Abel Korzeniowski Used Dual Storyline To Build Lush Score For "Nocturnal Animals"

It had been seven years since composer Abel Korzeniowski worked with director Tom Ford. Korzeniowski had scored Ford’s debut, “A Single Man” and was thrilled to reteam on the director’s sophomore outing.  When he received Ford's script which he based off Austin Wright's novel “Tony and Susan”, he was overwhelmed by the story’s power.

“Nocturnal Animals” tells the story of Susan Morrow (Amy Adams) who married into wealth and owns a high-brow art gallery. Although she suspects her husband is having an affair, she is complacent in her life until she receives a manuscript from her ex-husband Tony Hastings (Jake Gyllenhaal).  Entitled “Nocturnal Animals”, the manuscript follows an imagined and violent tale that highlights the misadventure of a young family that cumulates in multiple grisly murders.  Korzeniowski saw “Nocturnal Animals” combined two stories: the personal drama and a thriller, into one movie.  Early on he referenced Hitchcock, who was a master at creating a quality that something was coming without drawing suspicion to that element.  To ensure he placed an equal amount of work on the two stories, he wrote the score “in reverse”, from the end to the beginning.  The process began, as ventures on a Tom Ford movie do, with strong collaboration with the director.

“We didn’t start with a straight spotting, we started with a moment,” said Korzeniowski. “Tom’ process of discovery began with starting with the main themes, then seeing where that would lead.”

Further complicating the scoring process was the evolution the film was simultaneously making. Korzeniowski noted the scenes would be reshaped throughout the production process as Ford worked on finding the right balance of emotion and information within them. The restructuring did ultimately help Korzeniowski define the music used at the beginning of the film.  Thinking of the three witches that are featured in the prologue of “Hamlet”, the opening sequence tells of what is to come but the viewer doesn’t understand it at the time.  More on that in a minute.

What was present from the very beginning of Korzeniowski’s process was the use of a lush orchestra. The challenge that would accompany grand orchestration would be careful construction of expression: finding those moments that would be better defined by an ensemble and the moments that would be served by a full orchestra.

“I wanted to underline the expression of the screen; the joy, the pride, the energy, but I wanted it to be truthful, not gimmicky,” said Korzeniowski. “I had to find the balance.”

Moments where Korzeniowski scaled the music down allowed the strong emotions on the screen to come through. One example occurs with Edward Sheffield (Jake Gyllenhaal), the character in the manuscript, finds the bodies of his wife and daughter.  A solo violin heightens the raw intensity Gyllenhaal brings to the moment. “When there are intimate cues, there is not as much to hide the action behind,” notes Korzeniowski.

If composing a score wasn’t challenging enough, Korzeniowski had two additional complications to contend with. Once the process began, Ford informed Korzeniowski he’d like him to work close by, meaning Korzeniowski would have to relocate his studio to London.  While it was a little obstructing to move his entire studio to London, he managed to relocate to an area on Sutton Square.  Once he was up and running, Ford visited every other day.

The second complication was demos. While Korzeniowski agrees that demos are “painful” because the sound is never truthful to what the actual recording is, they are a necessary part of the process.  Demos give the director an idea of the music before it goes into final recording.  Korzeniowski was aware of the reaction Ford would have to the synthetic sound of a demo – the emotion the lush orchestrail sound provides would be lost. Even though he was in a time crunch, Korzeniowski invited musicians over to his studio and conducted small recording sessions that he then passed on to Ford.

Back to the opening sequence, which highlights some Ruben-eque naked women dancing with sparklers and party hats. Korzeniowski had asked Ford what the sequence meant to him, but Ford refused to share his intention.  To Korzeniowski, the sequence was meant to highlight the life Susan had abandoned.  The music exemplifies the women, unashamed in their girth and nudity, living life to the fullest.

“They are everything Susan is not,” said Korzeniowski. “She gave up happiness, gave up what made her fulfilled in life and instead chose security.”