Combining traditional string-driven film scoring with electronic textures and embellishments, Hans Zimmer’s score for Paperhouse inhabits a murky atmosphere occasionally lightened by tingly surges and feathery sweeps.  Much of the score operates in muted tones, with an edge of discomfort to the subdued arrangements, and the Terminator-like stabs of flared synthesizers in the later half (an ~18-minute suite titled “Me and My Daughter, We Get On Like a House on Fire!”) do an effective job of overturning the sedateness. 

That second half also ups the creepiness of the background sounds, but while it does a good job of building the mood, the arrangements feel somewhat underformed, as though Zimmer had captured some programmed interactions he found interesting and made a piece primarily for the sake of threading them in somewhere.  The main theme is striking, however, particularly in its revisited form (with added electronic guitar), and while the score as a whole feels a bit meandering, the little pieces of which it’s made up are well-crafted.

Here’s the alternate cover art.