‘Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl’ to have strong Inverness connection when new Aardman movie hits BBC on Christmas Day and Netflix elsewhere in the world
Stop motion animation legends Wallace & Gromit’s latest on-screen antics will have an Inverness connection this Christmas - thanks to Highland composer Lorne Balfe.
For the Grammy winning and BAFTA nominated composer, who comes from Inverness, has written the score for the plasticine pair’s new movie ‘Vengeance Most Fowl’ which will be hitting BBC 1 on Christmas Day and airing in the rest of the world on Netflix.
The 48-year-old is well known for his Hollywood film scores, having written the music for numerous big screen blockbusters - from The Lego Batman Movie, and the two most recent Mission: Impossible films (as well as next year's entry in the franchise), to Bad Boys: Ride of Die, and Dungeons & Dragons: Honour Among Thieves.
It also not his first foray into the world of Wallace & Gromit, having composed some of the additional music on Hans Zimmer's score for The Curse of the Were-Rabbit.
But the chance to write the new music for one of the animated world’s most famous pairs, is one he is particularly excited about.
Speaking in an interview to The Scotsman, he said: “I'm a massive fan and they’re quintessentially British. It's something that I think every generation relates to, whether it's grandparents or children. So that's why you want to do these projects, because they hit so many people's hearts”.
Although he is recording new music for the film, fans of the franchise’s iconic themes from composer Julian Notts can also rest assured that they will be present and correct too.
“It's honouring the past. It's very much bringing those old themes back. The films all have that element of the old-school film noir, Hitchcock and the northern brass band feeling”.
The new movie serves as a sequel to classic Oscar-winning Wallace & Gromit entry, The Wrong Trousers, with that story’s villain - Feathers McGraw - newly-released from ‘prison’ (the zoo) and out for revenge.
But if you want to find out more you’ll need to watch Wallace and his faithful pooch in action on Christmas Day, as Mr Balfe is keeping quiet about the specifics of his score - for fear of spoiling any of the magic ahead of time.
