It’s time for that inevitable moment in every suspense/thriller film score: the final confrontation cue! In addition to the requisite hair-raising effects, this cue presents several of the film’s themes in a musical “getting the gang together” moment. (For example, the main theme becomes a creepy call-and-response between two solo violins.)

As usual, you can tell from the music when the bad guy gets his just deserts. (Or does he? See the movie to find out!) We conclude with some of the overprotective grandmother’s piano melody, hinting that maybe she wasn’t so paranoid after all.

This piece is about getting under your skin and causing disquiet, rather than something you leave the theater humming. In the corresponding scene from Secrets Beneath the Floorboards, our heroine’s sister has been taken hostage. The mood is, understandably, tense.

Instrumentation-wise, I combined organic-sounding timbres (violins) with electronic ones (the “growing” analog synth). To me this evoked the mood of a hostage situation — something alien intruding on something natural.

This week’s selection from Secrets Beneath the Floorboards is a pulsing electronic rhythm to accompany the snooping of a white-hat hacker.

I treated this cue as its own musical moment, distinct from the themes and motifs that pop up throughout the score. This kind of synthesizer smorgasbord is especially fun to write, since the potential palette of sounds is so vast and colorful.

This week’s score track from Secrets Beneath the Floorboards accompanies a classic “heroine ferreting out increasingly dire secrets” scene. These moments often involve lead actors peering at computer monitors with growing concern, presenting an opportunity for music to amp up the energy.

This being a big “a-ha!” moment in the story, it’s the first time we hear the score’s main theme in full. Previously, said theme peeped up in the form of a four-note ascending motive, sometimes leading into other melodies. (Here’s the theme’s more rustic cousin earlier in the film.) Elaborated here, a piano repeats and transforms that four-note sequence, turning it into a proper melody.

This week’s music selection from Secrets Beneath the Floorboards accompanies a moment near the start of the film, where our heroine is attending the funeral of her abusive husband. Though her mental state is fairly dark, she’s surrounded by supportive people. (Well, supportive people and a nosy cop; this is a thriller, after all.) I thus made the score lean towards being empathetic, as if it were also a loved one providing comfort.