Don McKay (Original Motion Picture Score)

Writer/director Jake Goldberger weaves tragic romance, murder and a raft of small-town mysteries into an effective updating of screw-tightening Hitchcockian suspense. Yet composer Steve Bramson works masterfully against the expectations that too often dominate that genre, instead using insights gleaned from his two-generation-deep musical roots to construct a quiet, yet subtly unsettling musical score that’s much more than mere dramatic punctuation. Indeed, so evocative is Bramson’s restless musical soundtrack that it functions more like a haunting, unseen character in the film’s dramatic arc. It’s also a virtual primer on the power of musical restraint in scoring — languorous, instrumentally spare, yet persistently challenging, with a tireless, inventive ear towards textural experimentation.