Top critical review
3.0 out of 5 starsGood but could have been so much better
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 1 January 2011
Desplat's assignment for The Deathly Hallows undoubtedly occurred as a result of his excellent score for Twilight: New Moon, showing his skills at writing for the fantasy genre. Unfortunately, Desplat did not manage to pull anything special or unique for this penultimate film of the Harry Potter franchise. The scores for Harry Potter have suffered from a lack of consistency as different directors chose different composers from The Goblet of Fire onwards, often with little or no reference to John Williams' original themes or any subsequent themes by the other composers.
Desplat, as he did with New Moon, could have stamped his own mark, but instead many of the tracks whilst individually impressive, never seems to evolve into a well rounded listening experience on album. It is frustrating because he does have some good themes here, and some of the action writing does sound impressive. Maybe he will develop the themes further in Part 2, but this score does feel a little incomplete. It is nonetheless good, but not groundbreaking score with individual moments of flare rather than a cohesive music progression of ideas and themes. Hopefully these themes will be further developed in Pt 2.
