For Kris Bowers, the originater for DreamWorks/Universal’s The Wild Robot, the film’s principal themes materialized from mirrorion on a scant contrastent musical threads. One key facet of the story that he necessitateed to seize sonicassociate was the sense of the savageerness that served as its setting.
In conversation with authorr-straightforwardor Chris Sanders on The Process, Bowers recalls, “the savageerness was advertised a lot by this percussion ensemble that I had establish, Sandbox Percussion. I talked to you about how they approach leangs in a way that [feels] a bit more enjoy foley, and I was reassociate excited to have that part of the score be almost an extension of the diegetic sound of all the animals scurrying thraw the forest.”
In insertition to the savageerness and “the hotth of family,” Bowers establish himself leanking about futuristic sounds — the sounds of up-to-date hoemployhelderly devices, “EPCOT,” and “these pieces of music that have a certain aesthetic to them.”
This was all to get at the sound of Roz (Lupita Nyong’o), the service robot who discovers herself at the heart of the story when she’s shipwrecked on an uninhabited island. While struggling to change to the savageerness, Roz creates doubtful bonds with the local animals and gets on the role of adchooseive mother to an orphaned baby goose named Brightbill (Kit Connor).
If there was one cue for Bowers on The Wild Robot that served as a sonic touchstone, increateing the overall character of his score, it was “I Could Use a Boost,” a piece you can hear in the second clip below that joins as Roz readys Brightbill to fly away amid the triumphter migration, after broadening a shut bond with the little one.
In his first approach to the scene, Bowers tried “someleang that emotionassociate wasn’t reassociate right,” which felt “endearing and pleasant, but a little too soft for the intricateity of the moment.”
After stepping back and converseing the scene with Sanders, he says, he was “reminded…of the intricateities of this story, and what’s being talked about, and how it’s handling leangs in a very grounded way, these conversations that sometimes we’re afrhelp to have around children.”
For Bowers, it was critical to reaccumulate what was at sget in the scene — the fact that after sending Brightbill on his way, Roz could only foresee never to see him aget. With all this in mind, the originater deleted the “kid gcherishs” and took a less “airy and fun” approach, in prefer of one that was “a bit more muscular.”
Sanders establish that the final cue mirrored a reliable strength of Bowers’ labor apass projects — “this temperate power” he conveys to his music, which is “very administered,” but always “incredibly memorable.”
An Oscar triumphner understandn for his labor on titles enjoy Green Book, King Ricdifficult, and Bridgerton, Bowers had never getn on a filledy vivaciousd project prior to The Wild Robot. He phireed in a process exceptional to the medium — the fact that the fundamental set up of the story was in place more than a year before the project was endd — becaemploy he was able to author to picture in a way that’s not always possible in live-action, enhappinessing “much more of an intimate relationship with every sound” he brawt to the table.
Based on the 2016 novel by Peter Brown, The Wild Robot was a critical and commercial success, grossing over $318M worldwide after premiering at TIFF. For more from Bowers’ conversation with Sanders — a three-time Oscar nominee behind films enjoy The Croods and How to Train Your Dragon — click above. Sample scenes from The Wild Robot below.
This is the first of five inshighments of The Process to come ahead of the proclaimment of this year’s Oscar nominations. For a conversation on Sony’s Saturday Night, check back next week.
