"Inception" soundtrack - love it!

Right now, I can't stop listening to the "Inception" soundtrack. Clever how the composer uses 3 simultaneous musical motives of varying rhythmic speeds to suggest the relative speed of time in the 3 dream layers (normal, slower + slowest - at least that's my theory!). Love the film, by the way. Seen it twice so far, going for a 3rd next week.

I realised today what the final track (12 - Time) reminded me of... a favourite moment from the wonderful "The Thin Red Line" (T. Malick), a sequence which I have used for years in Film Studies A-Level lessons as an tremendous example of the use of sound (sound effects, soundtrack music, voice-over...). First up, they are in the same key, secondly there's the same rate of chord change (with similar-ish chords), thirdly they are roughly the same speed, fourthly they both make use of a 'pulse' motif, fifthly some motivic + orchestration similarities, and sixthly and finally they are both slow burn minimalist constructions based on repetition of the same basic 4-chord pattern, starting quiet with a thin texture, building up to a harrrrrumphing climax, then falling back down again...

But hey, what I didn't tell you is that they are by the same composer, Hans Zimmer! So we'll let him off. I don't mind someone plagiarising himself. Even the greatest composers do that.

Here, listen to the 2 tracks and make your own mind up.