Patrick Doyle is a very good composer. His score for Kenneth Branagh’s 1989 adaptation of Henry V is one of my favorite soundtracks. A film like that, however, should be used as Exhibit A to show why he’s the wrong person to score a Harry Potter movie. It’s not that his music for Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire is necessarily bad, it’s just not up to snuff. Granted, it’s very hard to reach a bar that’s been set by John Williams, but the first three movies give a pretty good blueprint of not only what the score should sound like, but at the very least the types of musical cues used for different types of scenes. Instead, Doyle throws all of Williams work in the first three films out the window (except for a smattering of “Hedwig’s Theme” lasting approximately ten seconds), creating a score that is, while pleasant enough in parts, totally inappropriate for the subject matter. The best example is track 16 titled “Hogwarts March,” music he’s composed sounding inexplicably like it was written for an Oktoberfest celebration.

This soundtrack was Patrick Doyle’s big chance to come out from the shadows of being “only” an independent film music composer and join the big boys like Williams, Danny Elfman and James Newton Howard. Instead, he falls flat on his face by trying to move forward while completely ignoring the past.