I just finished watching Scarface for the very first time, have to start off by saying that I really liked it. I just found that so many scenes were really hard to bear due to the extremely bad 80s soundtrack by Giorgo Moroder. Maybe it was supposed to be contemporary or something, but I found it really jarring in contrast to the otherwise timeless nature of the film. Why is it that we can accept period costumes and hairstyles, but the music can sometimes stop you from immersing yourself in the movie’s world? (I realise that it might be hard to do Eight Mile or something without Hip Hop music, but I know that going in.)
Anyway, my question is: what are some other examples of otherwise fine movies that are ruined by their soundtrack?
Cave of Forgotten Dreams comes to mind. Beautiful paintings on the walls of a deathly silent cave, and Werner Herzog scores it with screetching, dissonant violins. A documentary about feral cats would have been better served by the “music” chosen.
Ladyhawke - awesome medievally movie, nearly ruined by the cheesy bombastic 80’s synthesizer music. If they rereleased this with a nice orchestral soundtrack, I’d buy it in a heartbeat.
Robert Aldrich could make movies that were both interesting and trashily enjoyable; chief among them Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?. But he often hired lightweight Frank (“Brady Bunch” theme) DeVol to score them. Aldrich was no Hitchcock, but DeVol was no Bernard Hermann by a microscopically lesser degree.
Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid is much better now that you can skip that stupid Raindrops song.
“The Great Escape” is a wonderful movie almost ruined by its soundtrack theme. It’s played over & over & over and I’m noticing the music not the movie.
This may seem like blasphemy but I have this criticism about the LOTR music scores (and I think they are brilliant, brillaint) - couldn’t they have eased up and let the audience figure out how to respond to a scene without the music telling us what to feel EVERY SECOND.
What I’m about to say is blasphemous in a whole other way, but the LOTR music works almost like the orchestra in a Wagner opera. Many times it’s very obvious, but sometimes the Leitmotifs are so subtle you won’t catch up on them unless you really pay attention.
Two examples: There is the “Reclamation of Nature” theme, played in the scene where Gandalf talks to the bug on top of Orthanc, the March of the Ents on Isengard and the Charge of the Rohirrim on Pellennor Fields. These scenes don’t really have anything to do with each other, but their common idea is that nature (the bug, the Ents, the horses) fights back.
Another scene in the beginning of Fellowship has Gandalf saying: “There was one who knew [the Ring was in the Shire].” Then you hear the Gollum theme, almost as a commentary on Gandalf’s line.
I could go on for hours, but I can also see what you’re saying. I just feel that the in-your-faceness of the music really adds to my enjoyment of LOTR.
ETA: BTW, well he’s back, is your username a LOTR reference?
I’m probably alone in this, but I feel John Williams orchestral scores are all wrong for science fiction flicks like Star Wars. His anachronistic 18th Century compositional style seems to clash with future Century stories.
That’s why they were so revolutionary - it just hadn’t been done before, or at least not for a very long time. (Also, the composers he “borrowed” from are more like late 19th/early 20th century). At its core, Star Wars is a timeless fairy tale, and “timeless music” goes best with that. What’s your alternative? Use whatever electronic/experimental music is popular at the time? That’s how you wind up with Scarface…
I loved the music he chose for Cave of Forgotten Dreams. I think it completely set the mood. On the DVD I had, there was an hour-long feature on the music, and I was enthralled with that as well.
Yep. This is one of the Great Fantasy Films, IMO, but the soundtrack is excruciating. I opened this thread half-thinking I’d mention this movie, and half-thinking there was no way it wouldn’t have already been mentioned.
A long time in cinema years, maybe, but Bernard Herrman et al were writing symphonic scores like that in the 1940’s and 50’s.
I had a techno-pop LP for a group whose name I can’t remember which had a cut that I thought perfectly worked for the opening Star Wars sequence. I used to turn off the movie sound and turn up the LP to show people (musicians, no less) how much better it fit, and most agreed with me.
Sorry, the soundtrack is, possibly, even more iconic now than the film itself. And, even when it was first released (I know, I date myself,) we whistled the musical theme all the way home.
(As an aside, I, too, absolutely loathe Raindrops; still, most people would say that it added to the movie IMO)
KarlGauss - the funny thing is, I like the Great Escape score and theme. I just think it (the main theme) was overdone during the film itself. now, I’m humming it.
Pitchmeister - I see what you mean, and it’s wonderful. In fact in one of the behind the scenes thingies Howard Shore & Peter Jackson say that they want the different themes to be identified with the different characters and places, peoples, etc, to help newbies to LOTR follow along. This is all great. It’s just that they are also always telegraphing what I should be feeling, and they do that a teeny bit too much. (yes, the name is a LOTR reference)
There Will Be Blood. The soundtrack just seems really out of place. And overbearing.
I’m a big Radiohead fan, but it seems like Greenwood never watched the movie.
The Transformers: The Movie - the 1986 animated one, not that piece of shit with Shia TheBeef. The soundtrack is all 80s hair metal. And not just 80s hair metal, obscure no-name 80s hair metal. Completely hilarious.
The Phantom of the Opera. Not the Andrew lloyd Webber version, but the silent one. Aside from performances I’ve attended with live organ music or a live orchestra, this film never seems to get a decent score. I was going to prepare one myself, when I heard that Rick Wakeman was recording one. Wakeman’s piece Judas Iscariot, on Rick Wakeman’s Criminal Record was one of the pieces I was going to use – it sounds like the work of a psychotic organist.
So I saw his version. It was awful.
Actually, the score on the two-disc archival DVD is pretty good – the only good recorded score for this film I’ve come across.
