Composer Hans Zimmer gets his due credit in The Weekly Rising. By Kevin P. Sullivan Tom Hardy in “Dark Knight Rises” Photo: Warner Bros. In the years since “Batman Begins” changed the superhero-movie game and “The Dark Knight” took it one step further, the masses have heralded Christopher Nolan as the singular source of genius behind the two films. No one — myself included — will ever deny Nolan’s brilliance, but it is essential to recognize the wealth of creative masters working on the films. Academy Award winner Wally Pfister used a mastery of cinematography to paint Gotham landscapes that are distinct in each entry in the series, yet never betray any sense of consistency with the setting. Editor Lee Smith worked with Nolan to cut the action in a way that thrills but always provides a sense of space. But perhaps the most unsung hero of Nolan’s Batman movies is composer Hans Zimmer . His work with James Newton Howard on the first two films can get lost within the chaos on the screen, but it is always there, accenting each and every memorable scene. His work on the first two films is worth revisiting, for now with the two trailers and the prologue, we’ve gotten a small sense of what to expect from the composer for the trilogy’s conclusion. Zimmer’s last two scores for Nolan films, “The Dark Knight” and “Inception,” have been, at least in part, concept-driven. A new video featured on /Film points out the uncanny similarities between the “Why So Serious?” track from the “Dark Knight” soundtrack and a song from the musical “
