CineConcerts met with composer Enis Rotthoff to discuss his score to the new Netflix film Trigger Warning!

CineConcerts (CC): You have such an eclectic background. How did you get into film music?

Enis Rotthoff (ER): As a 9-year-old I was absolutely fascinated by film music. I was already taking piano lessons and for me, it felt natural to watch movies, memorize the melodies and then try to play them on the piano. And, over the course of doing that, it became like a hobby or game for me as a kid.

Film music played an important role long before I considered becoming a film composer, it was just a fascination. At age 11, I was so interested in it that I started learning as much as I could about film music. And in my teenage years, film music was the most interesting thing to me.

Although I took piano lessons early on, composing came very naturally. If I did a mistake on the piano while practicing, I would just think, “Oh, that's a very nice chord. Maybe I can do something with it.” So, it was not about becoming a film composer.” It was more like, “I love film music and composing and how can I learn more about it?”

At that time it was not about a journey. It was all about enjoying it for the moment. My parents weren´t in the film or media world, so it felt very far away for me. But I had this early dream. I would go to libraries, learn about film, music, read books, music and I was absolutely amazed by composers like John Williams, especially, Star Wars, Raiders of the Lost Ark, but also Home Alone as a kid. Back to the Future by Alan Silvestri was one of my favorite movies and scores, and so, I wanted to learn as much as I could about orchestral music and writing for the orchestra and for movies.

CC: Would you say you're a visual person in relation to composing? Do you imagine certain situations or certain images in your mind and that translates to music, or is it the opposite? Do you think musically first and then think of the imagery?

ER: I am a very visual person but over time my approach has changed. Initially I was interested in coming up with ideas based on scripts. Now I prefer watching the picture  to see what I can add to it. I want to be immersed into the film and draw the inspiration from the actual film experience instead of imagining my own world. And I hope that doesn't sound contradictory. I still write themes based on scripts to inspire filmmakers and to start the journey but the film itself is my primary source of inspiration.

CC: You’ve worked with some pretty incredible artists through your career. How did that change your perspective as a young musician? And did that allow you to really hone in your skills even further? I imagine it did. But it's not every day that someone get to work with Jan [Kaczmarek]. I mean, he's just an incredible composer. And Wolfgang Petersen, it's just these are legends in the industry.

How did you get into that? How did you step into working with them?

ER: I met Jan when I was 20. He was a very warm person from the moment I met him and we connected on a personal level right away. I felt like I could be myself with him. And that opened up a journey that started two years later. He contacted me and said, “Would you like to be my assistant on films?” And working for him as an assistant was one of my most important experiences in my 20’s. To learn as much about film music, to be involved working on a studio project, how it is to record an orchestra in London or Poland and all these things I was able to experience with him was exciting.

I worked for Jan Kaczmarek for seven years. And over the course of these years, he always gave me an opportunity to be part of his projects in different constellations: assisting, arranging and composing. The most important aspect was our personal connection and mutual appreciation for each other´s sensibilities.

I learned so much from him because he was so different. And that difference was actually a source of my inspiration because I could relate to his sensibilities, but I could see that he would do things differently than I would. And that's beautiful and I appreciate that in general, when people do things completely differently in a way I would never do, because this is what enriches our culture. Sadly Jan passed away recently which is a huge loss.

CC: That's true. It’s a massive loss to film music and the world. I mean, hearing about his passing this year was just awful.

But, what an amazing experience to learn from somebody for so long. And I think the personal connection that you had with him, is that something that you find often? I feel like that's unique, right? For somebody assisting a composer and having that kind of personal connection. I mean, you don't see that all the time.

ER: Absolutely. I was very fortunate. Jan sometimes felt like an uncle. I am still close with his family and am thankful for the great experiences and laughs we had together.

CC: So, before we get into the nuts and bolts of the music of Trigger Warning, can you talk a bit about how you got involved in this project?

ER: I had seen the film Marlina the Murderer in Four Acts by Indonesian director Mouly Surya which premiered in Cannes. When I heard this amazing director was shooting an American action film starring Jessica Alba, this felt like a dream project. The combination of her arthouse sensibilities and an action film was intriguing to me. I love when filmmakers and teams come from all places of the world to create a movie that's universally understood. I am very romantic about this. Meeting Mouly was wonderful. We really connected and she decided to work with me on the music. It was a beautiful journey. I have to say, I have learned so much, and it was so much fun and inspiring and of course, also a lot of work - but I expected that on an action movie.

CC: Did you come into that meeting with ideas? Or had they shot the movie and then you came in? Where did you come in during that process?

ER: They had already shot the movie so I saw early edits, which helped our conversations. But I did not come in with early ideas. I wanted to first understand Mouly´s vision. We had a conscious process, where we built on first finding a mutual understanding of what Mouly wants to achieve in the movie as a filmmaker and what her vision is for the film. And then, I could show her what is possible with musical ideas based on the scenes that we have.

As Mouly is a director with lots of openness towards surprises and experimentation, we were able to try out things and see what worked. It was as if we were in a laboratory of ideas, experimenting until we found the best approaches.

And based on that, I could experiment a lot. I'm glad you hear that in the music because that's something that I built the whole score on. It's basically our best ideas and building on these. And it was, to some degree, a humbling experience, because you understand that action is a genre where sometimes you just have to go with the genre, and you can break the genre in interesting ways. But you have to also understand that you're working within a framework where some action really does need heavy percussion and heavy hitting electronics. And some scenes can be surprisingly different and, as you say, emotional. To find these moments and find the balance was the whole game and the fun.

CC: It seems like your working style is that you sit at the piano, right? I imagine that you still compose on the piano like you did when you were younger. Do you watch it and then go to your piano and start sketching out ideas?

ER: There are two sides to me. There's the composer side where you imagine things in your mind, how you can create a melody, how you create a theme. I sit down at the piano, try it out, and I think about the instrumentation. There´s this composition mindset where I can compose a whole piece just in my mind, but the scoring mindset is the dominant one later, which means I come up with themes in that composition mindset, but then I have to test it to the picture. So, I'm actually scoring to screen, and I'm watching the movie while I'm working on scenes all the time. But it does help tremendously to have a compositional concept before I dive in.

CC: So, let's go into the experimentation element. When I listen to the music, I feel like there's an undercurrent of emotion. There's an emotional melody underneath everything.

And understanding that you start with a theme and then it seems like you tweak certain sounds, and then add certain percussive elements on top of something that I think would be a very simple or unique sound or theme sequence.

ER: Our starting point was that we wanted to include Western elements because the story is like a modern Western. So, the first thing I did, I bought myself a resonator guitar, and I learned to play the resonator guitar. How I can slide on it and how I can tune it to my liking, quickly bending the rules of that instrument

I felt "how am I going to compose for a resonator guitar? Either I record a musician with directions or I start learning that instrument" And since I play piano and guitar already, I was excited to just dive in. My first ideas for the score were actually based on that resonator guitar. And what I liked about it is it immediately gave us this Western feeling.

But we also understood this is just a starting point. This was not the theme of the movie, it was just one color of the movie. And, I wanted to bring in a sound that we wouldn't hear in that world. So, I brought in a GuitarViol. It's a custom hybrid electric cello - electric guitar that I put through a guitar amplifier. And it has this gritty sound that became the sound of Parker.

That sound is accompanying her through the whole movie. If we hear an orchestra, it's there. If we hear action, it's there in a different way, and it is something that most of the audience might not even recognize as an instrument. It´s more of a soundscape. Combining these two layers, the Western inspired guitar and GuitarViol was the basis of having a signature sound for Parker. We added retro electronics that remind you of the 80’s and the 90’s. The idea was that Parker comes from this little town and she spent her teenage years there so she's a kid of the 90s’ at the very least. So, there are some refreshingly retro sounds in there that mix up with the orchestra. And then on top of that, we added strings, brass and a lot of percussion.

CC: How important is it for you to find space to experiment with sounds when you're composing? Is it something that you do on every score? Is it something that you try to implement?

ER: I approach every movie a little bit like a method actor where I channel the movie or the cinematic experience. I worked on a low budget British drama "Love Sarah", where the director and producer were able to get me the budget to record a small string ensemble, harp and piano, so I composed within that instrumentation for that film as a frame. I would say the experimentation was more on a compositional level for that British film because, this is just how we went. It was a more heartwarming drama. And within that genre, it felt appropriate not to experiment too much with sound, but more with the power of the orchestra. So it really depends on the needs of a film and which genre we are working in.

On a film like Guns Akimbo, starring Daniel Radcliffe, it's an action comedy. And we knew that it should be a pop cultural clash. And so that was all about experimentation, I knew I would not use an orchestra. I would use as many different synthesizers and electronic drums as I could and mash it up with my own childhood memories, in terms of electric guitars and retro computer sounds. So, experimentation in my case can take very different forms. I have this feeling I can be like a chameleon where I apply what I find most appropriate for the movie in terms of instrumentation and compositional mindset. I understand that having a signature sound can be a beautiful thing. And I appreciate that some of the finest composers can be recognized within a second. But I find it appealing to almost disappear and just create a world for every movie. I do get reminded especially when writing for the Orchestra that my composing style does build on every movie I scored and the experience I gained. One thing that is important for me is to think about empathy in movies, how to create it within the audience and how to find the right empathy for the people we follow. Movies have the power to connect us to people and stories we otherwise would not experience. And it connects us a society and the whole world.

CC: It seems like you come into films knowing what boundaries you have and, depending on what they are, you push them to the absolute maximum. Whether it's budget or whether you have an orchestra or not. You go within the constraints of whatever is put in front of you. That's got to be exciting, but also scary, right?

ER: It can be scary, but I wouldn't be that excited about what I do if it wasn't also risky sometimes, right? If you don't take a risk, you're probably in your comfort zone. Then it's maybe less exciting. So, I really like to bend the rules, I like to surprise the audience with an experience. And the filmmakers are my biggest inspiration. They help me to realize their vision. Basically, since I'm working so closely with the filmmakers, I'm pretty comfortable with trying out things.

CC: How did you come up with the idea of the guitar and these other sounds? Does it happen naturally or do you sit around a studio and start messing around with instruments? How does that work?

ER: It is like a creative pregnancy. You need your time. I try to get as much inspiration as I can from the filmmakers and learn from them. They went through the process of writing the script, shooting the movie, and here we are with an edit where we need to rediscover the actual film. And I try to listen to a lot of music within the genre I am, or sometimes I will randomly hear something on the radio that inspires me.  I would call this the research phase. And the research phase is very important for me where I don't have preconceived ideas, where I am actually open and don't have an idea what I'm going to do.

CC: That seems very intense.

ER: For me it's a beautiful phase. I think that the closer you get to the deadline, there is more pressure, but I'm used to that. I find that taking time in the beginning for any creative journey is the right approach.

CC: The research phase of taking it all in and being inspired, is that a mode you want to be in all the time or do you have to say I need to take a break and emotionally recharge for the next one. Or is it something that you could just continue to do all the time from project to project?

ER: I don’t find it exhausting. I find it highly inspiring because in the research phase, I don't need to compose. I actually can listen to other people's work. I think the composing phase is the challenging phase where you need to bring everything together and where you need to make decisions. What works with the movie and what doesn't. And I think that wearing these different hats is the challenge. The challenge is to be clear in your communication with the filmmakers, but also honest with yourself. The last phase of a project, the final recording of the score with musicians, the orchestration and mixing of the film score is equally important, but less stressful for me because I have a wonderful team who help me with the recordings and the mix of the music.

CC: What are some of your favorite tracks from Trigger Warning?

ER: One of my favorites is “Memories of the Past” for a scene where Parker returns to her father´s bar. She has a casual chat with her ex-boyfriend and then stays in the house on her own. And the music is not really about Parker. The music is about her feelings towards this house, this is the place of her memories of her childhood which reminds her of her deceased father. I loved that I could add something to the scene that makes the house feel warm to let the audience know that she had good memories there.

So, she looks at a picture of her father at some point in that scene, where the music is able to transport something to the audience that they experience more through the music than what you see in the picture. And I found that very satisfying. It's a Western inspired sound with strings, GuitarViol, resonator guitar, bass, piano, and some string flourishes. It's an unexpected scene in this film in the beginning because it leaves so much space. She's on her own. There is sadness and warmth at the same time. And just to have that character introduction through her eyes, we experience a place through music.

Another track I really like is “Machete”. In the movie, there is a scene where Parker discovers a machete that she's going to use for her fights and it's almost this transcendental moment, where we created pulsing electronics when she touches the machete. And it is like the story of the machete and it becomes this epic moment. And we did it in a very positive upbeat way. We hear some sliding Western guitar sounds in the piece that represent her connection to her past and her father. But then, there are also electronics underneath that intertwined with the strings.

CC: What is it like going into the theater and experiencing your film with an audience as a composer? That's got to be an incredibly transformative experience as a composer, sitting there seeing the finished product on a big screen.

ER: I love that experience. Since my first movie I go to screenings or go to a random cinema to just experience it in the cinema with the audience and see and feel how they react. You learn so much from that and it´s very inspiring.

CC: What are you working on next? Anything you can talk about?

ER: My next movie is a film about Steffi Graf and Andre Agassi. It's a beautiful tennis love story between the two. I just recorded the score with an orchestra with strings, two harps and piano. So, I'm very excited for that one to come out.

CC: Is it a documentary?

ER: It’s a feature film and an American-German co-production. Scoring it was a truly different experience in comparison to "Trigger Warning",  and that’s what I love about film music.

Trigger Warning is now streaming on Netflix!