It was exceptionally memorable for at least one reason not related to music.
The movies were successful, so I don’t know if they count, but I would suggest Jesuschrist Superstar and The Blues Brothers.
This themefrom *Dragonheart * (“To the Stars”), is probably better remembered than the movie itself, partially due to its use in many, many trailers.
Children of Men does this for me, for both the original score (by John Tavener — the modern composer, not his Renaissance doppelgänger), and for the songs (including unusual Beatles and Stones covers). I’m not sure it does for others, though.
While I can understand why the soundtrack was a success, and the movie may have dated to the usage of radio stations, I still love it, and regard it as one of the great cult classics of 80s, along with Real Genius and Heathers.
Judgement night, for a bit of rap/funk metal soundtrack from a pretty bad movie, with the Teenage Fanclub and De La Soul being a great highlight.
Tank Girl. The movie is lousy but the sound track offers a good helping of mid nineties alt-rock.
Last Action Hero was released in 1993 and the soundtrack album was certified platinum in August of 1993.
New tracks by AC\DC and Megadeth? headbang emoticon
we should really have a headbang emoticon.
and when did they go from being emoticons to “emojees” anyway?
but I digress.
I’ve never seen this film – but then, not a lot of people outside Russia have, either. The music from it was supposedly incredibly popular, and is still requested on the radio today, although the movie came out in 1936.
It’s the Russian adaptation of Jules Verne’s novel The Children of Captain Grant*, and the music was written by Isaak Dunayevsky, and is now probably better known in Russia than the movie, from all accounts.
- In the US there was a version of this released in 1962 by Disney under the title In Search of the Castaways. It starred Maurice Chevalier and Hayley Mills. It was the second and last Verne adaptation by Disney. It had music by the Sherman brothers (who did a lot of still-famous music for Disney, including Mary Poppins and the theme vfor the Disney TV show, but nobody remembers their music for this film. You’d think that there would be more Disney/Verne collaborations. The two seemed to be made for each other. But, despite this film being a hit, they decided not to do any others for some reason.
Westside Story. The flick was great, but I wore out the vinyl record soundtrack.
Last of the Mohicans suffers from that as well. Although the film is still awesome.
Hatari!
I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles) by The Proclaimers has lasted long after Benny & Joon.
Sunshine on Leith was released in 1988, five years before Benny & Joon. That was an example of a movie using an existing popular song. Not that that would make it wrong or off-topic for the thread or anything. Just sayin’.
Bing Crosby’s White Christmas is actually from a film “Holiday Inn”, which most people have probably never heard of, much less seen.
The soundtrack for the George Clooney film “O Brother Where are Thou?” is probably better known than the film, especially “I am a man of constant sorrow”.
At the time, I read that the soundtrack was the best-selling bluegrass/country album in… years? Maybe in history?
My kids, who only liked hard rock (Sabbath, AC/DC, “Zep’lin”) loved O Brother Where Art Thou!
ACDC’s album Who Made Who is the soundtrack for the Stephen King Film Maximum Overdrive. While it was a compilation, a few new tracks (including the Top 40 hit title song) were recorded, and older forgotten tracks were rediscovered/rescued from previous forgotten albums.