MovieChat Forums > Tau ming chong (2007) Discussion > Music from Pirates of the Caribbean

Music from Pirates of the Caribbean

posted 16 years ago by jtl714
24 replies | jump to latest

I can't believe nobody else has pointed this out. During the big battle about 35 minutes into the movie (the first battle after the bandits join the army), there are numerous pieces of music playing throughout the battle. Alot of it was dramatic, but then youll suddenly hear some sort of up beat heroic trumpet that really stood out from the rest of the music. Two of these songs sounded EXACTTTTLLLYY like the music from the Pirates of the Caribbean music. I dont know the titles of each individual song, but if youve seen both movies youll know exactly what I mean. I started laughing out loud because the music was EXACTLY the same. I cant believe they had the nerve to copy the same tune and use different sounds for it. Dont tell me im wrong, its too completely obvious.

[–] Snusmumrikken 16 years ago

I don`t care about it. Everyone copies everyone all the the time in the moviebuisness.

"My name is Legion: for we are many"

[–] jtl714 16 years ago

I watch ALOT of movies and rarely do they ever rip off the exact soundtrack off another extremely popular film. The fact that I noticed this one right off just shows how blatantly obvious it was. Dont get me wrong, I liked this movie. It didnt live up to expectations, but it was good. The part with the music just made me laugh was all.

[–] Devoncs 16 years ago

I noticed that too. I think if you take something like 8 or more measures of some other song, before changing it slightly, that's pretty much copying it. For Miss Robin Grusomme, who insists on sharing what she does and doesn't care about, you're right, but only as far as trailers go. Requiem for a Dream was used in trailers for other movies, the theme from Dragon the Bruce Lee Story was also used repeatedly, as are some other Randy Edelman penned themes. It sounds to me like John Williams stole his own theme for Hook and used it in the first Harry potter movie, but it's his own work to plagiarize.

[–] Snusmumrikken 16 years ago

I am not a she. I didn`t insist, i just said my opinion on the matter.

"My name is Legion: for we are many"

[–] richimorton 13 years ago

I agree 'jt' - it's way too soon after POTC to be ripping stuff off. Chinese people watch Disney films right ? Or are Pirates too subversive a concept for their weird government ?

Having said that , i think there is more of a tradition of ripping Hollywood off in Asia , especially in India . In India they will re shoot scene for scene & throw in a few song & dances - et voila! - Bollywood .

That which does not Kill me makes me Stranger . . .

[–] albertam 16 years ago

Some music are also from Gladiator.

[–] henninghaeder 16 years ago

yup - from 'the battle' on the Gladiator OST...

Kinda ruined that movie for me cause it lost its credibility as a piece of art

[–] luck_ie 16 years ago

and the last samurai....generally everything from Hans Zimmer.

[–] wuzsubi 16 years ago

Yep I noticed Pirates of the Caribbean and Gladiator for sure.

[–] UberNoodle 16 years ago

Many people confuse "ripping off" from just an similarity of style. I doubt the music is note for note copied or even intentionally emulating anything. And I would wager that many of the melodies are just standard progressions often used in such music. Anyone who has actually taken the time to compose music knows all too well that it is very very easy to stumble accross music that someone else has already written; in fact it happens regularly just like artists in the same school of painting will come to similar stylistic decisions.

[–] Bonzai-Boy 15 years ago

Duuuude, the music is EXACTLY like it! It'd be ok if it was just one theme (like the POTC ghost theme in POTC1, which was used during the fight scene in Warlords), but this movie used THREE SEPARATE THEMES all done by Hans Zimmer!!

Here's a list of the music plagiarized in that fight scene ALONE:
1. POTC ghost theme (as mentioned before; track 9 on the POTC1 Soundtrack)
2. POTC main theme (last track on the POTC1 soundtrack)
3. The Gladiator theme (I think it was track 9 on the Gladiator soundtrack.)

Hah hah sorry, I'm a huuuuuuuuuge music junkie. But yeah, you can't excuse such BLATANT plagiarism! There IS NO DOUBT that it's note for note copied, then altered to make it "original". Sure someone could argue that the composer is trying to go after Hans Zimmer's "style" (not like it's that original anyway, since he used the same sounding themes for two separate movies), but c'mon! That's too much :P It's like the movie version of Green Day's Boulevard Of Broken Dreams to Oasis' Wonderwall (hah hah)

So yeah. It's a rip-off plain and simple.

[–] turtleh 15 years ago

Just off the top of my head I can think of a few movies that have done the same on some kind of level, either in the film or with trailers etc.

Lotr
Matrix
Black Hawk Down (not sure about this one)

Shouldn't detract too much from the films acting and story however.

[–] t-a-hall 14 years ago

When I heard the various themes, I thought it must be scored by Hans Zimmer, since he often steals sections from his previous scores, often note for note with the same instruments (Of course he can copy himself as much as he likes).

On looking at the credits on imdb, I was surprised by two things. Firstly that it wasn't Hans Zimmer, and secondly that it was Chan Kwong Wing. I thought his soundtrack for Infernal Affairs was excellent, so I wouldn't have expected a half-hearted copy of a Hans Zimmer theme.

[–] the_dark_spectre_lives 14 years ago

Was there an original soundtrack and a western soundtrack?

Ong Bak for example, interesting rock (?) style soundtrack to the original release, French version changes it to american hip-hop. Which totally kills the fight scenes in my opinion.

[–] Torrible_2013 15 years ago

I noticed it. Seems a little strange. It'd be better had they picked a less popular theme. Ip Man and Red Cliff have very excellent soundtrack but Warlords edges both of them slightly in terms of both cinematic flair and plot.

Tribute to Bruce Lee's Master Ip Man
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a7SV3XMAdyk&fmt=18

[–] 15 years ago

[deleted]

[–] giaou13 14 years ago

It trully was Gladiator's OST all over the place...

THE WORLD IS YOURS

[–] kevdor 14 years ago

whate a shame, especially since Americans hardly ever copy any foreign themes or movies... *cough cough*

------------------
I see dumb people everywhere, and sometimes, they don't even know they're dumb!

[–] betelgeuse-5 14 years ago

Everything by Hans Zimmer sounds the same, ergo Gladiator vs. Pirates of the Caribbean (well, Klaus Badelt *was* his apprentice, sort of) etc.

Also, I don't know if anyone here watches Dr Who, but the last few seasons also have this upbeat da-na-na-nah da-na-na-nah da-na-na-na-na-nah kinda theme.

Sucks.

[–] BabyFarkMcGeeZax 14 years ago

I absolutely noticed the "tweaked" POTC and Galdiator themes during the big battle sequence (which is the reason I visited this board--to see if anyone else did). The melodies were too identical to be mere artistic coincidence. If anything, they just played the melodies in an off or different key to disguise them... slightly.

I also noticed hints of the music from The Last Samurai, and no, I'm not just talking about general Asian-music sounds. But this was far less blatant than the POTC and Gladiator themes, enough that I could give The Warlords the benefit of the doubt here.

I have an ear for music, and the POTC and Gladiator soundtracks happen to be two of my favorites. I know them inside and out. The makers of The Warlords lifted themes from these movies for sure, no doubt about it. The disappointing part is this lowered the overall production quality of The Warlords for me. It otherwise had good moments.

[–] Sei09 14 years ago

I think it was Beethoven (or one of the other Classical Era composers) who said "All of music is plagiarism." When you think about it, it's pretty much true.

Other than that, I'm in this boat too. Not that I'm condoning plagiarism, mind you. I just think if you're going to do it so blatantly that you should do a better job than this.

I've seen the strings score for PoTC and there's about 4 bars from the main theme's melody that get repeated over and over and over for what I'd estimate to be at least 2 lines. What the composer basically did was eliminate all the other instruments (winds brass, horns, bass, cello, etc) and kept just the strings part, then proceeded to rehash it. This allowed the theme to be really noticeable, but caused it to lack the grand sort of "punch" of the PoTC original (IMHO).

[–] Falconeer 14 years ago

You do realize that this is not the original soundtrack. For US release they stripped this film of it's chinese soundtrack and added this new soundtrack. (They also lopped off about 20 minutes of film!) So i would not be at all surprised if they used music from "Pirates of the Carribean." It shows how much respect hollywood has for world cinema.

[–] yatgohoyan 13 years ago

If you ask me, I think a lot of films these days have very similar music to both Batman Begins and The Dark Knight.

Agreed with the POTC and Gladiator take offs in this movie though

[–] alexmoviefreak 8 years ago

Yep, I noticed that too.
I thought: wait a second. I know the music from somewhere!
And because I recently rewatched Pirates of the Caribbean I knew that it's from there.