Composer Christian Wibe has lent his musical expertise to projects such as Dead Snow, Dead Snow 2: Red vs. Dead and Hellfjord to name a few. More recently he scored Netflix’s dystopian thriller set in the not-so-distant future, What Happened to Monday starring Noomi Rapace, Glenn Close and Willem Dafoe. The film follows a set of identical septuplets whom must avoid being put to a long sleep by the government and dangerous infighting while investigating the disappearance of one of their own, as families are limited to one child due to overpopulation. His distinctive electronic score for the project was a standout one for viewers/critics and what caused the filmmakers of The Marine 6: Close Quarters to reach out to him about scoring their film. With The Marine 6: Close Quarters being released November 13th by WWE Studios, we decided to speak with Christian about his work on this film, along with What Happened to Monday and more.
How did you get involved with The Marine 6: Close Quarters? What was your initial appeal of the project?
I believe someone in the M6 team had seen What Happened to Monday and liked what I did on that. WWE and I had been wanting to do a film together for some time and Marine 6 was a good project to join forces on. They wanted a fun driving score and for me it seemed like a cool project and chance to write with a big brush.
How would you describe your score for The Marine 6: Close Quarters?
Marine 6 is a film with very distinct characters. Clear cut good guys bad guys. I wanted to support this with distinct contrasting colours in the music. It allowed me to create a characterized score and go pretty far with it. I wanted to make Maddy the main villain unpredictable, tense and dangerous. I had this eerie pulsing texture in mind and did a lot of sound experiments to materialize what I heard. These unsettling textures backed by electronics, synths & noise drums became the backbone for the bad guys. For the good guys I contrasted with more organic sounds. Guitars, bass, hand percussion etc. It´s fun when these colours mash together in the action sequences. The score is a fun blend of electronics and organic instruments.
What was the most challenging part of scoring this film?
There’s this tense scene where they’re climbing down the interior of a very high ventilation tube. It plays with the feeling of claustrophobia and height. They temped this with big action music, which to me didn’t feel quite right. I suggested a different and smaller approach with this very slow rising tension. I worked with a combination of very effected slide guitars, tense ambient synths and a falling shepard tone design. The idea was good but getting it right was a challenge. One of these moments where the smallest details makes a huge difference. It´s experimenting till it feels good and those can sometimes take a while. Fortunately, the director loved it.
You also scored Netflix’s What Happened to Monday. What was your favorite part of working on that project?
I´ve done a lot of films with director Tommy Wirkola and it´s always a lot of fun. We both like going the extra mile to make something good great. One of many enjoyable moments on that film was recording the huge 68-piece string section for the emotional cues. I had a very particular sound in mind for these cues and to hear that materialize was great!
Because What Happened to Monday takes place in 2073 how important was it for you to make the score sound futuristic as well?
Using electronics in that score was a given to provide that futuristic flavour. At the same time, while being epic it´s also a very close and intimate story about family, survival and betrayal. I really wanted the music to feel big, futuristic but also close and honest. We achieved that by doing a slightly unusual blend of string mikes and electronics. The wonderful sound design by Karen Baker Landers gave the film a lot of that futuristic sound also.
What in your background inspired you to pursue a career in film/television composing? Was it a conscious decision or did you fall into it?
I always knew I wanted to do music. After doing albums and touring extensively with my band Animal Alpha for years I was asked to do the score for Dead Snow. At that time, I hadn’t considered a career in film but immediately fell in love with it. There’s so much to explore in film and film music. I love learning and exploring. To me that’s a big thing.
Has there been a film or TV score that has really blown you away recently?
I was really looking forward to hearing Johann Johannsson’s collaboration with Disney. I´m sure that would have blown me away but unfortunately we never got to hear that. Desplat’s score to The Shape of Water was amazing.
Thanks to Christian Wibe for taking the time for this interview.
