In a year that has seen the demise of Breaking Bad and the rise of Fargo as a compelling somewhat sadistic television series, perhaps the most unexpectedly gripping show that also has its origins in a popular feature film is the television debut of Thomas Harris’ Hannibal. Culled from the same world as Silence of the Lambs and Manhunter, few could have predicted how the violent charisma of Danish actor Mads Mikkelsen (The Pusher/ The Hunt) as the refined sadistic serial killer Hannibal Lector, would take this story to a whole new level, even giving Anthony Hopkins a run for his money in the chilling stakes. It’s a show about relationships, about mental illness and the depravity of the human condition, a cannibalism cooking show garnished with a surreal psychological thriller – and it’s nothing short of addictive. It’s television as art.
It’s possibly the most cinematic series on television at the moment, it’s gripping, sadistic, somewhat stately and immeasurably dark, a psychological drama drenched in the uncompromisingly lush visual style of producer Bryan Fuller (Wonderfalls/ Pushing Daises).
However perhaps the most remarkable aspect of the series is the dependence upon the score, which is often present for almost the entire episode, with barely a breath of silence, meaning that composer Brian Reitzell, the former drummer of Red Kross, who’ toured with Air, and scored Bling Ring, 30 Days of Night, and Friday Night Lights, has his work cut out for him.
What’s immediately apparent on season one is the remarkable breadth of his score, which not only takes this series to some truly dark places, but also some challenging musical worlds. The scraping metal, the droning strings, the tinges of bleak electronics and explosions in grandeur that are alternatively elegantly creepy and searingly visceral are only half the tale. It’s a score that is both elegant and abrasive, highlighting the classical sadism, the dual streams of both the character Hannibal and the series as a whole, which oscillates between refinement and brutality. Even the tracklistings represent this, with titles like ‘Amuse-bouche,’ ‘Sorbet’s and ‘Potage’ – clearly someone’s (possibly Reitzell’s) idea of a joke.
Reitzell’ score is equally informed by club culture and classical music, a work where structures are so dictated by the visual cues that devoid of them they come across as bizarre eccentric experimental fusions. From ambient music to atonal modern composition, from lush electronics to analogue fugues Reitzell appears capable of anything.
Rarely has a TV score been so important to a series, cocooning it in its bleak uncertain world, and rarely has it been so commanding, so experimental, and so complex. Make no mistake, you have never seen a TV series like Hannibal, nor have you heard a score like Reitzell’. This is a remarkable and lasting work.
