as I sit here killing even more time at work…
whats the best movie soundtrack you’ve ever heard? I’m not talking about those trash soundtracks that are just full of those songs that are popular at the moment, what movie soundtrack genually has good music on it that will be good for years to come?
I believe its the soundtrack from “Last of the Mohicians” – that soundtrack is simply perfect. I cant put it any more clearly. Every time I listen to it I am simply moved to speechlessness. If you haven’t ever listened to this CD, and you are a fan of “classical” music. Get it, you wont be sorry.
I like the classic Ennio Morricone stuff; A Fistful of Dollars, The Good, the Bad & the Ugly, Once Upon a Time in the West; plus a few lesser known soundtracks of his, particularly Navaho Joe, a lesser known Burt Reynolds vehicle of the early 70s, Once Upon a Time in America and The Untouchables which is just begging to be used in a Super Bowl one of these years.
Also the work of Howard Shore, particularly his work for David Cronenberg for The Fly, (purely operatic in my view) and Dead Ringers.
Bernard Herrmann’s final work for Taxi Driver is appropriately scary.
Carter Burwell’s score for the Coen Brothers’ Miller’s Crossing.
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (although it does have the obligatory bad Asian pop song at the end.)
Anima Mundi
Powisquatsi (That’s not even close to the right spelling)
Rob Roy
Glory
Conan the Barbarian
Last of the Mohicians (as previosuly mentioned)
Gladiator (Some great stuff by Dead Can Dance’s Lisa Gerrard)
1492
Baraka
A Fistfull of Dollars (Or any Eastwood/Morricone score. This is my fave, though)
The Truman Show
Passion (Peter Gabriel’s soundtrack to Last Temptation of Christ, and hands-down, bar-none, no-questions-about-it the best soundtrack ever recorded.)
Passion Sources (Companion to aforementioned Passion, containing the music that inspired Gabriel)
Last of the Mohicians (as previously noted)
Amistad
For more pop-oriented soundtracks,
Straight to Hell (A little known western, featuring music by The Pogues and Joe Strummer)
Magnolia (mostly original Aimee Mann songs)
High Fidelity
Grosse Point Blank (Vintage '80s stuff, much better soundtrack than the rather bland Wedding Singer)
O Brother Where Art Thou? (Bluegrass/folk, simply astonishing)
The Big Lebowski
Pulp Fiction (although the dialogue from the movie starts to grate)
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (Oddly, the movie dialogue in this one never gets old)
Especially the Hitchcock scores. Especially North by Northwest (dig that crazy fandango), Vertigo, and Psycho.
The Devil and Dan’l Webster, Citizen Kane, and The Day the Earth Stood Still aren’t far behind. All these stand up to listening to apart from the movies they enhance.
After you acquire all his film score CDs, try his “serious” music…especially the Symphony, the String Quartet, and the Clarinet Quintet. He seems to only have written one of each.
Danny Elfman is pretty good. My favorite soundtrack from him is Beetlejuice.
Jerry Goldsmith is good. The Omen is his best, I think.
As is Hans Zimmer. The Lion King and Rain Man are my favorites. My favorite on the Rain Man soundtrack (and the reason why I got it) is for the score called “Las Vegas” which is the music playing when Charlie and Raymond enter Las Vegas. Rain Man is a mixture of songs and scores composed by Zimmer.
And of course, John Williams. He has numerous great works.
Playing God soundtrack is very good.
So are The Matrix and City of Angels. Although those might be a bit mainstream for the folks around here. I have the Rob Roy and The Big Lebowski soundtracks . . . I concur they are good.
Oh, yeah, the Empire Records and Pump Up The Volume soundtracks are pretty good if you get nostalgic for the early nineties.
I’m partial to scores by Michael Nyman and Zbigniew Preisner. Preisner! That man can do no wrong…
‘Popular song’ soundtracks I like - Trainspotting
The Matrix
Twister
In the Name of the Father
Platoon
Stand By Me
Dirty Dancing (and More Dirty Dancing!) Grease
Xanadu
erm…
And if it’s not too much of a hijack, I’ll add Northern Exposure as one of the best TV series soundtracks I’ve heard.
I am a BIG Jerry Goldsmith fan. “The Omen” is one of his best (won an Oscar for it.) “L.A. Confidential” is pretty damned good, and, believe it or not, “The Mummy” (the first Brendan Fraser film, not the one out now) is damned good. Also, “Alien”, “Patton”, “The Ghost and the Darkness” and “The Shadow” are all fabulous. Though, I guess the 1985 (?) Nick Nolte film “Under Fire” is my absolute favorite. Great contribution by Pat Metheny on guitar. It just came back in print on CD too - before it was about $100 for a CD, it was that rare and that sought-after. It has this great blend of sythesizer and a South American sound. This is an absolute wonderful, brilliant soundtrack. (And Goldsmith was robbed of the Oscar for it!!!)
I also admire Bernard Herrmann and Ennio Morricone. (Has anyone else heard the score to “Burn” by Morricone? This has got to be the weirdest score ever!) And I do love all of Herrmann’s stuff/ “Farenheit 451” is fabulous, and also “The Day the Earth Stood Still”.
Of course, I really like John Williams (some of his more obscure stuff - if you ever hear “The Missouri Breaks” it will blow your mind). And Patrick Doyle, Hans Zimmer, Thomas Newman, and SO many others!
To weigh in on one more… I haven’t heard the whole soundtrack for this, but the main theme music used in this movie was Samuel Barber’s Adagio For Strings, which is a truly excellent piece of 20th century classical music – one of my favorites. This piece alone would make the whole thing worthwhile, regardless of what else was on it.
I consider my taste in soundtracks to be nothing if not ecclectic. Consider, in no particular order:
*Star Wars
American Beauty
The Sting
The Sopranos: Peppers and Eggs
Risky Business *(which I listen to only after skipping track 1)
*Grease
High Fidelity
The Godfather
*
