For a man who was scoring video games only ten years ago, composer Michael Giacchino wasted no time in becoming one of the most in-demand composers around. Hand picked by J.J. Abrams to write the music for TV show “Alias” (he’s since gone on to compose “Lost” and “Six Degrees” on TV for Abrams), he made his feature debut in spectacular fashion on Pixar’s “The Incredibles,” knocking out a stunning, John Barry-homaging work that launched him into the big leagues.
Since then, despite working on “Lost” consistently throughout its six year run, he’s also managed to pull in some strong work — working with Abrams on “Mission Impossible 3” and “Star Trek,” and Pixar on “Ratatouille” and “Up,” the latter of which is probably his best work to date, picking him up the Academy Award for best score. And even when he works on films that aren’t up to scratch, like “Land of the Lost” or “Speed Racer,” his music is often the best part of them.
He can currently be heard in theaters with the eerie, choir-tinged score for “Let Me In” (which is lovely, but a little intrusive — one of the film’s few flaws), and, with the day job on “Lost” wrapping up this year, he’s lined up half a dozen projects that’ll keep him busy through to 2012.
A Variety profile of the composer has revealed that Giacchino is reteaming with a number of directors he’s worked with before; Abrams on “Super 8,” Brad Bird on the fourth “Mission Impossible” and Thomas Bezucha, with whom he worked on “The Family Stone,” on the Selena Gomez comedy “Monte Carlo.”
But he’s also making waves with new helmers, teaming with two members of the Pixar Brain Trust — John Lasseter on “Cars 2” (replacing Randy Newman, who did the original) and Andrew Stanton on the live-action “John Carter of Mars.” Finally, and probably the first to hit the screens, he’s currently working on the Seth Rogen/Joseph Gordon-Levitt comedy “Live with It” (formerly known as “I’m With Cancer,” which Jonathan Levine (“The Wackness”) is directing.
We love Giacchino’s work, on the whole, and it’s good to see him busy, and on a generally promising selection of projects. We only hope that it won’t see him spread too thinly, but we imagine that after knocking out two dozen episodes of “Lost” a year for the last six, this’ll seem like a holiday.