# Music makes most movies worse, not better **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 12, 2017, 9:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987 "2017-03-12T09:32:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![stillownedbysetters](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/41988e/32.png) [@stillownedbysetters](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stillownedbysetters)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2017, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/21 "2017-03-12T23:53:08Z")
From my family apocrypha, it appears music could make or break the silent movie experience. As a young bride living in Fargo, ND, my grandmother was hired to play piano at the local silent movie theatre. She left when she became pregnant, not intending to return, but when attendance fell off precipitously after the silent films became truly silent, the proprietor came to her, hat in hand, begging her to return. She did, attendance rose, happily ever after, etc. She continued to play until the silents became the talkies. (Off topic, I know, but a great story I had to share) ---
**Author:** ![snfaulkner](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snfaulkner/32/433_2.png) [@snfaulkner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snfaulkner)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2017, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/22 "2017-03-13T01:30:39Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > This! It’s almost tautological! Nearly anything will work in a movie…if you do it right. > > Unsteadicam? Soft focus? Mixed-up chronological order of scenes? Modern black-and-white? Extreme gore and violence? Extreme sentimentalism? > > All of these can be brilliant…or crap. > > FWIW, I love a good score! The soundtrack from The Last of the Mohicans is a joy to listen to, simply as music, or in the film itself, highlighting scenes. It adds greatly to the overall quality of the movie. This. 90% of everything is crap. But when done right, and everything comes together, then you get true masterpieces. ---
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2017, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/23 "2017-03-13T02:39:09Z")
> [@Joey\_P](#): > > What I’m getting from the OP is that great movies have great music and that bad movies have bad music, but in turn, great movies tend to have great budgets and the opposite also tends to be true. I’m not saying that exactly. There is a correlation, sure, but _great_ music is very hard to write, and most great movies don’t have great music. For all the praise _La La Land_ earned, I heard very little praise for the music itself. Had I liked the songs, I may have tipped over into like from dislike. OK, I’m disobeying my own preemptive strike here, but I didn’t want someone doing a drive-by and saying, “The music in _The Phantom of the Opera_ movie was great!” But great music is difficult to do whether it’s a musical or a film score. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2017, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/24 "2017-03-13T02:42:58Z")
> [@Ukulele\_Ike](#): > > Yeah…Hermann, Korngold, Waxman, Steiner, et al didn’t come cheap. > > Thanks for bringing up _The Third Man_! Anton Karas’s zither score was the cherry on top of that scrumptious sundae. Also the chocolate sprinkles. Not for nothing but my grandparents had a zither playing at their wedding. Whether it played as a constant score under the entire ceremony ala The Third Man, I don’t know. However, that does bring up something interesting. Noir films are unique and defiantly follow their own set of rules, but I don’t think that I know of another movie that had the balls to play (for the most part) the theme throughout the entire movie. Even if it’s the motif for the movie, they usually just come back to it a few times. The theme music, on the zither, was played nearly throughout the movie. FTR, while it is one of my favorite movies, I haven’t seen it in a while, so forgive me if anything I said isn’t totally correct. Also, if you like ‘odd’ movies like this, I encourage you to watch Peter Lorre films, he was a master of that kind of stuff (see: Arsenic and Old Lace, another Cary Grant film, who I could go on and on about). ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2017, 3:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/25 "2017-03-13T03:10:38Z")
The best movie music supports the story, and doesn’t hang around to fill up space. It should manipulate how you feel, but not tell you what to think. It can direct your attention, misdirect your attention, but shouldn’t obscure information. It can describe a character, but should not be a character\*. You shouldn’t notice it’s there, or not there, but afterwards you should be humming it, and when you hear the piece out of context it should remind you of that scene. \*_A lot of filmmakers might disagree on that one, judging by some movies I’ve seen_. ---
**Author:** ![Dale\_Sams](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/779978/32.png) [@Dale\_Sams](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dale_Sams)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2017, 6:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/26 "2017-03-13T06:34:25Z")
All I have to add is the last score I can recall being able to hum is Return of the King, and the motif from NuTrek. Don’t know if Morricones reused deleted cues from The Thing into Hateful Eight should count. ---
**Author:** ![PatrickLondon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/patricklondon/32/4422_2.png) [@PatrickLondon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatrickLondon)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2017, 7:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/27 "2017-03-13T07:05:43Z")
> [@Aeschines](#): > > Is this a bit like the loss of the IMDb message boards? What happened? I’d imagine the BBC decided that paying for people to moderate the usual sort of online squabbles that often had only tangential relevance to their programmes and issues wasn’t core business, which is fair enough. They do have other routes for comments/complaints/suggestions. ---
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2017, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/28 "2017-03-13T14:19:04Z")
> [@Channing\_Idaho\_Banks](#): > > I think with the OP is trying to say is that choice of Music can date a movie to a particular area. I’m guessing that sometimes this could be a good thing. Sometimes you get _Ladyhawke_ which is (to me) unwatchable with that Alan Parson’s 80s synth soundtrack. Good lord. I suppose in the 80s it wasn’t as bad since it was at least contemporary to its time but now it’s pseudo-feudal Europe plus 80s electric keyboard playing. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2017, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/29 "2017-03-13T14:51:54Z")
Martin Scorsese’s \*The Last Waltz \*was improved by the soundtrack. ---
**Author:** ![WordMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e8c25b/32.png) [@WordMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WordMan)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2017, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/30 "2017-03-13T14:58:48Z")
I never liked the **Vangelis**'80’s synth music for the period piece **Chariots of Fire**. Now watching the famous beach run scene is especially jarring to me because the music is dated, but in a completely different way than the movie is historical. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2017, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/31 "2017-03-13T18:22:34Z")
Do-do-do-do-do MONTAGE!!! ---
**Author:** ![Eonwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eonwe/32/240_2.png) [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2017, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/32 "2017-03-13T20:07:09Z")
My #1 movie gripe is soundtracks that are too full. I’m a musician, and I love movies and movie music, but too many (most) contemporary movies have too much music. Too much underscoring. Let’s have some silence; just dialogue and environment. ---
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2017, 1:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/33 "2017-03-14T01:31:38Z")
> [@Eonwe](#): > > My #1 movie gripe is soundtracks that are too full. I’m a musician, and I love movies and movie music, but too many (most) contemporary movies have too much music. Too much underscoring. Let’s have some silence; just dialogue and environment. Yes, exactly. ---
**Author:** ![Philliam](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/philliam/32/3011_2.png) [@Philliam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Philliam)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2017, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/34 "2017-03-14T02:14:09Z")
Music makes most movies worse, not better Not if it’s _Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon_ or _Mononoke Hime_. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2017, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/35 "2017-03-14T02:24:55Z")
We can all name examples of great movies with great music. But can the OP or anyone else name even a single great movie without music? If music were really, on the whole, detrimental, then there should be plenty of them. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2017, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/36 "2017-03-14T02:42:24Z")
> [@Eonwe](#): > > My #1 movie gripe is soundtracks that are too full. I’m a musician, and I love movies and movie music, but too many (most) contemporary movies have too much music. Too much underscoring. Let’s have some silence; just dialogue and environment. Some movies do it well. The movie Garden State, with it’s eclectic soundtrack of trip-hop, adult alternative singer songwriter and indie songs hand picked by Zach Braff fit in seamlessly with the film. OTOH, many films just come across as a string of music videos and many of the songs themselves have almost become tropes. Like the audience can’t tell it’s an emotionally powerful and uplifting scene unless Coldplay’s Fix You or The Fray’s Just Let Me Go is playing in the background. ---
**Author:** ![Defensive\_Indifference](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/defensive_indifference/32/6502_2.png) [@Defensive\_Indifference](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Defensive_Indifference)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2017, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/37 "2017-03-14T02:47:16Z")
Didn’t “Paths of Glory” have no score, except some songs sung by the soldiers themselves? It’s been ages since I saw it. ETA: in response to Chronos . ---
**Author:** ![femmejean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/0ea827/32.png) [@femmejean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/femmejean)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2017, 9:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/38 "2017-03-14T09:43:05Z")
I think IMHO, music was the only thing that made the ending of United 93 ‘epic’. I’m putting epic in single quotes not because it was a good ending but rather John Powell’s song captured the suspense perfectly. I honestly don’t think I’ve ever come across an ending like that before. So going by the OP, without that music, it would have been relatively bland [United 93 - “The End” by John Powell](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-VjlGlc1Gs) ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2017, 10:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/39 "2017-03-14T10:40:34Z")
My pet peeve is _podcasts_ with obtrusive background music. It usually comes off as saying something like: “Attention – prepare to feel sad about something I am about to say!!” ---
**Author:** ![N9IWP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/n9iwp/32/3154_2.png) [@N9IWP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/N9IWP)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2017, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987/40 "2017-03-14T17:25:40Z")
I don’t know, half the fun of Highlander or Flash Gordon is the Queen music. (arguably the best part of FG…) Brian [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/music-makes-most-movies-worse-not-better/781987.md?page=3)