{"id":396828,"date":"2026-01-08T20:29:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-08T20:29:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/396828\/"},"modified":"2026-01-08T20:29:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-08T20:29:09","slug":"f1-composer-hans-zimmer-on-scoring-his-third-racing-movie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/396828\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018F1\u2019 Composer Hans Zimmer on Scoring His Third Racing Movie"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tF1<\/a>: The Movie marks the third racing feature that Hans Zimmer has scored \u2014 following 1990\u2019s Days of Thunder and 2013\u2019s Rush \u2014 but it was a thrill unlike any other composing for a film that had unprecedented access to the world of Formula 1.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI think the main thing I could add to F1 was excitement, pace and a little bit of romanticism,\u201d the German composer tells THR, adding with a laugh, \u201cOne of the things that interested me was, you\u2019ve got to be crazy to be a race car driver!\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tF1, which stars Brad Pitt<\/a> and Damson Idris<\/a> as teammates on an underdog racing team, reunited Zimmer with producer and longtime collaborator Jerry Bruckheimer after they worked together on Days of Thunder as well as The Rock, the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise and Pearl Harbor, among many others. Add Top Gun: Maverick director Joseph Kosinski and real-life F1 champion driver Lewis Hamilton (who served as a producer) to the mix, and Zimmer couldn\u2019t say no to the project.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhen Zimmer first read the script for the movie, he knew he wanted to include as much electronic music as possible to match the howling of the F1 engine. \u201cBut there is orchestra as well, partly because I love the orchestra, partly because we live in a time where we need to support the orchestras,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI did this film, which I really wanted to do because it was apolitical,\u201d he adds. \u201cIt dealt with technology and fun, and at the same time, we\u2019re living in complicated times. So I thought, \u2018The one thing I could do really well at this moment in time is when people go to the cinema, [I want] to put a smile on their\u00a0face.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tHans Zimmer wanted the F1: The Movie score to resemble the howling of the cars\u2019 engines.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tScott Garfield<\/p>\n

\n\tWhat resulted was a futuristic score infused with sounds from the \u201980s. Zimmer, who worked on the music with co-composer Steve Mazzaro, approached the score for the opening sequence differently than with previous projects.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cRight at the beginning, when you see the car [driving around the circuit] and the drums come in, I go straight for a disco beat, and I\u2019ve never done that before,\u201d he muses. \u201cI\u2019ve always avoided that. Film music is all about making it so that the audience gets a surprise. That car going around, it was exciting, so I thought, \u2018I\u2019m going to celebrate that.\u2019\u00a0\u201c<\/p>\n

\n\tAfter his career scoring more than 150 films, the thrilling racing sequences in F1 presented a unique proposition for Zimmer.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThe challenge was to keep it exciting but keep it light,\u201d he says. \u201cI have a tendency to go dark. When I say dark, there should be a color on the color palette called Zimmer Black. (Laughs.) I wanted us to get to that moment at the end of the film where [Pitt\u2019s character] Sonny Hayes is flying, and I wanted people to feel great. Like, do we really need to go to the cinema right now and feel Zimmer Black? I don\u2019t think so. There\u2019s nothing dark about these race car drivers. These guys are reckless, they love what they do, and they\u2019re funny in their recklessness.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tF1 was a collaboration across the board, from production consulting with Formula 1 to schedule tiny windows within real races to shoot footage, to Zimmer working internally with the sound design department.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe made a plan early on about which race would be music-heavy and which would be a sound effects-heavy race,\u201d he says. \u201cWe inevitably were going to collide, so it really became story points: Who gets to lead here and who will get to make the loudest noise in this race? It was a very peaceful production. This was a movie about a team, made by a team.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tSee more on the making of F1: The Movie and other awards contenders at THR\u2019s dedicated site for behind-the-scenes stories at THR.com\/behindthescreen<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\tThis story first appeared in a January stand-alone issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. To receive the magazine,\u00a0click here to subscribe<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"F1: The Movie marks the third racing feature that Hans Zimmer has scored \u2014 following 1990\u2019s Days of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":396829,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[441],"tags":[167709,3491,49,48,45888,578,576,577,77,82],"class_list":["post-396828","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-behind-the-screen","tag-brad-pitt","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-damson-idris","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-international","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396828","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=396828"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396828\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/396829"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=396828"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=396828"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=396828"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}