A glance at the 2026 Oscar nominations and the 2025 best soundtrack charts across the most authoritative outlets reveals, in vivid relief, the coexistence of the generation of Masters (Alexandre Desplat with Frankenstein, Hans Zimmer with F1, Max Richter with Hamnet, Michael Giacchino with The Fantastic Four: First Steps) alongside the Young Lions in their 30s and 40s (Daniel Lopatin with Marty Supreme, Bobby Krlic with Eddington and Anemone, Jerskin Fendrix with Bugonia). And then there is him, the New Prodigy: an Oscar winner with Black Panther in 2019, Oppenheimer in 2024, and Sinners in 2026. He also composed the score for Odyssey. In other words, Mozart storming Vienna in 1781, the premiere of The Rite of Spring on May 29, 1913, the release of Revolver in 1966: seminal musical events that fundamentally rewrote the DNA of sound as it was known until then. He is, of course, Ludwig Göransson, a 42-year-old Swede who nevertheless fits right into the Young Lions cohort.
Each composer, among both the Masters and the Young Lions, possesses their own distinct voice, musical heritage, and auteur signature: grouping them into two camps is certainly a simplification and a constraint, yet it serves to outline a foundational divide.
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On one side: conservatory degrees, rigorous symphonic architecture, and scores that act as faithful, luminous handmaidens to the moving image (with Zimmer slightly departing from this model, being self-taught and an heir to 1960s Krautrock). On the other – with Göransson as the sole exception, holding a degree from the Royal College of Music in Stockholm – composers whose musical instincts were forged primarily in the crucible of underground experimentalism. This yields a radically different approach to film scoring: not merely in production methods (orchestral arrangements are rarely deployed, largely supplanted by digital tools and software), but above all in purpose. The score is no longer a sophisticated commentary; it operates as an equal partner to the visuals, emerging alongside the images to shape their meaning and direction as deeply as possible.
This prelude maps out the two opposing gravitational fields currently reshaping film music. While none of the aforementioned composers will present work at this year’s Venice Film Festival, world-class musicians are nonetheless prominently featured, neatly reflecting these two grand lineages.
Below are several highlights in the Competition lineup that promise exceptional musical intrigue:
Andrea Pallaoro’s The Echo Chamber features a score by Clément Ducol. Alongside the fascination surrounding the film’s origins – based on an unproduced screenplay by Bernardo Bertolucci – comes immense curiosity for its music: Ducol is the co-winner of the 2025 Academy Award for Best Original Song (El mal in Emilia Pérez).
Among the Masters, Alberto Iglesias stands unchallenged. His music, charged with tension and psychological shifts, has served as the sonic backbone of Pedro Almodóvar’s cinema for the past two decades. In a notable first, Iglesias has scored the Competition entry by Nanni Moretti, who had previously relied almost exclusively on Franco Piersanti and Nicola Piovani.
Given the film’s premise and the pedigree of their collaboration, expectations run high for Werner Herzog’s Bucking Fastard, scored by Ernst Reijseger. A classical cellist steeped in avant-garde experimental practice, Reijseger has spent over twenty years providing extraordinary timbral and emotional textures to the German auteur’s visionary landscapes.
Daniel Pemberton composes the score for Danny Boyle’s opening film, Ink. Following his breakthrough work on the two Spider-Verse films and his Oscar nomination for The Trial of the Chicago 7, anticipation is naturally peaking. Pemberton ranks among the purest, most inventive musical talents on the contemporary scene; each of his scores stems from a bold conceptual core that dictates the sonic architecture across the entire film.
Finally, Shinya Tsukamoto’s Mr. Nelson, Did You Kill People? demands attention. Chu Ishikawa’s iconic scores for the Tetsuo franchise, with their brutal collision of industrial frenzy and percussive violence, set a benchmark for independent cinema. Following Ishikawa’s passing in 2017, Tsukamoto turned to ermhoi, a Japanese-Irish artist who weaves melancholic, introspective moods with the fluid, electronic textures of the Soft Machine.
