A.I. is a haunting, deeply moving science-fiction about David, a robot-boy “adopted” by a couple whose real son Martin lies hospitalised in a coma. The plot thickens when Martin recovers and deviously instigates David’s abandonment, setting him on a vast adventure to find the fictitious Blue Fairy so he can wish for mortality and seek a new acceptance from his mother.

The film salutes the tale of Pinocchio without compromising originality, and unfolds with uncanny realism in a frighteningly plausible future. It challenges our distinction between man and machine, and hints carefully at the conflicts of interest people can have in raising children. The visual effects are mind bending as typical of a Spielberg picture, but serve the story commendably without turning the film into an ILM showreel.

Combined with the elegant yet characterful scoring of John Williams, this is one film bound to put both your morals and your tear ducts to the test.

- Pogo

More Pogo remixes:

Finland based composer and sound designer Ari Pulkkinen seems to be one of the most listened to composers in the world right now with over 250 million people who have heard his original Angry Birds theme. Pulkkine’s catchy theme was also recently performed by the London Philharmonic Orchestra which was part of a music festival in the city.

Angry Birds has been praised for its successful combination of addictive gameplay, comical style, and low price. Its popularity led to versions of Angry Birds being created for personal computers and gaming consoles, a market for merchandise featuring its characters and even long-term plans for a feature film or television series. With a combined 350 million downloads across all platforms and including both regular and special editions, the game has been called “one of the most mainstream games out right now”, “one of the great runaway hits of 2010″, and “the largest mobile app success the world has seen so far”.

Ari has also worked on other very popular games such as Trine (PS3/PC), Dead Nation (PS3), and Outland (PS3/360). The games have received rave reviews and praise for their soundtracks and sound design.

by Michael Coleman

If I had to choose just one great horror soundtrack from the 1970s, I’d go for The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. Relentless, disturbing and totally “out-there”, this groundbreaking work arose out of free improvisations by the film’s director Tobe Hooper and his musical associate Wayne Bell. Rather than composing melodic themes for the characters, or dutifully applying motifs to particular events, Hooper and Bell approached the soundtrack like vengeful deities, raining down storms of pure nightmare. The sound design rumbles with elemental violence; it’s difficult to discern precisely which musical instruments, if any, are responsible. When I spoke to Bell a few years ago he told me that a signature ingredient was “an upright bass, which we did all sorts of torturous things to during the Chain Saw sessions”. There’s also lots of tape manipulation (slowed-down and speeded-up gongs), and what sounds like a heavily asthmatic pedal-steel guitar (it is set in Texas, after all). Hooper and Bell smear these cues (with ad hoc titles such as Seethe and Madness) throughout the film, creating a dense, expressionist impasto into which screams, chainsaw engine noise and murderous gibbering are embedded; the effect is to completely mire you in the film’s claustrophobic horror.

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