Speaker #0Very difficult, I think, for a composer with me. Not personality, I don't mean that. I mean, because I love music so much, I think my temp track, when I've taken music from other sources, can be very effective. And so it's a barrier, in a way, for the composer, because he looks at what I've laid up and he says he doesn't want to copy it. he has to. free his mind of of that temp track and come up with his own compositions but he gets an idea of what i'm thinking about so the temp track becomes a talking point as to why i used it and what i was looking for in this you know i mean in some strange way if if i wasn't a film director i think i would be like to be a composer um i love music i think as i say it's the I think the fount of all the arts. So it can be difficult because I can love these tracks. But Maurice was very clever because with me he could talk through it and come to understand why I'd used a piece. And he might use something with a different feeling, but he'll say, I think this will bring out more what you want. I mean, in a way, I don't work in the classical movie sense. I never have had a score from beginning to end. I tend to use music only when it is the only way you can say something. You know, it's in a military analogy, it's like the music is the reserves that you hold out of the battle. And only when you're in trouble do I bring the music in. I don't like music to be didactic or to lead the audience, as it were, to certain points of view or feelings. But music can say things that image and sound and dialogue can't say. Only music can say it. It's like another language. And Maurice understands this. And so we could talk this language and he could make it come into the movie for me. He could write it. It's very difficult. The composer, when you think about it, generally comes in very late. And there's not much money left. They're always getting the budget cut. And you sort of say, there's the movie. Be inspired, composer. Inspiration, maintenant, immédiatement. Vous avez deux semaines. Something like that. Get to work, you know, and bring me something amazing. Well, that's very challenging in the short time. And what happens, you might have 15 cues, 18 cues, and in the end, you know, you get your favourites, you know, six, seven cues if you're doing well, and then you repeat, I think, some of those, you know, that you come to love, in which the composer caught the piece. But that, again, helps when you have good communication and you like being together. You know, Maurice and I, by the time of Witness, were friends, were working friends. And, you know, we'd have dinner and we'd talk about this, other things. You know, he'd met his wife-to-be on Fong on Year of Living Dangerously. So I felt I was his sort of best man. It was something I, and we had that connection. And when you've been through something together and you've worked well together, you have a bot, naturally. So we could communicate a lot about what I was looking for. And Maurice is amazing in that really he leaves his ego outside when you're working together, which I think a director has to do too. You have to leave your ego. Only the film has an ego, and you have to serve the film, not yourself. And Maurice was terrific like that. If I said to him, I remember it on Mosquito Coast. Well, there was a very good cue, a beautiful piece he'd done for the end penultimate scene. And I wanted to drop it and just use sound, natural sound, because I also love natural sound. That's again why I don't do a big score, because I like to hear the rustle of the paper and, you know, the clink of the cup and the birds. And they can tell the story too. So I rang him up and said, Maurice, I'm going to drop that cue in the mix. And another composer might have been very angry or upset or whatever, but Maurice said, well, you know, if it makes the picture better, then you should drop it. And this was one of the, you know, extraordinary things about his personality, this ability to make the music not about himself. The music was never about Maurice Jarre. It was always about the picture. When Maurice is working and he's got into the general themes and feelings and he has some ideas, he'll call me over, play on piano. He's really a very good pianist. He certainly is not a good pianist, but I think he's very good. And as he's playing, he's watching you, you know, under these brows, you know. He's a bit like that. He'll pick up everything, becomes extremely sensitive, as I think creative people do. In the heart of your work, you know, you reach a point where you're extremely, you're like an Aborigine. You know, you're like a native. You can pick up. communication beyond words. You really pick up everything. All your antennae are out. And so he's very much like that. And so he might see a little frown on my face or something. So you don't like that? I could do this. Yeah. Or this. What if we went this way? And he watches my face, you know. I have to be careful sometimes to keep almost impassive so I don't have him interpret my reaction. Because I think you have to live with the piece for a while. You know, you have to, you can't, sometimes you can react straight away, but mostly you have to think about it. And so that's the way it was with Maurice. But again, he's very focused, very focused down on the music and he gets inside his bubble. And I understand that. And he thinks of nothing but the music at that point, in those last weeks and last days and last hours. And musicians love him. They love him, you know, because he speaks the language. He has, again, the lack of ego, but he's disciplined. And he knows his music. He can help somebody in a big orchestra for trouble with something. He'll go and talk. You know, I love all the hearing that. I can't understand because I don't read music, you know, but he consults with them and goes back. And, you know, if he's conducting and he is, you know, interesting to watch in that, you know, final recording. And there's always problems. You know the musicians always saying you know something you know there's just this part here Maurice you know I can't um you know it kind of doesn't you know and so Maurice will say okay you know so just take a little here you can you know you know so like like so you know so he's always fixing and you know I love to watch that you know.
