“Give me 45 minutes!”: How Edgar Wright managed to improve ‘Top Gun: Maverick’ thanks to his melomania

Don’t say music, say Edgar Wright. In addition to camera work and —especially— electrifying and study-worthy editing, the filmography of the British filmmaker is full of memorable moments enriched by a soundtrack chosen with care and great success; and we only have to remember the zombie assault on Winchester to the rhythm of Queen in Shaun of the Dead to see a first sample of it.

Enriching the danger zone

Five fiction feature films later, this is nothing new, but what is surprising is that the melomania of Poole has been reflected in that blockbuster cathedral that turned cinemas upside down in 2022 under the title of ‘Top Gun: Maverick’. A bomb that between setpiece and setpiece he takes his time to build his characters with great care.

Sometimes, apart from dialogues, actions and interactions with other characters, few things describe a character better than music, and a good example of this is in the ‘Maverick’ scene in which Hangman confronts Rooster after the decide first play Foghat’s smash hit ‘Slow Ride’ at full volume; a choice that came out of Wright’s top hat.

This is how he explained in The Hollywood Reporter how own Christopher McQuarrie asked him for help to solve the musical dilemma.

“I didn’t have any more notes on ‘Top Gun: Maverick’. I first saw it in 2020. Chris McQuarrie and Tom Cruise showed it to me, and it was mostly the movie that was released, minus the Lady Gaga song. Foghat, they needed a song. The dream message I got was from Chris McQuarrie saying, ‘Hey, we need a new song for the bar scene in ‘Top Gun: Maverick.’ Can you think of something that…? something like, ‘Oh! Give me 45 minutes! I think I still have a playlist on Spotify, it was ‘Maverick Bar’. This stuff amuses me.”

You know; if you are ever short of new music to bring to your ears, exist few better places to make discoveries that Edgar Wright’s Spotify account with its endless playlists.