some, it’s a musical reminder of a beloved film; for some, it’s a place where you can find great tunes, great melodies; for others, it’s (for the most obvious reason) the most viscerally visual form of music, constructed in a way that allows the listener to either recall a particular film in a particular way, or better still create their own interpretation of it; and there are many other reasons besides. Goldsmith, uniquely, did all of it – just the perfect blend of the European style of encapsulating a film or key moments of a film with an idea or a theme with the Hollywood style of creating a musical journey from one moment to another.

He rose to prominence when composers like Herrmann, Rosenman, Bernstein and North had already begun changing film music away from its seminal romantic classical form into something different, and took their ideas and launched them into the stratosphere – taking the idea that the absence of music can be as powerful as the presence of it, absorbing ideas from classical masters like Bartok and Ravel as much as his film music heroes Waxman and Rózsa (and his great friend and idol North), blending this into the most phenomenal technique.

He could do everything – I don’t think there’s ever been another Hollywood composer who could so naturally drift from serious drama to action thrills to romance or comedy. While outside of the core niche who appreciate his breadth he may be best-known for his music for science fiction or other futuristic movies – whether Planet of the Apes, Alien, the Star Trek movies, it’s not hard to know why – he himself was always most proud of his more personal music – anyone who asked him what his own favourite thing he’d written was got told it was Islands in the Stream, his exquisite and deeply personal music for Franklin Schaffner’s Hemingway adaptation – until the 1990s that is, when his answer changed to Rudy.

Jerry Goldsmith

In the ten years from 1974 to 1983, he did the most extraordinary roster of wide-ranging scores, including Chinatown (which created the “film noir sound” still in use today), The Wind and the Lion (which features perhaps the single most thrilling piece of film music ever created, “Raisuli Attacks”), The Omen (which created the choral “horror movie sound” still in use today), Capricorn One (which served as the template for most action scores for a good couple of decades), Star Trek: The Motion Picture (the most dazzlingly beautiful symphonic interpretation of Roddenberry’s vision of the future), Alien (haunting, scary, beautiful), Poltergeist (the third horror movie I’ve mentioned and the scores are all exceptional and all completely and utterly different from one another), The Final Conflict (the best music ever written for a bad movie), First Blood (another action masterpiece, but it’s the way he single-handedly brought humanity to a character who would otherwise have just not worked that makes it stand out) and the utterly astonishing Under Fire (has there ever been a greater “ethnic” film score? – no, there hasn’t). And in between all these there are literally dozens of other scores which, had they been penned by anyone else, would be lauded as masterpieces.

I mentioned The Final Conflict as being the best music ever written for a bad movie – and while it’s sa

We Were the Lucky Ones tells the story of the Kurc family during the second world war. Until it began they lived in the Polish city of Radom, but following Hitler’s invasion some went into hiding, some were taken to concentration camps and others flew to distant corners of the world. The score is jointly credited to Rachel Portman and Jon Ehrlich with no indication of the division of labour – but there is no doubting who was responsible for the main theme, which is nothing short of magnificent.

Few can write a tune like Portman and this one is a seemingly effortless mixture of effervescence and tragedy – such a difficult mixture to pull off, I imagine its creation was in fact anything but effortless. It is genuinely exceptional, and yes it sounds like various creations from the past works of the composer but that’s the hallmark of a truly distinct and individual voice. The score’s highlights are generally when it appears but elsewhere there are scondary themes, typically for solo piano, and typically very touching and with Portman’s trademark deft touch. Inevitably there are darker moments too which provide the album with a nice balance which help to sustain its long run time. Highly recommended.

Even though Liu Cixin’s The Three-Body Problem was necessarily dumbed down somewhat for its tv adaptation (as wonderful as it is, it does occasionally read more like a physics textbook) it was still made in a way that could have supported a great score. The direct allegory of the novel to Chinese social issues is lost in translation to the screen as the setting of the modern-day segments are shifted to allow more western characters, but there’s still stuff going on under the surface of the story that would have allowed a smart and deep score which could have combined these personal moments with the broad science fiction scope of the underlying narrative.

Unfortunately it didn’t get that. Instead Ramin Djawadi’s score is entirely surface-level, missing all the opportunities the project provided to him (whether this is his fault or the showrunners’, of course I have no idea). The main title piece is the highlight, a jittery and (by design) disorientating little piece with rhythmic cells being constructed then deconstructed over its brief run time. Sadly the rest of the score is just standard modern thriller material, an array of electronically-realised industrial sounds generally drowning out the orchestra with nary a tune in sight. Avoiding any attempt to create any emotional bonds between the characters (or between them and the audience) it’s just musical wallpaper, even the big sci-fi moments reduced in scope by the music. It’s such a dull album, and within the show feels like a big missed opportunity.

Djawadi fares a little (but only a little) better in his other big show released at the same time, Fallout, based on the post-apocalyptic video game series. While it’s not The Last Of Us by any means, I found it to be a reasonably entertaining show. Again the opportunity was there for a distinctive score and again it wasn’t really taken – the big mecha-warrior types, the cowboy/ghoul, the plucky young heroine, the mystery of the creation and leadership of the underground community – easy to see how these elements could have been given their own sounds with some overarching material linking everything together.

Instead it is mostly standard modern thriller material again, a bit grittier and more electronic than 3 Body Problem, but importantly with more of a sense of momen