In the special "Holiday Movie Preview" issue of Entertainment Weekly (with Johnny Depp as Sweeney Todd on the cover), the magazine examines the new turn director Paul Thomas Anderson has taken with his latest film, There Will Be Blood, particularly with its score by Jonny Greenwood (due out on Nonesuch December 18). The two creators give EW the scoop on the story behind the music for the film, which stars Daniel Day-Lewis as a merciless early 20th-century oil tycoon:

"Sometimes Paul would describe it as close to the horror genre,'' says Greenwood, who set aside his rock guitar for string quartets, piano trios, and an 80-piece orchestra.  'We talked about how The Shining had lots of Penderecki in it. We figured the instruments should be contemporary to the turn of the last century, but not period music. Even though you know the sounds you're hearing are coming from very old technology, you can do things with the classical orchestra that unsettle you, that are slightly wrong, that have some kind of slightly sinister undercurrent.'' Anderson adds: ''I guess when you have a title like that, the music better be a little bit scary.''

Anderson speaks highly of his first-time collaboration with Greenwood: ''It's really thrilling just to hear different sounds coming out of a film you've made,'' he tells EW. ''I worked with ... people I've never worked with before. It's nerve-racking and exciting and ... you have to be more polite."

To read the complete article, visit ew.com.

For more on the soundtrack, click here.