Credited to composers
Hans Zimmer,
Geoff Zanelli, and
Blake Neely, the soundtrack to the HBO mini-series The Pacific owes more than a courtesy nod to the late
Michael Kamen’s elegiac work on the Steven Spielberg/Tom Hanks-produced 2001 companion series Band of Brothers. Appropriately melancholy and drenched in French horns and sepia-toned nostalgia,
The Pacific yields a more reflective tone than its older brother, although
Zimmer makes sure to toss in a few of the bold, heavily percussive military themes that have become his forte over the years. This uniquely American, stoic, brass-heavy approach to scoring historical military drama may feel well worn (the main theme could be applied to nearly every WWII film, documentary, or video game released since Saving Private Ryan), but that’s because it works so remarkably well, acting as a cooling agent for the horrific images that war so deftly burns into our collective psyche. ~ James Christopher Monger