Veteran trailer music composer Yoav Goren has crafted trailer music for popular films such as “The Dark Knight,” “Hancock” and “The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor,” among dozens of others during the past 15 years.
Now the composer, who is also chief executive of Santa Monica-based Immediate Music LLC, is launching a new record label called Imperativa Records designed to make his music available to advertising agencies and film fans.
“Granted, a good deal of the money we plan to make will be generated by licensing our music to advertisers,” Goren said. “But I believe that there is a very real market for our music on the consumer side too.”
Most people don’t realize it, but that thunderous music behind an action-packed movie trailer is not taken from the film’s score. It has been composed by people like Goren or industry legend John Beal long before the film score is even conceived.
In fact, about 90 percent of the music is recorded using full orchestras or what the industry calls “hybrid-orchestral style,” a combination of live music and computer-sampled music.
“When you’re making a trailer for Steven Spielberg, you need a big sound and that’s what Yoav and the guys at Immediate Music are really good at,” said Benedict Coulter, president of Hollywood-based Trailer Park, one of the oldest trailer production companies in the industry.
Goren has composed and recorded hundreds of hours of music to fit every genre from dramatic to comedic and everything in between, creating a library of ready-made trailer music.
One of the first CDs from Goren’s Imperativa Records is called “Trailerhead,” which is comprised of movie and TV trailers from “Spider Man,” “Beowulf” and the Emmy-winning trailer composition for NBC’s “XX Olympics: The Torino Games,” among others.
Hollywood Connection
The Hollywood-Bollywood connection once helped independent films get financed but has since vaulted into the big leagues with talk of a DreamWorks acquisition.
Now, Korea is getting into the act, creating an investment fund to promote joint ventures between Hollywood and Korean entertainment communities.
Hollywood production companies and content creators, especially those working in animation and visual effects, are being encouraged to produce and edit at an entertainment complex called “Hallyuwood,” in Korea’s Gyeonggi Province.
The first project being produced using the fund is “Dino Mom,” a 3-D animated feature film for the global market.
Scary Viral
Ever since “The Blair Witch Project” virtually created what is now known as viral marketing for feature films, thousands of filmmakers and producers have been trying to duplicate its grass-roots success.
Japanese producer Yumiko Aoyagi, who was behind the “lonelygirl15” online phenomenon, is hoping that he can do the same with a new Web site not yet up called “Scary City.” The site is a platform for a $5.4 million cyber-series about a missing 10-year-old girl who battles unseen evil forces in her haunted L.A. apartment building.
Aoyagi hopes to turn the Scary City online series into a major motion picture. Besides the Web site, series content will be delivered to mobile phones. Each weekly episode is just 90 seconds to three minutes in length.
Aoyagi’s production company is based in L.A. while a Japanese company owns the Web site. The series and Web site are slated to launch Sept. 15.
Yahoo & THR
The industry trade publication Hollywood Reporter has had its stories picked up by Yahoo for many years. Now, the duo has teamed up to create what they’re calling cross-promotional opportunities for movie and box office content.
The two brands also will present Yahoo’s new “Purple Filmstrip Award” program, a monthly honor given to the film studio with the most successful movie title on Yahoo Movies as measured by a combination of the most trailer streams and best user reviews.
Short Takes
Chatsworth-based Image Entertainment needs its common stock to trade at $1.22 or higher per share for 10 consecutive trading days prior to Nov. 3 or risk being delisted by Nasdaq FilmL.A., the nonprofit organization that coordinates permits for filmed entertainment shot on location in the City of Los Angeles and unincorporated parts of Los Angeles County, has begun processing applications for permits to film in Palmdale.
Staff reporter Brett Sporich can be reached at [email protected] or at (323) 549-5225, ext. 226
