Jumper (soundtrack)

The musical score to Jumper was composed by John Powell, who previously worked with Doug Liman on The Bourne Identity (2002) and Mr. & Mrs. Smith (2005). The score was recorded predominantly in Sydney and sparsely in California for the mixing. The score was conducted by Brett Weymark and performed by the Sydney Symphony Orchestra. The album was released through Lakeshore Records on February 12, 2008.^[1]

William Ruhlmann of AllMusic wrote "there must not be too many moments for the audience to catch its breath in Jumper, since Powell's short cues usually sound like they are accompanying frenetic action. The soundtrack comes off as efficient, if unimaginative."^[2] Thomas Simpson of Soundtrack.Net wrote "works with the film, but not on its own. But that's not to say Powell doesn't have more tricks up his sleeves with forthcoming scores. We all have bad days and produce work that isn't always top-notch, in this case, this is Powell's feel."^[3]

Filmtracks wrote "For writing one of the best jazzy themes you'll ever hear in an unexpected place in cinema, Powell achieves a three star rating, but the rest of it screams of a large crew attempting way too hard to give the score a unique sound without regard to the bigger picture."^[4] Jonathan Broxton of Movie Music UK wrote "Jumper is certainly not one of Powell's best scores – it's not even his best score of 2008 – but it still is worth checking out, especially for Bourne fans."^[5] Thomas Glorieux of Maintitles wrote "Jumper's nothing remotely spectacular. But it can entertain my thirst for about its duration. Sadly, the game version received a more memorable score instead (of Chris Tilton by the way). Just so you know."^[6]

ReadJunk.com-based critic "As far as the score is concerned, I'm kind of disappointed in it because I thought it would have been more thematic like the Bourne scores or something. The Jumper score was fairly quiet and not that exciting. It seemed more like background noise than anything. Towards the end it got a little more exciting but as a whole, I wouldn't want to listen to this again. I just wish John Powell did this score differently. Maybe I'll like this once I see Jumper?"^[7] Manohla Dargis of The New York Times and Brian Lowry of Variety being "bombastic" and "action-packed".^[8][9]

Credits adapted from liner notes:^[10]